Saturday, August 10, 2013

Loonies Midnight Marathon

Found this marathon about a month before and thought how cool is that....a marathon that starts at midnight and it's only about a 5 hour drive plus it will count as the State of Tenn for my 50 states challenge. I got up and taught spin class that am then had some things to do and drove on down to Livingston TN.  I had been in contact for a couple weeks before with some other maniacs that were going and also with Alex and Shawn from Columbus who I had not met yet but had chatted on occasion with about other events in our area.  When I arrived Maniac Ed was there and he and I went to Pizza Hut to eat and such. Packet pick up wasnt going to be until 8pm and the timing company was late so it was I think closer to 8:30 or so. By this time I had met Alex, Shawn, Traveling Marathoner Tim, female Shawn and some other 50 Staters and Marathon Maniacs...yes we really thought we would be able to rest in our cars before the run started....I brought a small air pad and it was humid but left that back end up and windows down put some ear plugs in and a eye mask to block the street lights and I think at about 10:30 I dozed off, 11pm came and Ed was tickling my toes to wake me. Gathering with everyone really woke me up and the start was a little late. Boy was it humid!! The course went a mile and half then did 5 5 mile loops around the town, we crossed highway 111 and I wondered what some of those truckers and out of town drivers passing through thought when they were stopped for runners to go by at 2am 3 am 4 am etc! ha I was completely drenched this entire run, my socks clothes and I wonder if it was from my maniac shirt, this was the first time I had worn my pink diva tank...at one point I wanted to just run naked! I chaffed in some areas that normally you wouldnt chaff in just a 26.2 mile run. During the run it was fun to pass by the folks I had met earlier and online and give them a high five. Alex and I would stop and hug and I'd take a photo of he and I together...we were close to the same speed I may have a couple miles ahead of him is all. When I finished I saw male Shawn and he had showered ohhhhhh I heard there was a shower where where where! So I got my stuff out of the car and was heading to the shower and Shawn said Alex should be finishing soon...so I wanted to wait for him to come acrossed, I saw him heading up and I had sandals on but I jogged down to meet and ran in with him...then took a lovely shower everything felt amazing except for those areas of chaffing ouch!! Got dressed and started heading home....ok I didnt think it would be a big deal to drive down friday sleep 30 min run a marathon and immediately drive home ha....I was hungry but not super hungry, I decided to wait a bit and stopped at a cracker barrel, it was still early and totally forgot it was going to be breakfast food oh well it was food and it was delish. I was starting to feel tired and drove a bit further and by then my eyes were having a hard time staying open so I decided to stop at a church parking lot and take a quick nap, the problem was it was already almost 90 degrees so I had to keep the car running and ac on to stay semi cool in the back end. I set my alarm for an hour and think I dozed off pretty quickly but got up after about 45 min, I did feel much better and refreshed and had about 2.5 hours to go. I didnt start feeling the tiredness again till about 30 minutes from home but I set cruise control and sang a lot! This was a super fun marathon with awesome people. The bling was great and unique and if I dont have anything on tap next year at this time I will drive again for this one!

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