Latest / Hurdle with Emily Abbate / #HURDLEMOMENT: The New York City ~Virtual~ Marathon, A Recap

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#HURDLEMOMENT: The New York City ~Virtual~ Marathon, A Recap · Hurdle with Emily Abbate

0:00
Speaker 1: Twenty six point two ridiculous miles running through Manhattan, feeling
0:06
Speaker 1: like I'm flying by the seat of my pants, and
0:08
Speaker 1: it was nothing I ever envisioned, but everything I could
0:11
Speaker 1: have ever asked for. Hey, everyone, Emily here bringing you
0:30
Speaker 1: a really exciting.
0:33
Speaker 2: Installment of Hurdle.
0:35
Speaker 1: Moment from Hurdle, the episode you have been waiting for.
0:40
Speaker 1: Make it sound super dramatic. I wish I had like
0:42
Speaker 1: some dune dune done kind of beats. Here my New
0:47
Speaker 1: York City Virtual Marathon recap. It's fun to do this
0:51
Speaker 1: today because I remember sitting on my couch recording the
0:54
Speaker 1: Chicago recap and thinking to myself, Wow, I feel like
0:59
Speaker 1: I am just spewing all of these feelings into this
1:02
Speaker 1: microphone sitting on my couch, and I have no idea
1:05
Speaker 1: if anyone is going to find any of this information
1:08
Speaker 1: at all useful. But fun fact, the Chicago Marathon recap
1:14
Speaker 1: is actually one of the episodes that I get the
1:17
Speaker 1: most feedback about, and I feel as though that's because
1:22
Speaker 1: I really went into that episode without much of an agenda,
1:26
Speaker 1: but rather with hopes to just give you my honest
1:28
Speaker 1: feedback about what a big day that was for me.
1:32
Speaker 1: If you have yet to listen to the Chicago marathon recap.
1:35
Speaker 1: I highly encourage you to do so. The link to
1:37
Speaker 1: that is in the show notes. If you missed what
1:40
Speaker 1: happened back then, it's cool. We've got some newbies in
1:43
Speaker 1: the house. Back in Chicago October twenty nineteen, I ran
1:49
Speaker 1: a personal best marathon time that was three twenty eighth
1:53
Speaker 1: eight and qualified for Boston, which in itself is super exciting,
1:58
Speaker 1: but more exciting for me with the fact that that
2:01
Speaker 1: time for me was cutting off about twenty minutes from
2:06
Speaker 1: my personal best marathon at least, so super emotional, super exciting,
2:13
Speaker 1: which brings me to an even greater exciting subject again,
2:18
Speaker 1: my virtual New York City Marathon. I'm going to spoil
2:21
Speaker 1: what's happening here. I ran my virtual New York City
2:24
Speaker 1: Marathon on October thirty first, twenty twenty an official virtual race,
2:31
Speaker 1: no official water stations or crowds or oh god, so
2:36
Speaker 1: many things, and I did something I don't even know
2:42
Speaker 1: what I thought I was going to do that day,
2:44
Speaker 1: but it was crazy, that's for sure.
2:48
Speaker 2: On that day I ran a.
2:52
Speaker 1: Three twenty three fifty six marathon. Today, I'm going to
2:59
Speaker 1: give you the rundown. How the hell that even happened,
3:02
Speaker 1: from the planning that went into it, the training that
3:05
Speaker 1: went into it, the day of the race, logistics as
3:08
Speaker 1: a solo racer, and so much more. As always, if
3:12
Speaker 1: you have questions about what I'm chatting about today or
3:14
Speaker 1: anything else that I don't cover, you can feel free
3:17
Speaker 1: to hit me up over on social media, at Hurdle
3:20
Speaker 1: Podcasts or at Emily a Body. And the last thing
3:23
Speaker 1: I want to say before we get into this today,
3:26
Speaker 1: thank you, Literally from the bottom of my heart. I
3:29
Speaker 1: was so beside myself with what happened on Halloween this
3:34
Speaker 1: year and so grateful for the support of this community
3:38
Speaker 1: in a year that has been unlike any other. So
3:42
Speaker 1: with that, let's get to hurdling. I didn't go into
3:56
Speaker 1: the marathon with a plan. I know that sounds absolutely bizarre.
