Notes
Interesting day today at the Chicago Marathon; weather was 60 with on again/off again rain. Ended up wearing my Vapor Fly's which was only the 3rd time I've ever worn them and only had about 4 miles in them lol but it ended up being a good shoe.
This year was very different from years past. Up until this year, I've always had the urge to chase a certain time or had a particular goal in mind. However, life definitely was the craziest it has ever been this year as I was still trying to come back from being sick, along with the GA stuff, school, looking for coaching jobs, moving, and getting married. Taking out workouts of my routine was necessary for my mental sanity; and sadly getting sick after my honeymoon really cut into quality mileage/long runs so going into this race, I was just excited to be able to breath and avoid a performance like last year where I had my asthma attack at mile 18. For this reason, I purposely went out slow and wanted to even/negative split the race. I could go into a ton of detail but the truth is I was very happy and felt really good throughout the whole race. My mental state was great, I was letting the run come to me and kept the effort around that of a hard tempo and the miles were passing quickly. My nutrition was on point in the race and I was able to build and catch a ton of people between miles 13-22. Sadly, my hip flexor began to go around 18 and then both my hamstrings blew out at 22...same story it always is. Was forced to slow down to avoid being unable to run but I felt so good and honestly know that had that not happened I would have run around 2:36-2:37, which is realistically where I felt I am fitness-wise currently. Either way, it's ok. I finally feel like I've gotten my health back and I had a year of crazy transitions while still being able to stay in relatively good shape. This marathon served as a good transition in shaking the bad blood from last year. I'm very excited to have gotten through this crazy life transition healthy and am looking forward to recovering and having Johnny help me gear me up for some upcoming races. Finishing this marathon slower than I'd like but oddly more confident in myself lol. Highlight of the day was definitely seeing Kaytlin and my dad crush their marathons! I know the times we all ran weren't exactly what we wanted, but the effort was there and that's what made it special. Great experience, time to rest up and get ready for the next one!