The race

A friend of mine once said that the best part about expeditions is preparing for and returning from them. I so know this to be right that I might as well write it on my t-shirt or smth.

So. Remember i said that I put in 12 hours of sleep from friday to saturday? Well ... saturday evening just before the marathon I went to bed at nine thirty and managed to sleep at 1. Woke up at 02:50 and started getting ready. Left the house at 03:30 and found a smart cabbie that dropped us just behind Fullerton hotel. I was meeting Yap, Shumei and Kiak at 04:45 at the cenotaph and we were there at ... 03:50. Good, good*! :)) Stretched, used the toilet like a gazillion of times, kissed Marian goodbye and went for the finish line. [Warning!! Somehow yucky tales coming up]

I ran with Kiak for about 13 clicks or so, but when I took a sip of water I had the mother of all cramps from hell, so I slowed down a bit and lost Kiak. Yap caught up with me but when I spotted a toilet I ran for it... Yup. What was the worse that could happen? Period cramps!! Yey! Even though I was prepared for it, I was kinda hoping that maybe this time my horrendous luck wouldn't show its face!!! Well ... IT DID!!! Normally when this happens i like to lay down, eat and read, in silence. But not yesterday ... I ran the first 14 km in 1 hr 15 minutes, so I was actually contemplating a finish in under 4 hours, but no no no no no ... Every time I would drink something, or even worse, have a power gel, I would have to stop for the loo .... I had to struggle to see if the water point had any toilet. If it did, I would drink, if it didn't... too bad ... About km 30 or so I realized that pushing down the elastic of my tights so as not to be on my stomach helped a lot, so afterwards it was better.

But ... I was reaching the end of my fuel line, and by km 34 I felt my muscles starting to contract... Maybe this is what pre-cramping feels like. Anyhow, I had seen that the other runners put deep heating muscle rub on their calves ** so I did that. After km 35 or so, I started yelling to the guys that were walking, "Come on!" and "We're there!" and "Let's go!".My favorite one was "We're kenyans!", and "I see giraffes!" (even though only an old guy got it) and I did that a lot too. It got quite a few of them running if I do say so myself (after the finish line one guy came and shook my hand, gush!).

Things I saw during the race:
- a lot of supporters
- one guy had a sign on his back saying: "PEACE, NOT BUSH" (lovely)
- a lot of caucasians with signs, t-shirts or even a flag of their home country - next year I'm doing that too!!!
- one old guy who was at his 43th (OMG!) marathon

Pains and aches:
- relatively painless, roughly the same as after the 30 km run (tomorrow I'm back training for Aconcagua, man!)
- the only thing that really hurts is my left foot, whenever I put my weight on it. Why, oh why!?!?

* when i was little my grandparents were afraid that we would loose the bus (in the country) or that there won't be any train tickets (we bought them directly from the station) that they used to get me to the station about 2 - 3 hours before. I would sit there and play, run around etc. Taking a breather where the trip starts is still one of my favorite rituals before leaving for a trip.

** ahem. Initially I thought that the deep heating muscle rub was anti-abrasion cream :))) [talk about what people fear the most :))] so i put it on my inner thighs ... :)) it never got absorbed :)). I smart.

All in all, a good first marathon. I learned a lot. Looking forward to the next one.

Update: Final results are out (and yes, i spent all day refreshing the results page, thank you very much): 1063 place (wohoo!! 8641 behind me), 123rd woman (1181 behind - so few ladies?!), 52nd in my age and sex division. And ... ahem
"Opposite Sex
For the record, you were ahead of about 89% of male finishers."

Girl power!!