4:04
Speaker 1: I had a lot of thoughts about running a virtual marathon,
4:10
Speaker 1: you know, when the pandemic started back in March. If
4:14
Speaker 1: you were to tell me that I was going to
4:16
Speaker 1: run a virtual race on my own, no crowds, no
4:21
Speaker 1: water stations, no nothing, there's no way I would have
4:24
Speaker 1: believed you. But I think you guys know me, and
4:28
Speaker 1: I know me, And although at that point I couldn't
4:31
Speaker 1: have imagined it. It's certainly not something outside the box
4:35
Speaker 1: for my character to say, finally, you know what, why
4:39
Speaker 1: the hell not? Over the last few months, I was
4:42
Speaker 1: running a lot. If you've been following along with the show,
4:46
Speaker 1: then you know that I've hit a lot of really
4:50
Speaker 1: great moments with my stride and with running. This year,
4:54
Speaker 1: I pr'd in the half marathon, doing the virtual sewees
4:58
Speaker 1: on my own. Earlier this year, I did a mile
5:01
Speaker 1: time trial where I finally broke that six minute barrier
5:05
Speaker 1: that I've been striving for. And so it really got
5:08
Speaker 1: to a point with all the running that I was
5:10
Speaker 1: doing and all the mileage that was already in my wheelhouse,
5:15
Speaker 1: I just decided that I would go for it again.
5:18
Speaker 1: Like I started this episode saying, I didn't have a plan.
5:21
Speaker 1: I didn't think, all right, I'm going to run this
5:24
Speaker 1: virtual marathon and I'm going to do it obscenely well,
5:27
Speaker 1: and I'm going to.
5:28
Speaker 2: Race it and none of that.
5:30
Speaker 1: I just thought, you know what, this will be something
5:34
Speaker 1: that I can do for one day, something that I
5:38
Speaker 1: can look forward to, something that is like literally an activity,
5:42
Speaker 1: which when you say that out loud, it sounds kind
5:45
Speaker 1: of ridiculous, like, Oh, you know what activity I'm going
5:47
Speaker 1: to do next weekend.
5:48
Speaker 2: I'm going to go run a marathon. I'm an odd.
5:52
Speaker 1: Bird anyway, So the training was definitely there. So the
5:57
Speaker 1: only thing that I had to integrate to make sure
6:00
Speaker 1: that I was ready for this effort and that I
6:03
Speaker 1: was staving off potential injury by taking on too much
6:06
Speaker 1: was ramping up the weekends, so I added in. I
6:10
Speaker 1: believe it was a sixteen mile long run, an eighteen
6:13
Speaker 1: mile long run, a twenty mile long run, and.
6:16
Speaker 2: That was it.
6:16
Speaker 1: Leading up to that Saturday morning, the prep on marathon
6:22
Speaker 1: week looked a lot like my normal prep, except I
6:25
Speaker 1: didn't have to go to an actual race expo. I
6:28
Speaker 1: was trying to make sure that I was getting to
6:30
Speaker 1: bed early. I also made a concerted effort to make
6:33
Speaker 1: sure that I had all the gear that I wanted
6:35
Speaker 1: to wear, and that was kind of fun because I think,
6:38
Speaker 1: for the first time in a long time, those gear
6:42
Speaker 1: picks were absolute no brainers. Like at this point, I
6:46
Speaker 1: really homed in on my favorite pieces. I know what
6:50
Speaker 1: makes me feel fast, what makes me feel confident, and
6:53
Speaker 1: I will link to all of that stuff in the show.
