I'm Running The Boston Marathon!

Well, not 'The' Boston Marathon that you are thinking about, it is the Boston 'Mini' Marathon in Boston, Ga on October 25. They will have a half marathon, 5K, and one mile fun run. I will be signing up to do the half marathon. I did this race last year. The course is an out and back, which I like a lot. That way I know exactly where I am and how far behind (or in front) I am. The course is on open roads but it is so far out in the country that Google Maps couldn't even find it. It is a very flat run. The scenery is hay fields and cow pastures. Did I mention it is out in the country?

Jay says she is going down to the race with me. I'm very excited that she is coming to cheer me on but boy is it going to be a long 2 hours for her to wait on me to finish. There is not much for her to do besides read a book. Now I understand that there will be a parade and chili cook off but I'm not sure what time all the excitement starts. Last year they had a DJ at the start/finish line. It provide atmosphere and helped bring you in at the end of the race because he was so loud that you could hear it from a half of mile away.

Last year I ran most of the race with a guy from my church. He had one of those nice GPS watches so I stayed with him and it was nice to know my pace. My finish time last year was 1:55:50. This year I think I will run by myself with an ipod. I plan on doing a 4:1 run/walk ratio. I would like to finish in a time under one hour and fifty minutes. I'm a bit nervous about the race because I haven't been running as much as I did last year at this time my two longest runs this month will be 9 & 11 miles. Both of which I did this week. However this race is not my 'A' race but I would still like to beat my time from last year.

I feel like I can do at least better by five minutes because I had some really really bad digestion issues. You see what had happen was... I didn't exactly 'Carbo Load' the night before the race. I thought, "Hey I'm a pro. I can eat what I want and I'll be fine."

Yeah Right! You see I had long runs ranging from 15 to 20 miles so this would be easy. So, being the newbie that I am I went and got some Chinese Food the night before the race. And it was good. I went to bed about a normal time. The next morning I didn't wake up in time to get breakfast so I stopped by one of my favorite place, Chick-fia-a and got a Fried Chicken Biscuit and a sweet tea. As you can guess I was looking for the Port-O-Pots as soon as I got to the race. I need to 'Carbo Unload' and I needed to do it in a hurry!

I thought everything was good until I lined up to start the race and I had some 'unfinished business' to take care of. But the race was starting. So I stayed and hoped for the best. And I was good up until mile 8 or 9. Then there wasn't much more I could do. There were no port-o-potties around just wide open cow pastures. Great! I had to keep going till I found a small wooded area to where I could answer the call of nature. From now on my rule is that I race with TWO shirts, just incase. So I won't have to finish shirtless again.

This year I will have learned my lesson. My race tip is - Don't change anything on race day. Eat what works.



This is the only picture I could find from the race. The picture was taken right before the start. I am standing somewhere in the circle. And as you can see they did have enough bathrooms and they were conveniently located.