26.2 Miles. Done and Dusted

In December of 2019, I made probably one of the most significant decisions of my life (blogging 101 — start your piece with a cringeworthy cliche… Nailed it). I decided that I was going to run a marathon.

To put that in perspective, let me give you some background. I would say that I am somewhat athletic (subtle flex). I played college sports, so that has to account for something. BUT, I played college baseball, and I was a pitcher. For those unfamiliar with the physical duties of a pitcher, it requires next to no running and a different type of endurance. I “trot” out to the mound. Pick up the ball. Throw it a couple of times, and “trot” back into the dugout. That’s pretty much it. We would occasionally run postgame to clear lactic acid but realistically no more than a mile at the absolute most. So here I am. December 2019. Two years out of seriously training for baseball deciding I was going to make the jump to long-distance running. Nice.

So, why… Great question. I wanted to prove to myself that I could do it. I have no business running a marathon. The most I had run up until that point was 3 miles. I wanted to prove to myself that if I systematically attack a big goal, that I could achieve it. I knew that I would be able to do it physically. I wanted to break into the part of my brain that tells me to stop. “You don’t have to work out. Watch Gossip Girl for the 4th time…” Thus, I began my journey.

I got new running shoes, signed up for the San Diego Rock n Roll marathon, and started the Hal Higdon 18 week novice training program. I started just running a two-mile loop around the neighborhood in Los Angeles. Thank god it was in the city and I had to stop for traffic. Those first few weeks were brutal. I stopped to walk several times along the way. Consistently. But alas, kept at it. Day by day, it got better. Two miles turned into three and then 4. I went from running exactly zero times a week to four times a week, every week, for 18 weeks. My first long run was 6 miles. I mapped a beautiful little out-n-back course on the Santa Monica boardwalk and set off. Three miles in, I had reached the pier and started back. I was giving myself a short break, walking for a tenth of a mile before starting again when I began to do the math in my head. I was near peak heart rate, at 3.1 miles of a 6-mile run, which is less than ¼ the total distance of a marathon… “L.O.L., we got a long way to go, bud.”

Finishing that 6-mile run ended up being a turning point for me. I felt like I had accomplished something. It was the first barrier that I knocked down. The “Hey! I can do this!” feeling. Running long distances has never been easy for me. I was fast in short bursts, but I could never maintain throughout an endurance effort. Throughout the program, I was able to break through the mental barriers that told me to slow down or stop. It’s honestly terrifying what your body can do if you can turn off your mind and just do it. For me, it was easiest to turn my mind off by listening to podcasts or audiobooks. The podcasts and audiobooks forced my brain to be engaged. When I focused on the books and podcasts, I wasn’t thinking about how painful the run is. I also learned quite a bit from all the books and podcasts — a nice little bonus of learning and growing mentally on top of the physical benefits. I’ll break down all of the audiobook and podcast learnings in a separate blog post.

I would be lying if I said that the training didn’t hurt physically. This is probably not an earth-shattering realization, but running can suck. Like a lot… The first couple of weeks of the training, it was mostly the cardio that kicked my ass. Once I got the right running shoes, a lot of the little structural pains went away. I honestly felt pretty good that first couple of weeks. The body was fresh, and we were moving at a good pace. Midway through the training, we started to see some overuse injuries. The most bizarre being that my left foot would go entirely numb about midway through the runs. Nothing like feeling pins and needles every step you take at mile 6 of your 12-mile run! Luckily that particular issue subsided, but we weren’t out of the woods yet. The more I ran, the more I would find another body part disagreeing with my marathon goal. Nonetheless, we were still able to get the training in until we hit the “Hell Week” of the training program.

The 18-week training program comes to its peak about four weeks before the marathon. The typical schedule was short/speed runs Tuesday and Thursday, long mid-week run Wednesday, and long-run Saturday. My marathon “Hell Week” (pales in comparison to the actual Hell Week but you get the point) consisted of a 5-mile run Tuesday, 10-mile run Wednesday, 5-mile run Thursday, and a 20 mile run on Saturday. And then the wheels fell off literally and figuratively. About 3 miles into the 20-mile run, I was fighting off shooting pain down the entirety of my left leg, starting from my back to my ankle, double shin splints, and a right Achilles tendon that felt like a stretched-to-the-limit rubber band. Ouch. With a mixture of run and walk the rest of the way, we were able to get it done. The time wasn’t pretty, but we got the miles in, and that all that matters. That was one of my least favorite experiences in the marathon.