6:56
Speaker 2: Notes to this.
6:57
Speaker 1: Episode there were some logistics that I had to take
7:00
Speaker 1: into consideration when it came to setting up, so to speak,
7:03
Speaker 1: this marathon. Unlike a normal effort, obviously, the course is
7:07
Speaker 1: an outline for you. So being a New Yorker, someone
7:10
Speaker 1: who has spent years and years running around the city,
7:13
Speaker 1: I had the fun opportunity to design my own course.
7:18
Speaker 1: So I think I tried like three four or five
7:21
Speaker 1: different routes and landed on the Goldilocks route that felt
7:24
Speaker 1: right for me based on a few things. First of all,
7:26
Speaker 1: I knew that this route involved some of my favorite
7:30
Speaker 1: parts of New York I this year specifically, have loved
7:34
Speaker 1: running the perimeter of Central Park, not anywhere inside the
7:38
Speaker 1: actual park, but actually, if you look on a map
7:41
Speaker 1: of New York City, the rectangle of sidewalks surrounding the park,
7:45
Speaker 1: that area has a dedicated bike lane on the south
7:50
Speaker 1: west and north side, and also a big enough sidewalk
7:54
Speaker 1: so that I don't have to run in the street
7:56
Speaker 1: with cars at any point. So I liked starting off
8:00
Speaker 1: the effort with that rectangle so that I would have
8:03
Speaker 1: space to move and it would be very unlikely that
8:07
Speaker 1: I would need to stop for traffic when it came
8:10
Speaker 1: to planning the rest of the route, I didn't feel
8:12
Speaker 1: like it was an actual marathon for me in New
8:14
Speaker 1: York City if I wasn't tackling at least one bridge,
8:17
Speaker 1: and if you're going to tackle one bridge and you've
8:18
Speaker 1: got to tackle another because you've got to come into Manhattan.
8:21
Speaker 1: So the route, as I mentioned, a lap clockwise of
8:24
Speaker 1: the perimeter of Central Park, across Central Park north over
8:29
Speaker 1: to First Avenue South. On First Avenue till I got
8:32
Speaker 1: to the Queensboro, over the Queensboro into Astoria, through Long
8:37
Speaker 1: Island City, all the way through Brooklyn to the Manhattan
8:40
Speaker 1: Bridge back and over the Manhattan Bridge down and up
8:43
Speaker 1: the West Side Highway, finishing around fifty fifth Street.
8:47
Speaker 2: That's my route.
8:48
Speaker 1: I'll link to the Strava from this day so you
8:50
Speaker 1: can see what that really looked like. Okay, gearing up
8:53
Speaker 1: for the route, planning the route, something else I had
8:56
Speaker 1: to do pre race that I wouldn't have to have
8:58
Speaker 1: done before next up logistics in terms of finding friends
9:02
Speaker 1: that would be around to help me hydrate and fuel.
9:07
Speaker 1: I was wearing shorts with two sets of pockets, so
9:09
Speaker 1: I knew that I could carry some gummies with me
9:13
Speaker 1: for this race. In particular, I chose to use the
9:15
Speaker 1: cliff blocks and two sleeves fit inside my pockets. But
9:19
Speaker 1: other than that, I wasn't carrying my own water or
9:22
Speaker 1: electrolytes for this race. I leaned into the Element electrolytes.
9:27
Speaker 1: If you've never heard of Element, I've talked about them
9:30
Speaker 1: on a few episodes right now.
9:32
Speaker 2: They are my new shtick.
9:33
Speaker 1: Like I cannot stop drinking, especially the orange salt flavor
9:37
Speaker 1: is my absolute favorite. If you're interested in trying Element
9:40
Speaker 1: for yourself, a little plug here, definitely do it. Head
9:43
Speaker 1: on over to drink Element dot com slash hurdle Again,
9:46
Speaker 1: that's drink LMNT dot com slash hurdle. I've tried a
9:51
Speaker 1: lot of stuff before, but I keep coming back to this.
