We had to be downstairs in the lobby at 6:30am to leave. It was a two hour drive to The Great Wall - we arrived to Ying Yang Square where all the runners gathered for a briefing and summary of each race - full marathon, half marathon, and 8km Fun Run. As the race official went on with his schpiel, he informed the runners that this year they were going to be much more lenient on the rules because of the weather. Typically the weather ranges 60*F to 90*F, with the average of past races being around 77*. However, the high on Saturday (aka race day) was 97*F! At least five or ten times the official told runners that they could downgrade their marathon to a half, or their half to a fun run - but nobody could upgrade, like they've allowed in years past.
After the briefing all the runners returned to their bus and were taken to the start of The Great Wall. We were told by the race official that the route the busses would take to get there would be the initial part of the race for everyone - IT WAS A 5KM DRIVE, ENTIRELY UPHILL...TO START THE RACE!!! The track that I mostly trained on in Newcastle was pretty flat, both coming and going, so I knew I wasn't going to be completely prepared. Now, the incline was bad, but it honestly wasn't as bad as I was envisioning.
Then we got to The Wall. Ho-ly shit! A few days before I left Australia, I watched the videos of marathons past. I knew it was going to be tough, but man, it went straight to big steep steps and only got worse from there! There were small steps, big steps, wide steps, narrow steps, steep steps, and even steps that should really be called slopes - they were slick, and uneven - and if you didn't watch what you were doing you'd slide right down, taking everyone in your path with you! Lindsay and I lost my mom at some point; we wanted to try and push ahead of the crowd to get better photos, and she needed to stop to use the restroom.
We walked. And we walked. And we walked. There were so many points on The Wall when I thought to myself, "How am I supposed to run this?! Do people actually run this?! What the (eff) was I thinking when I signed up for this as my first EVER marathon?!"
It took Lindsay and I an hour and fifteen minutes to finish the inspection and get back to Ying Yang Square where lunch was being provided - it took my mom an hour and forty five minutes. You'd assume that in an hour fifteen we would've walked at least five miles...that's normal(ish) if you average a 15min mile walk. But no, I looked at my watch and we had only walked 2.2 miles. TWO POINT FREAKIN' TWO MILES IN OVER AN HOUR. And I still had to do 21mi after all that come race day!
What the actual hell.
To be continued...
xx - Cristin
No comments:
Post a Comment