Marathon Women

Good evening, dear family,
I wanted to write and tell you about Debbie's and my adventure last Sunday when we walked/ran in the Lincoln marathon. We did the half--13 miles plus a few yards in just over three hours. My assistant had done it a couple of times and I thought if she could, I could. We started the event by going to the Pastathon at the Champions Club on campus the night before. There were lots of very fit people there, some of whom had shirts on chronicling how many states' marathons they've been in. We were there to "carb up" on pasta; no decadent desserts for this crowd--just popsicles.

The morning of the race, we gathered in front of the Coliseum with the 5200 other people in the rain at 6:45 AM; we were such novices that we didn't know where the starting line was and when we realized we were toward the front with the serious competitors, we moved through the mob to get further back. We were a bit jolted when the race started with a cannon at 7:00. It took us nearly 10 minutes to get to the starting line, but since we had computer chips tied to our shoes, our times didn't start until we passed the starting line.

My walking partner chose this time to have foot surgery, so I haven't been walking in the morning, but Shadow (our Sheltie) and I went out in the country every weekend for several weeks. I worked up to 10.5 miles and thought I was ready, however, I wasn't ready for Debbie's pace. She's a machine!! I could keep up with her for a few feet, then she'd pull ahead and I'd run to catch up with her. It was raining pretty hard at the beginning, but let up after a few miles, so it was actually good race weather. Debbie ran the last few blocks and I could only run the last block and a half. It was quite a rush to cross the finish line under the digital clock. We got medals and "Finisher" shirts, but the most valuable thing is the sense of accomplishment we felt for having done it.

Stan and Jim weren't all that supportive at the beginning. Stan: "You're paying $35 to walk around Lincoln?" When he asked if I was going to take Shadow since he went with me on my "training" walks, I said no because people might get tangled in his leash. Stan said to me, very deliberately, "Nancy, they will all be ahead of you." Jim was concerned about Debbie's health, saying that marathoners have blood in their urine when they finish. He was also doubtful that she could do it because her foot swelled a lot while she was in Honduras and "how could she possibly think about walking 13 miles on that foot?" We were determined to prove them wrong and they were actually proud of us for having done it. They posted themselves several places along the route and met us at the finish line. We went to the Schmidt house afterwards and they waited on us, fixing and serving a sumptuous breakfast--french toast never tasted so good!

Love, Nancy