9:54
Speaker 1: Trust me, you will not regret it.
9:56
Speaker 2: Okay.
9:57
Speaker 1: So I dispersed electrolyte packets. I figured it out with
10:00
Speaker 1: where I could meet them. I figured out with another
10:02
Speaker 1: friend who could meet me at the end with warm
10:04
Speaker 1: clothes because it was going to be a chilly day
10:06
Speaker 1: and if I hadn't done that, that would have been
10:08
Speaker 1: a huge regret. I literally probably would have ended up
10:11
Speaker 1: like intensive care. And that was it. From a logistics perspective.
10:17
Speaker 1: The night before standard personal pasta party. Wow. Try saying
10:21
Speaker 1: that three times fast, and then that was it. It
10:24
Speaker 1: was go time, and to reiterate once more. I didn't
10:27
Speaker 1: know what was going to happen. I had an inkling
10:31
Speaker 1: if things went a certain way from the get go,
10:36
Speaker 1: that I might try to go for something big. But
10:40
Speaker 1: I also had a realistic expectation of the fact that
10:44
Speaker 1: I was running twenty six point two miles on an
10:50
Speaker 1: unsanctioned course where I might have to stop. Anything could
10:54
Speaker 1: happen like there were just so many variables. But I
10:58
Speaker 1: also believe that I'm just that right kind of crazy
11:06
Speaker 1: that wanted to believe that I could do something ridiculous.
11:12
Speaker 1: It makes me smile saying that out loud, although I'm
11:14
Speaker 1: not sure if that sentence actually made any sense.
11:18
Speaker 2: So Race Morning.
11:28
Speaker 1: Taking a break from today's recap to give some love
11:31
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11:34
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11:39
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11:43
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11:48
Speaker 1: I in my marathon brought along and wore the blackout
11:53
Speaker 1: mock gees. I absolutely love them and I get so
11:56
Speaker 1: many compliments on them. And again that's because they move
12:00
Speaker 1: with me. I don't have to think twice about them
12:03
Speaker 1: being on my face, even when.
12:05
Speaker 2: Oh, here go or I'm coming, I'm picking up the pace.
12:09
Speaker 1: I can't believe I just said that you have got
12:11
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12:14
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12:18
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12:21
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12:29
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12:33
Speaker 1: I told you they started twenty five dollars. This deal
12:36
Speaker 1: is outrageous. Do it today. You won't regret it, and
12:40
Speaker 1: let's get back to it. I decided I was going
12:51
Speaker 1: to start this thing right around seven. I wanted to
12:54
Speaker 1: make sure that I was safe in that my friends
12:57
Speaker 1: and family could track me. Any point I was running
13:01
Speaker 1: alone and something happened to me. Of course, you never
13:04
Speaker 1: know exactly what's going to happen. Over the course of
13:06
Speaker 1: twenty six point two miles, I wanted to make sure
13:08
Speaker 1: that I had taken some necessary precautions, so I did
13:11
Speaker 1: two things. One was use the Garmin Live track feature,
13:15
Speaker 1: which I set up the evening before. This allows you
13:19
Speaker 1: to once you start your effort, Garment automatically sends out
13:22
Speaker 1: an email to the list that you can predetermine, so
13:25
Speaker 1: I set that up. I also was extremely surprised and
13:30
Speaker 1: appreciative of the app that New York Roadrunners put together.
13:34
Speaker 1: That app allowed my family and friends and also many
13:37
Speaker 1: of you, to track me as I made my way
13:40
Speaker 1: along my self created route. So I the morning of
13:45
Speaker 1: had a toasted peanut, butter and jelly sandwich that's my
13:48
Speaker 1: marathon go to.
13:49
Speaker 2: I drank an.
