Marine Corps Marathon

The morning started out without a hitch. The knowledge acquired from running six marathons this year left me prepared and knowing full well what I needed to do, what I needed to have ready, the night before so as not to leave anything important behind. Before I dive into the details of the race it is best to take a look back. Saturday turned out to be just like the day before the Erie marathon I’d run in September, pouring buckets and just plain miserable. Fortunately, my family decided to stay up in DC the night before this marathon, having stayed in Fredericksburg last year and gone through the gauntlet of driving north up 95 and catching the Metro. Saturday night Team Fisher House hosted a team pasta dinner so we could mix and mingle and really get excited to run this marathon together. LCol Greg Gadson was the keynote speaker who told us about his journey of losing both legs to an IED in Baghdad to being an honorary member of the NY Jets Superbowl winning team. I was once again reminded of the importance of Fisher House to the families of our service men and women who are injured, as well as the importance to the individual receiving treatment. I spoke briefly to LCol Gadson about my experience of fracturing my femurs and almost losing my right leg due to infection and we both agreed that without our families neither of us would have healed in our respective ways; him deciding to amputate and my near perfect recovery. After the dinner it was time to settle down and gear up for the marathon. It was still raining and I was nervous that it’d turn out to be a cold, wet morning. As it turned out the day turned out to be absolutely beautiful. It was cool and brisk and there was a clean, fresh feel in the air from the dousing the day before. One of the three running partners I’d arranged to meet actually made it to the appointed rendezvous. When the race started we’d met up with the third and as it happens at least three of us started together. Since MCM is a huge marathon with a field upwards of 18,000 runners it took us quite a few minutes to cross the starting mat after the race gun went off. Somewhere between Mile 1 and Mile 2 I’d lost both my running buddies and I made the decision that this would be my day to run a great marathon.. . . as it's taken me almost a month to post this race report I should note that I ran an AMAZING marathon and barely felt that I'd run it at all. 7 marathons in one year has left me with a sense of accomplishment and triumph. More to come again soon.