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Who the hell does this shit?
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I did something today that I would normally think insane. You see, I figure the only reason anyone should run is if someone is chasing them. Today, however, I ran without a dog or large animal chasing me. I paid money to run in a race. Today was the Los Angeles Marathon.
I did not run that. I don't think I will be doing that any time soon, either. Now, they do have a 5k run that starts about an hour and a half after the marathon. I ran that. Ok, I walked for some of it, but not most of it. And running doesn't really describe it. It was more of a falling jog. You see, I woke up this morning with a terrible earache and sore throat. My back was killin' me. My girlfriend kept telling me it was a bad idea to run, but I had to do it. She's a runner. She likes to do these things. I trust her opinion on my running, but I wasn't going to let anyone keep me from this. I asked her how well she thought I'd do. She said it'd take me about an hour.
I wanted to do better than that, but given that I'm ill and all, I figure she's right. Not to mention, this is the first time I've ever decided to do anything like this. I normally just do a couple laps on a track and then call it a day if I'm doing that sort of thing at all. Well, I do my stretching and the next thing I know, the gun's going off and we're running. There were so many people at the beginning that we were forced to walk part of the starting. We started running shortly after that and I lost her. As I came around the first corner, I saw her mother and sister with signs telling us to keep going and what not. When I started coming in to the end of my 3 miles, I just started sprinting...that hurt. I felt like I was going to vomit again (I had already puked in the first mile). But, I just pushed through for the last 100 yards or so. Again, I saw her mother and sister cheering me on.
My finish time was rather impressive to me...and to my girlfriend. She finished at 37 minutes (something she's most unhappy with) and I was a mere 5 minutes (and a few seconds) after her; 42:58. Now, my body is recovering and hating me for putting it through that. My bad knee isn't feeling so bad, but my ankle is killing me. All my leg muscles are rather sore and I've got a pretty bad headache. My throat doesn't hurt as much, though. And my earache, pretty much non-existant. My back is another story.
Oh well, I think it's well worth it for me. I proved something to myself and to a few other people. I did something I didn't think was possible, and I know it wasn't possible about 4 months ago (when I first started seriously exercising). I am definitely doing this again. Perhaps next year, I'll do the bike tour (the marathon, but on a bike) since I've been cycling a lot lately.
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