13:50
Speaker 1: Entire bottle of Element and I also had a small
13:53
Speaker 1: cup of an espresso. I finish all of my eating
13:55
Speaker 1: and drinking about forty five minutes before I need to
13:58
Speaker 1: leave my apartment, so I can make sure that all
14:00
Speaker 1: settles well and I get ready and I get out there.
14:04
Speaker 1: It's hard to articulate exactly how I felt on that
14:07
Speaker 1: walk the like five or so blocks to that starting line,
14:10
Speaker 1: that I decided that no one would be hat Like
14:12
Speaker 1: so many of you, I've spend a lot of time
14:15
Speaker 1: alone this year, and I think about how twenty twenty
14:20
Speaker 1: and even the years before that, for me, it's been
14:23
Speaker 1: such a beautiful time of getting comfortable with being alone.
14:30
Speaker 1: It felt really necessary for me to show up at
14:33
Speaker 1: that starting line on my own and begin anyway, without
14:37
Speaker 1: needing anyone to cheer for me, without needing a push
14:41
Speaker 1: in the right direction, without someone else telling me to start,
14:44
Speaker 1: Like this was the thing that I was going to
14:46
Speaker 1: go out and I was going to do and I
14:48
Speaker 1: was going to do it well. And my definition of well,
14:51
Speaker 1: not anybody else's definition of well, Like whatever was about
14:54
Speaker 1: to happen was completely on me, and that felt special.
15:01
Speaker 1: And so there I am. It's six fifty four. I think,
15:05
Speaker 1: like all my ducks are in a row with like
15:07
Speaker 1: the New York Roadrunners app and the Garment app, and
15:10
Speaker 1: like everything's set up. I press the button and I go.
15:15
Speaker 1: And I didn't expect or know that with the New
15:19
Speaker 1: York Roadrunners app, when you pressed start race, there was
15:24
Speaker 1: an announcer that came on, just like the actual beginning
15:28
Speaker 1: of the New York City Marathon, like when that started talking.
15:33
Speaker 2: And I'm running south.
15:36
Speaker 1: On Central Park East by myself at six fifty.
15:40
Speaker 2: Seven in the morning.
15:42
Speaker 1: You better believe I started crying, and so just like that,
15:46
Speaker 1: I was running a marathon. And it's just such a
15:51
Speaker 1: metaphor for this year, because there has been so much
15:55
Speaker 1: shit that I've been working on on my own, and
15:57
Speaker 1: so much stress and so many feelings that I have
16:00
Speaker 1: had to navigate on my own, and there I was
16:07
Speaker 1: doing this big thing on my own. I don't think
16:12
Speaker 1: until around mile five, when I saw my fifth consecutive
16:17
Speaker 1: sub seven thirty minute pace per mile split, that I
16:23
Speaker 1: started to get excited in the same way that I
16:27
Speaker 1: felt in Chicago when I saw a bunch of splits
16:31
Speaker 1: that were sub eight minute miles, And I did feel
16:35
Speaker 1: like going into this race that I was conditioned in
16:38
Speaker 1: a way that maybe I had never been before. But again,
16:41
Speaker 1: I was entirely realistic about what I was about to undertake,
16:43
Speaker 1: and so when I got to mile five and I
16:48
Speaker 1: saw what the splits kept coming in on my garment,
16:51
Speaker 1: I started to feel like I was ready to get crazy.
16:57
Speaker 1: At around mile six, I was supposed to meet my
17:00
Speaker 1: first friend with a bottle, and I didn't see them anywhere,
17:05
Speaker 1: so I kept going, and then around mile eight I
17:09
Speaker 1: was supposed to meet my next friend with a bottle,
17:12
Speaker 1: and they weren't there yet, and so I kept going.
17:17
Speaker 2: The only single.
