There’s so much to tell you!

I should have blogged while I was in Germany so I wouldn’t be about ready to *pop* will stuff to tell you but I played instead and had tons of fun!  We’ll spend a few posts trying to recapture everything that happened over the past week while I was in Germany.

First thing I need to mention is when I left for Germany I was completely exhausted and a tad under the weather.  The dark o’clock runs had been hard on me and I was paying for all of the middle of the night long runs.  They’re tough and they mess up my internal clock.

33 days before the race, I had been diagnosed with pneumonia.

One week before race day I was in the Emergency Room with a kidney stone.

Two days before the race I ended up with a terrible yeast infection (TMI) from the antibiotics they gave me to help with the kidney stone.

I was definitely not 100%.

The night before the race I figured out how many hours sleep I could get before my alarm.  I’m sure I’m not the only person around who does that?  My internal clock was set for that much sleep.

My alarm went off race day morning and I hopped out of bed.  I had been deep in sleep!  I was surprised at how deeply I had been asleep because normally I just don’t crash like that so close to the time the alarm is set to go off!  I showered, got dressed and was going to head down to the lobby for breakfast.

A quick glance at my watch said, 2:45am.  What!?!  I thought maybe the battery in my watch had died so I grabbed my phone to check.  Nope. 2:45am.  That was odd!

I was so fuzzy from being sleepy it took me too long to figure out that #1 Daughter had called me from Colorado to wish me luck for the race!  I had hung up on her!!!  The alarm hadn’t gone off.  I felt awful!!!

After attempting to reach #1 Daughter, we ended up texting and getting a giggle out of it.

Regardless, I was up and ready to run about 6 hrs before it was time to race.  Ugh.

Finally grabbed some breakfast and met up with a UK friend and we walked to the race together.

 

We got somebody to take our pic in front of the Brandenburg Gate before heading to the corral..and he got me with the bunny ears. LOL!!!

The corrals were packed and the porta potty lines LONG.  I stood in line and then joined the mass of runners pre-race.  There was the usual party atmosphere associated with big races.  It’s always such a fun time!!!

I heard them introducing the Elites.  I heard the countdown and then we all started cheering because the race had started!

The air was electric!!!

By the time I crossed the starting line, the Elites were almost to the 20K mark.  They are so fast!  Staggers the mind.  It really does!

I crossed the timing mats, hit the start button on my Garmin and away I went!

Now, the directions from my coach were actually pretty easy.  Run the first 10K in Heart Rate (HR) zone 2.  Up until 32K, zone 3 and the last 10K, zone 4.

No problem, right?

Wrong.

From my very first step in the race, I was dizzy and off balance. That was weird.  I don’t know if it was from being so tired, the infection, jet lag or what but I had never felt like this before!  That and my HR was already in the zone 4!  I wasn’t supposed to be there until the last 10K!!!

I tried everything.  I fueled and hydrated well.  I slowed my pace to bring my HR down.  Nothing worked.

Something was off and my mind was desperately trying to figure out what to do about it.

Around the 20K mark, I met up with this sweet man.  He was from Trinidad and he was there to check something off his #bucketlist.  He had decided to run a marathon when he turned 60.  Well, he was 60 and he got into the race and there he was.

He was struggling.

I slowed and started chatting with him.  Soon we were like old buddies and I decided that this guy was going to finish this race.  Bless his heart, he was having such a tough time!  We ran together up until the 32K flag.  I had told him that I was supposed to turn on the gas at that point.  He said he would stick with me as long as he could when we reached that point.

The 32K flag was there and I gunned it.  He stuck with it as long as he could and we wished each other well.  Sure hope he finished!

As soon as the man from Trinidad and I parted, a nice man from Poland fell into step along side me and he informed me we were running this thing in together.  Misery loves company so why not, right?  That’s exactly what we did!  We ran the last 10K together and chatted.  We encouraged each other to keep going because let’s face it, the last 10K of a marathon is NOT giggles and grins.

 

I still don’t know what was up with being dizzy.  That was with me the entire race.  My HR stayed higher than it was supposed to almost the entire race, BUT~

I Finished!!!

 

 

#IRun4Aiden

 

#teamZensah

 

#AbbottWMM

 

#MSBlueCrew   Discount code: MBM17MH

 

#areyourenegade

 

#oisellevolee