Befor heading to the starting line, we went to Charity Village, where we would be meeting with Team World Vision to take a group picture and say a prayer and hang out for a few minutes before the race.
We also got to meet a man who was turning 50 that day and raising 50,000 for Team World Vision by running 50 miles. He had started running at 1:45am and ran 23.8 miles to meet us at the tent and then continued on to the marathon with us and ran that also. Crazy--but awesome, and so inspiring.
Right after our prayer we broke up into pace groups and began walking with them to the starting line--I wasn't prepared to leave Landon that early and started to freak out a little, thinking that I would have to finish a marathon before I could see him again, but I pulled it together and met up with 2 women running about my pace as we headed to the starting line. One of the things they prayed for us before we left was for peace that day during the race, no matter what, and God so granted that prayer, beginning with the women I met who had run the marathon before and knew what they were doing and let me hang out with them.
After stripping off the sweats and standing at the start line in 32 degree weather for a while, it was finally time for the race to begin! Because of how far back I was I got a little slower start than I anticipated just because it was SO packed, but eventually was able to pick the pace up. And, before we even got 30 seconds in to the marathon, I lost the pace group, because they blended in to the crowd and put their signs down--which is so weird because one of my biggest worries about the marathon was whether or not I'd be able to keep up with the pace group, because I thought I wouldn't be able to run it on my own without dying at the end. So, I guess the answer is...no, haha! I didn't keep up with them for even a minute! :) It was all good though.
I ended up running with the 2 TWV women for the first 15 miles or so which was nice because they were running at my pace and good company. The weather was beautiful (we warmed up once we started running), the course was pretty and packed with fans and fun things to see and things were going well. The only issue was that the girls I was running with walked the water stations, which cost us a few minutes and then one of them had to use the bathroom at mile 9 or so, so we stopped to wait for her (which in hindsight I should not have done, but we had this camaraderie thing going on and I felt like I should wait). Because of that though, at mile 13, we were on pace for a 5 hour finish, and not 445, so I started to freak out a little and picked up the pace.
Then, at mile 15 I lost them (which panicked me for a minute, but ended up being a good thing). I ended up just running my race the last 11.2 miles--I got very focused on my pace and keeping it at exactly what I needed, because I refused to get over a 5 hour time. The last 8 miles or so I ended up running with a girl named Audrey who was going for under 5 hours too, which was nice. We talked some, which helped pass the miles, and pushed each other to keep going. Those last few miles were definitely tough, especially miles 19-23 or so, but I was SO focused on my pace and holding it at what I needed (I only had a 5 minute margin of error for the last 13.1 miles, since we were 10 minutes off our pace by the time I lost the 2 women I was running with), that I refused to acknowledge how tired I was, which looking back I know helped me to keep going and probably was what kept both Landon and I from ever really hitting the dreaded wall.
I pretty much just refused to get over a 5 hour time, because in our training I never ran at over a 5 hour pace and I had told everyone what my goal was and didn't want to have to face them--or myself--if I didn't get that goal. And I kept remembering Landon telling me I had a lot of grit when it came to races and my dad telling me about his friend who had a goal of getting under 5 hours and didn't make it--and I didn't want to be that person. And, I knew that Landon would make his goal, and so I wanted us to be able to celebrate together.
And then, around mile 24, I knew I was going to make it under 5 hours because we had something like 27 or 28 minutes to run 2.2 miles in and I knew I was going to pick it up for mile 26, so life was good! Audrey and I were talking about our families and then we rounded a corner in the middle of mile 24 and someone had their radios out and was blasting the song "Sweet Caroline" and she started laughing and said that was her husbands favorite song. So we ran past then, singing Sweet Caroline as we ran through the crowds, smiling and laughing. That was probably the most fun moment of the marathon--aside from crossing the finish line, of course!!--because we were almost done, about to make our goal, still able to talk and sing to a fun song and I felt like I was running with a friend, which was cool, even though I'm sure I'll never see her again. We ran past a group of girls while we were singing and she looked at us like we were crazy and said "You look so happy. You're smiling--why are you smiling??" We both laughed and said "because we're almost done!"
Soon after that we were at mile 25 and then rounding the turn for mile 26, no longer talking or singing because we were trying to push it coming up, especially on the uphill we had at the end of mile 26. Then, before I knew it, I was making the last turn, the finish line was .1 miles away and then I hear someone calling my name and see Landon in the stands--which made it all the more perfect! I ran across the finish line, crossed and smiled for the camera, and it still was surreal that it was over. That I had finished a marathon, something I'd wanted to do ever since I was in middle school, but honestly never thought I'd be able to do. It was awesome.