The next few days after “Hell Week” were some of the worst. I would get up every morning and have a nasty limp from the nerve pain that was still shooting down my left leg. Thanks to coronavirus, there was nothing I could do about it. I couldn’t see a P.T. cause well; they were all closed. Nothing I did helped with any of the pain. I started doing long yoga sessions a couple of times a day. While relaxing, it didn’t improve any of the symptoms I was having. So, my training ground to a halt. A mere three weeks before my marathon date, I was dead in the water.

Now is probably also a good point in the story to mention that the actual San Diego Rock n Roll marathon was canceled the week before “Hell Week” due to coronavirus. I had planned on a back-up marathon in Southern Utah the week after just in case (assuming that nobody lives in Utah, therefore no coronavirus, or so I thought) and after I finished my 20-mile long run, I came home to the news that the Utah Valley marathon was canceled. So here I was with 360 miles and 15 weeks of training under my belt with a decision to make.

I talked to my marathon coaches, and they all said similar things. At the time, we agreed that it was probably unnecessary for me to continue training for something that isn’t going to happen. I wasn’t able to walk normally, let alone run at all. It just didn’t make sense to keep going. So I put everything on pause.

Over the next two weeks, my body started to recover. I was able to kick the walking pain, and I was only affected when I put some type of physical strain on my lower half. I tried to stay as active as possible on the off chance that I might want to run the marathon. I swapped long runs out for long bike rides to eliminate the beating my lower half would take when pounding the pavement on foot. Even though in my head, it didn’t make sense to run a virtual marathon by myself, with no support, I never really gave up on the idea. Here’s where this whole marathon experience gets spiritual for me.

It only took two pages to get into the deep shit…

The whole idea behind this marathon goal was to prove that I can accomplish something if I systematically break it down into manageable chunks and attack each barrier head-on. The past couple of years, there has been this narrative in my head that I have fallen just short of a lot of my goals. I have felt like I have been on the very edge of success but just haven’t found a way to take those last couple of steps regardless of how hard they were.

In high school, my G.P.A. was .02 short of first honors. You and I both know that’s just a lack of effort. I played college baseball but only played a couple of innings. Ya, I had two surgeries on my throwing arm, but did I leave it all out there? I still haven’t graduated from college. I am 3 credits short. You get the point. Always on the edge of greatness or even just finishing what I started, and for some reason that’s a problem for me.

The thought of coming up just short again was eating away at me. I wasn’t sleeping well the weeks that I stopped training. Dreams and thoughts of being nothing short of a failure played like feature films in my head. Here I was again, being defined by coming up just short. Just not good enough…

Finally, I said, for lack of a better term, fuck that. I texted my buddy, who graciously let me use his house as a home base for my long run training and told him I was going to run the marathon that Saturday. I ran one mile on Tuesday as a test. It felt pretty good. A little bit of nerve pain but not a ton. I then gave it one more check on Wednesday and ran 3 miles. Again, I felt decent, not ideal. Still painful but doable. From there, I mentally prepared to turn those 4 miles into 26.2.

I’ll start this off by saying I do not recommend running 26.2 miles alone, with no support unless you want to lock yourself into a 4-hour cage match with, well, yourself.

I kicked off at 8:38 am on June 6th to find all of the answers to my life throughout the next four and a half hours. It was a beautiful day, which is great any other day of the week but not ideal when the sun is out without a cloud in the sky, and it’s already 75 degrees before you start your journey. The first couple of miles came and went without much of a hiccup. I was floating on adrenaline for most of the start of the run. Mile 3 turned into mile 9. I was knee-deep in my Joe Rogan podcast. I honestly couldn’t even tell you who the podcast guest was, but I know they were talking about the benefits of saunas and different types of diets. It had my brain occupied, and that was all that mattered.

