Walt Disney World Goofy Challenge Training Week 11: Paying the Bill
So last week I talked about getting back to it and I happy to announce this week was fun and I found the training fun and great! However, it got me thinking about a time when I did not get back into it and I wanted to share the story. So this is a bit different,. I do not meant to scare anyone out of running, but I hope this post you learn to have a safer run. That is the way it should be.
The reason I stressed about not slipping, is I did this going into the 2005 Marine Corps marathon. During my training, I had missed a few runs, and I got 16 miles in one weekend. The next week I was sick, and just told myself 16 is enough, and I really blew off the rest of my training. I did not get back to it, and I learned the very hard lesson of:
pay during training or pay during the marathon.
So I went into the run, and I cratered right around mile 20. Mile 20 is when the lack of training, proper nutrition, proper hydration all came to a head in a perfect storm. I finished but I was hurting pretty bad. As I was going through going through the food line, bagels, Gatorade, water, bananas….etc. I found a place and I tried to eat.. That is right I tried to eat. I could not eat and barely sip the water I had. I thought I was just tired, and decided to sit and rest for a minute. I sat down, and started to cool down and felt a little bit better.
I still could not eat, so I decided to stand up and walk around a bit to try to keep loose. When I stood up my vision started to tunnel and I got real foggy and hazy. Lucky for me a Marine volunteer was nearby and I told him I did not feel right. They had me sit down while they took my blood pressure. I remember them telling me it was really low and they had my lie down. My blood pressure seemed to get better, and they had me sit-up but the tunnel vision came back, and they had me lie back down.
This is when they informed me I was going to get a free ambulance ride, I was dehydrated. and remembered thinking wow, did I really mess up. I was a little nervous, as they wheeled me into the back of the ambulance and I met Ann who would by emt on the 10 minute ride to the hospital. Ann was fantastic, and as I was laying there she was going through the litany of questions, height, age, weight…etc. Then she got to my favorite question here is my transcript
-
- Ann: Do you hurt anywhere?
- Me: Lady, I just got done running a marathon, and I hurt everywhere!
- Ann: Okay, smart aleck, aside from marathon pain do you hurt anywhere?
- Me: No, I am fine.
As you could imagine, I was extremely thankful to have the wonderful volunteers and staff to make sure I made it back home safely. As I was reflecting back, I realized I had not trained hard enough, and that more than any other reason was why I cratered. It also got me more in tune with my body and listen to the signals, it also told me I have to train for my next one, and my wife sent me an interesting article about some of the risks:
Marathon runners suffer temporary heart damage
So train hard and train smart, here is this weeks schedule:
Monday |
Cross Train/ LowerBody |
Tuesday |
5 |
Wednesday |
10 |
Thursday |
5 Hills |
Friday |
REST REST REST |
Saturday |
Core/Upper Body Lifting |
Sunday |
20 |
Still have 2% left to be Goofy!