And then, it was suddenly VERY painful, haha. By far the worst pain of the entire marathon experience was about 20 seconds after it was over--all of a sudden the bottoms of my feet felt like I was walking on knives and my legs were all locked up and not wanting to work and I was freezing. It was horrible--I had to walk about a half mile to get back to the World Vision tent where I was hoping Landon was, and it was during that half mile that I had to fight back the tears and tell myself "you can do this, Aja...one foot in front of the other, keep going...". It was crazy--I never thought it would be after the marathon that I'd have to talk myself into not stopping and taking a break. Crazy. :)
When I finally made it back to Landon and saw him in front of the tent and we got to tell each other our times and I heard him say he got a 3:59:09, which is AWESOME, I almost started crying. It was a really emotional moment for me, for us to both have finished and finished feeling strong and at the time we wanted, after the journey of training for the last 9 months of training together. It was awesome.
Then, we walked into the TWV tent, where they announced our names and said thank you for running for TWV, which was neat (and made me get all emotional again, because I was so glad we had decided to run with them) and said down to talk about the race and eat some BBQ they had for us, which was again, so nice.
As we were eating, I told Landon my story and he told me his.He left the TWV tent about 10 minutes before me, with 3 or 4 guys running his pace from TWV, but lost them at the starting line, while we were all waiting to start running. Unlike me, he managed to stick right with the pace group, and was actually in front of them most (if not all) of the race. Where he was was the opposite of where I was in terms of starting pace, because the crowd was actually pushing to go faster, since they were at the very start of the open corral. A few miles in, he found another group of TWV guys and ran with them for a little while, but they weren't consistent with their pace, so after a little while he left them and was running on his own--thank goodness we had our Garmin watches!!
Unlike mine, his pace was amazingly consistent throughout the entire race, which shouldn't surprise me because he was able to do that during training too, but it still awesome. He found a way to run through the drink stations and kept on pace the whole way, meeting up with some people and running with them for a bit, but pretty much running his race.
Both of us were amazed at how much 2 things helped during the race--the landmarks we were told to look for like the male cheerleaders in Boystown at mile 8, the 3 TWV cheer stations,the GU station at mile 18, the Nike Power Mile at mile 23, Chinatown at mile 21. Even though some of these things weren't as cool as anticipated, just the anticipation of getting there was enough. The second thing was the comaraderie we felt on the course with the 1200 other TWV people we were constantly seeing out on the course--people would say hi, cheer you on, wish you luck, yell your name. It doesn't seem like a big deal, but it really made us feel like we were part of a team, which, for 2 people from Houston who didn't know anyone at the race besides each other, helped A LOT.
He didn't ever hit a wall (I'm still saying because we're both just so stuborn and were so determined to make our time goal...or maybe just because he's so awesome :) ), but miles 20-24 or so were the hard ones. Then, around mile 25, he started looking for that last turn, where we turn right and head up a hill that takes you to the last left turn to the finish line.
As he was rounding the last corner to run the last .1 miles to the finish line, a girl cut the corner and hit his leg and tripped and fell. Even though he was within seconds of making his time goal, he turned around, pulled her up and they both kept running--what a gentleman. :) And, he still made it across the finish line in under 4 hours. I am SO proud of him!! It totally made my day when he told me what his time was.
He had about an hour to kill before I crossed the finish line, so he walked (with the same pain as I described earlier!) back to the tent, talked to both of our dads and then went to wait for me at the finish line, which I didn't know he'd be able to do and was such a neat surprise.
After eating and talking and warming up (a little--I'm pretty sure I was still shivering at that point though), we walked over to Buckingham fountain to look around and take a couple of pictures...it was SO pretty.
From there we headed over to the Mile 27 area and bought our finisher shirts (we had to buy our own!) and then began the walk home, which thankfully was not too far--but seemed like forever at that moment, ha! What made it better though was about halfway there, inside a really nice hotel, was a Starbucks that we stopped at. We got a warm drink and a snack and sat down in some comfortable chairs for a good half hour before we could convince ourselves to get up again. It felt so good to sit down and warm up and then, after I was warm, I had the energy to call my family! :) It was so fun telling them all about our morning.
The rest of the afternoon we just rested in the hotel room--in a strange turn of events, my insomniac husband was able to take a nice long nap, and I couldn't manage to fall asleep for even a minute. I don't know if it was the pain I was in or the caffiene I had or what, but, as exhausted as I was, I couldn't fal asleep. It was miserable.Finally, when Landon woke up a few hours later, I gave up any hope of sleep and we got dressed and went out to celebrate finishing the marathon with some famous Chicago style deep dish stuffed pizza at Giordino's. It was SO yummy and it was a fun night out with my husband. If you're ever in Chicago, I'd definitely reccomend going there!
And let me tell you, with the weight of the marathon off our shoulders, our bellies full of pizza and the satisfaction of working hard for a goal and meeting it still fresh on our minds, we slept good that night. It was literally a perfect day; I couldn't have asked for a better marathon experience.
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