Recovery

It's been a week since I experienced the marathon - one long week of recovery. It has been one week of resting, stretching, icing the legs and elevating them. I particularly had problems with my left foot. The day following the marathon I could not move because of a terribly sharp pain on the underside of my left foot. But after a week of showing it some TLC it looked and felt like it was getting better. That is until I went for a run yesterday morning. There was no problem during the run. It was afterwards that the pain started up again. The good news is it wasn't near as bad as it was last week: the bad news is I might have to hold off running for awhile, give the foot more time to recover.  I won't make any decisions until I try another easy run on Thursday.

The past one week has also been a time of assessing my performance at that Marathon. What worked, what didn't and why did it go so spectacularly awry after the first fifteen miles? Those questions have got me reading up and researching a lot of stuff.   My room looks like the study of a crazed scientist or something. Books and magazines strewn everywhere with my laptop permanently on running websites. Anyway, I found some very interesting answers which I intend to use for my next marathon in spring so watch this space. 

My First Marathon...

Just over sixteen weeks ago when I started training for my first marathon, my goal was simple – to get round the course and finish the race. Time was not an issue. But by the time I got to the start of the Dublin marathon I felt like I could do it in four hours or just under four hours. That became my goal and my race strategy was designed to achieve just that. Unfortunately, like I found out yesterday marathons can have a mind of their own.
I started the race well and for the first fifteen miles it all went according to plan, then it all started to unravel. At mile fifteen my legs just gave up on me. I just couldn’t go on. Nothing I did could get them going. The legs just wouldn’t move. For the next five miles I resorted to a combination of walking and running (running? More like a funny shuffle on dead legs). I got out all my mantras, consumed copious amounts of sports drink, water and energy gels. Still – nothing. During those five miles all thoughts of running a sub-4hr time were drained away. All I wanted at that point was to finish. I got scared I was not going to finish. I had to make up mind – I am going to finish this race even if I have to crawl across the finish line!
Amazingly, at mile 20 my legs came back to life. I started running steadily again. By mile 24 it was all looking good then I got hit with cramps. By now I’m thinking, what on earth is going on today? But I was not going to be denied so I kept going slowly – walking and doing the shuffle again until I crossed the finish line in what was by now a torrential downpour.
I had done it! – finish my first marathon.
Will I do it again? Run another marathon? Hell, yes!!