Monday, October 25, 2010

You Know I Know How





Julia's Marathon Experience Part IV
So it's been a week. A full seven days since 26.2-and despite what Runner's World says: I feel fully recovered. I'm going to give you a run down of how my recovery week went though.




Immediate after the race: Collapsed in the grass aside the finish chute, I stood up and walked myself to the car. My mom drove me home, and walked me into my home. I stretched, not much-I should have done more. Showered. I watched a movie, and laid around until five. My husband took a three hour nap, and I gimped and paced around. Uneasy and uncomfortable, and unable to rest. I was tormented by my performance, and just by how things went. I desperately wanted to feel good about it-but I couldn't. I still don't. I'm embarrassed. Don't write me off, ok? I know it's ridiculous to feel this way, I finished I frickin' marathon-but I didn't do it the way I wanted to nor the way I deserved. I knew I not only could do better, but I DESERVED to do better. Not four hours had passed after crossing the finish line, I had already registered for another. It couldn't go down like that. I couldn't sit on this time, even though I swore I'd never do it again around mile 24.



Logan took me to Red Robbin that night, I totally maxed on the biggest burger of my life and bottomless steak fries. We talked about the race, he told me he was proud and I attempted to be happy about. After passing out for a few hours, I woke up at 3am scarfed down an oatmeal cream pie and sat up in bed just thinking about everything. I went through every step of training. I identified some mistakes and evaluated what I needed to do better for my next one.



The next day: I woke up after a long night of sleeping, and much to my surprise I wasn't sore. Like at all. Except for my jaw. I guess I sucked too much-ha get it! No I actually clinched my jaw through the whole race, and it was sore. I made pancakes for breakfast, cleaned up and watched football with my family. Logan and I took Goliath to the dog park later that afternoon, and met with some friends. I did some light stretching, and taped up my blisters. I ate a ton at dinner that night-post race carb loading is just as important as pre-race carbo loading!



My finisher shirt!


The rest of the week: I took it easy for the rest of the week even if I didn't feel like I needed to. I went to yoga on Wednesday, and did lots of walking throughout the week. Friday, I went in for a deep tissue sports massage-and that was more painful than the actual race itself. Apparently, my lactic scars are pretty intense. The therapist worked the crap out of my calves. Hilariously, I was more sore from that than the race the next day. Saturday, I volunteered at a 5k/10k race and got all energized to run again.


I have a half marathon in less than a month, that I'll start "training" for today and I'm already plotting out the next six months of racing.



After this post, we'll get the 12DoGA back up and running!

3 comments:

ash & diz said...

Glad to hear you're recovering and that you plan on doing another race! When is the next race?

Kathykins said...

After my 12k race last year that I didn't finish I was signed up for another race within hours of returning home and the new race took place within days. It's funny how we use races to get over other races. Glad to hear recovery is going well!

Becky said...

I'm glad you're recovering well!

This may sound ridiculously cheesy - but you inspire me to be a better runner and to run more races.

I love that I've signed up for 2 and cannot wait to sign up for more. :)