So apart from the disrupted schedule and knee injury, I had a 6 day stomach bug followed by a cold. And since I'm not mature enough to know when to call it quits I still rocked up to the start line sniffling into a tissue and fearing to cough should something cough back...
Loved it, hated it, a lot went wrong and none of you irresponsible people told me how addictive marathons are.
But the worst was having only 1h20min of interrupted sleep the whole friggin night. I'm happily addicted to coffee - drink 2 cappuccino's a day. We have a Simonelli Oscar 2 and consider it our marriage councilor and closest thing I have to a personality. I can - and often do - drink a cup at 21:00 and still fall asleep within 5mins. Had a cup at 5 the night before because I'm convinced I'm somehow invincible. Ate an early dinner, popped a Slowmag... and my close to deceased GI tract gasped it's second invigorating breath and my heart decided it's time to join the sokkie jol into the wee hours of the morning. I eventually fell asleep at 03:21 from exhaustion. Lekke. Veeeeery lekke.
Don't know how I got to the start line but I fell asleep sitting in my batch queue waiting and only realized I was actually attempting my first marathon when my watch gave the first of many little buzzes - 1 down 41 to go. Then my tired party animal of a stomach decided to reminisce about bfast and brought it back up for discussion, at the 4km mark. Twice the taste, zero the callories I guess? I just kept going, slow as hell but going. I swallowed some tears at 14km as I force fed myself Maurten bars and gels - worth its over priced hype for me - and went into elevator music mode. The supporters, fellow sufferers and lays chippies on offer were my saving grace. At 25km I realized there is no way out of this and at 30km I had an internal dialog that will make Charlize Theron blush.
Anyway I did it. It was a terrible intro to the game but I loved it? At least the shoes, nutrition and gear were on parr with no hassles. Just stupidity that won't get solved anytime soon, but that's why I married a smart man so I can ignore his advice. Already signed up for next year and then some. Def have to see how far is too far. Literally.
