How did I get to this point? In my youth I played many sports: football, soccer, golf, etc... I was a mediocre athlete at best; tall and skinny, 6', 145 lbs in high school. In college, I focused more on my social life. Later life brought me the joy of marriage, 4 children and a successful climb up the career ladder, I was enjoying life to it's fullest. Maybe a little too much. In 2008 our family decided to cut carbs in observance of lent. At the same time I stopped drinking soda, again, a recurring battle. At the end of the 40 days, I had lost 12 lbs., down from 210 to 198. I wasn't exercising, but with the weight loss I decided to get active . This was all happening right around my 39th birthday which got me thinking that I should set a personal improvement goal with my 40th birthday looming. So I decided to run a local marathon.
The Sarasota Marathon was scheduled for February 15, 2009. To begin my training I ran on the treadmill at the YMCA, 2 miles in 20 minutes was a good effort. At summers end I joined a coached running group which was training specifically for my goal marathon. I also started cross-training in the pool and on my bike to mix it up a little. This led me to enter a triathlon in the fall. And I immediately fell in love with the sport. I also competed in a 5 mile Turkey Trot with an encouraging 7:32 avg. pace. My goal for the marathon was a sub 4 hour finish, 9:09 avg. pace.
On the day of the marathon I was 179 lbs., down 31 lbs. in 10 months and was feeling good. My training, although not perfectly executed, had prepared me for the day. I had suffered from IT pain in both knees during training and recovered. The race morning schedule was going as planned, my son dropped me off and went to park and join the family on the course to cheer me on. I met up with my training group and tried to get mentally focused. My only mistake, and one that proved fatal, was that I didn't hit the port-a potty before the race began. The first half of my race went as planned and I was even a slightly ahead of goal pace. Then at mile 14 I had to use the bathroom, something that I never experienced during training. The port-a potty was disgusting and felt like a sauna. It seemed I was in there forever. This single event changed the rest of my race. By mile 17 I was experiencing cramps in my quads. With the help of my coach I was able to push through with only short pauses to stretch. But my pace had slowed significantly. By mile 23, I was only able to run in spurts before needing to stop to stretch the cramps out. I seriously thought I might not finish. I pushed through and crossed the finish line in 4:20:27. A respectable time but a disappointing result personally.
Over the next several years I concentrated my athletic efforts on triathlon, competing in 23 events to-date. Along the way I started to enjoy running again and competed in 33 individual events to-date and another 8 relay events, including 5 Ragnar events. In 2010 I won my age group in a Sprint triathlon. In 2011 I tied for the Masters points lead in my local running club racing series. Between 2011 and 2013 I qualified for the USAT National Age Group Championships in 9 consecutive events in which I competed. In December of 2013, I qualified for the 2015 Boston Marathon (I'll cover my BQ training and race in a separate post).