At mile ten, I hit my first patch of unknown territory. The furthest I had run up until this point was 20 miles. During that run, I hit 10 miles and came back. This time I kept going even further up P.C.H. nearly reaching Long Beach (I started in Newport Beach). Luckily there was an assortment of water fountains in this neighborhood on the journey, Not that long after that, I hit 13.2 miles. I could sense it now. Halfway there. We have a shot at doing this…

I turned around and called my dad to give him the update. Airpods are amazing. “We are coming home.” The next four miles or so were light. I knew I was behind on my time goal, so I tried to keep up the pace a bit. As I started to come back to the familiar part of the track, the emotions began to pick back up. I could feel it. I was close. At precisely 17.6 miles, I started to tear up a little bit. I was proud that I was out there doing it. I was going to finish something from start to finish — no doubt about it.

At mile 17.6, I made the switch from a podcast to music. Typically I only do this in the last mile of a run, but I knew I needed an emotional lift. I threw on the Big Bootie 17 mix. A classic and a must-listen. The next 2.4 miles weren’t that bad. I had done them before, so it wasn’t anything new. But when I hit the Huntington Pier, I knew I still had six more miles to go. Fuck.

A buddy had told me that the last 6 miles are the hardest in any marathon. I believed him, but I didn’t realize how hard it would be. No matter what training program you choose, you don’t train for these last 6.2 miles. It was all new. At this point, I had used all of my adrenaline. My body was screaming. I had ripped open the skin underneath my armpits. Every swing of the arms was a nice little burn. It’s now past noon, and the sun was at its peak. I had one more carbohydrate gel, and then I was out. In short, a less than ideal situation.

I got through the first 3 of the last 6 miles with a variation of a walk and run. I was still able to run these mostly but had to walk for parts of the mile. With 2 miles to go, both of my AirPods went out. I was alone with my thoughts for the rest of the run. I continued with more of the same. I was completely out of gas at this point. The only thing that kept me going was the thought that my life would be more of the same if I quit. I was determined not to let it continue to be my destiny.

Last-mile. I guess I like to screw with myself. I decided that the last mile of my self-drawn marathon course was going to be uphill. I’m sure the thought process was, “you got to earn all 26.2 miles.” While a great thought, I was 100% sitting on the couch when I came up with that, not on the last mile of a marathon… There was no turning back now, so I started my fat ass up the hill.

I knew this last little hill was going to be the metaphor for the change that I was instilling in my life. The last little bit of any goal and any journey is going to be difficult. It might even be the most challenging part of the entire journey. But this time, I was going to continue to push through and get to my final destination. I was going to realize my goal.

These thoughts streamed through my head as I trudged up the hill, watching my watch every step. “Time 4 hours 36 miles. Distance 26 miles… “my watch started to say. Tears began to stream down my face. Eighteen weeks of hard work, 411 miles of pounding pavement, hundreds of hours spent just running, were all coming to a head.

I kicked the shit out of that last .2 miles. I turned it on and gave it everything I got. “Time 4 hours 38 minutes 5 seconds. Distance 26.2 miles. Average pace 10 minutes, 36 seconds.” Marathon; Done and Dusted.

I finished just before my buddy’s house and started to walk. I turned the corner to walk down the alley to see all of my friends waiting for me with a surprise finish line. I’m not going to lie to you, starting to run again just for that block, hurt, a lot. But I crossed that toilet paper finish line and welcomed the champagne shower. Kinda. That shit burned the chaffing pretty bad. It was truly a remarkable moment and one that I will never forget. To all of my friends who met me at the finish line. Thank you. That is a memory that I will cherish forever.

Ya, so what’s the moral of the story. Just do it. Just do it. Literally, just do it. You are only as strong as your mind will allow you to be. Push your limits. Rewrite your boundaries. Many people think that these endurance races are a test of the body. They are wrong. They are a test of your mind. Break down your barriers. Stop making excuses.

Everything that I learned from the marathon has carried over to other aspects of my life, from training discipline to pushing mental limits. It has genuinely helped reshape the way I look at my life. I took something that I hated, and I turned it into something I love. I urge all of you to find your marathon. Find something that pushes you outside your comfort zone into the depths of your mind. I think you will be pleasantly surprised at what you find.

Now to go put this 26.2 bumper sticker on my car….