17:19
Speaker 1: Time that I completely stopped was right before mile eight
17:24
Speaker 1: for about twenty seconds waiting at a red light. Other
17:29
Speaker 1: than that, I missed those first two bottles, and it
17:32
Speaker 1: was just like here we go, full on insanity. And
17:38
Speaker 1: so I was supposed to meet I run with a
17:41
Speaker 1: crew out here in New York in a safe way
17:44
Speaker 1: called Old Man Run Club. They're such good, dear friends
17:47
Speaker 1: of mine, so many amazing athletes in this mix, and
17:50
Speaker 1: they always run on Saturday mornings. And so I was
17:54
Speaker 1: supposed to meet Old Man at the base of the Queensborough.
17:58
Speaker 1: But because of the pace and because that I was
18:00
Speaker 1: moving faster than even I expected, I miss them too.
18:04
Speaker 1: So I missed bottle one, Bottle two, and bottles three
18:08
Speaker 1: through maybe six when I missed Old Man at the
18:11
Speaker 1: base of the Queensboro. But then I kept going. And
18:14
Speaker 1: so luckily, because I'm wearing air pods and I'm listening
18:17
Speaker 1: to music only, I'm not a podcast marathon her, but
18:21
Speaker 1: I encourage you to be if you're listening to hurdle.
18:23
Speaker 1: And so I am listening to music and I'm using Siri,
18:27
Speaker 1: so I'm communicating with the people that I'm missing bottles
18:29
Speaker 1: from via voice text and voice call in my ears
18:34
Speaker 1: while I'm running. I at this point put a call
18:38
Speaker 1: into the world, which some of you may have noticed
18:40
Speaker 1: on social media, looking for any sort of fuel whatsoever,
18:43
Speaker 1: because the fuel that I had placed it just like
18:45
Speaker 1: wasn't happening. And definitely, by you know, mile twelve, when
18:50
Speaker 1: I'm still without liquids, I'm certainly starting to get a
18:53
Speaker 1: little nervous. I get a call from two of my
18:56
Speaker 1: friends that I was supposed to link up with. They
18:59
Speaker 1: are behind me but coming toward me. So I deviate
19:03
Speaker 1: briefly from my route that I had articulated, if only
19:07
Speaker 1: to run laps in Astoria. So I literally am running
19:12
Speaker 1: like square street loops in Astoria.
19:18
Speaker 2: I'm waiting for my crew to get over the bridge.
19:21
Speaker 2: I run some laps.
19:22
Speaker 1: The crew gets over the bridge, and I go to
19:24
Speaker 1: finally drink a bottle of water and then a bottle
19:27
Speaker 1: of elements that are past to me, and I swear
19:30
Speaker 1: it's like the best hydration I have ever consumed, and
19:33
Speaker 1: instantly I feel electrified and ready to keep going, which
19:37
Speaker 1: just feels really exciting. After literally running the first half
19:41
Speaker 1: of this marathon completely alone, without any sort of audience.
19:46
Speaker 2: I run with the crew for a little bit.
19:48
Speaker 1: It was certainly appropriate that unintentionally my half marathon mark
19:53
Speaker 1: was going over the Pulaski, which it's actually the half
19:56
Speaker 1: marathon mark for the actual marathon as well in other years.
20:00
Speaker 1: So we all run together for about a mile and
20:02
Speaker 1: a half, and then because I'm just like moving at
20:05
Speaker 1: a clip, I unintentionally drop them that I'm so gracious
20:10
Speaker 1: for the energy that they gave me. Also huge shout
20:13
Speaker 1: outs or an order at this point for the multiple
20:16
Speaker 1: people that are trying to find me in Greenpoint and
20:19
Speaker 1: dming me and texting me, trying to give me bottles
20:22
Speaker 1: after I made that call out on social media running.
20:25
Speaker 2: Over the bridge.
20:26
Speaker 1: The MVP of the marathon may just be a guy
20:30
Speaker 1: that I went to college with that I haven't talked
20:32
Speaker 1: to in some time who literally shows up out of
20:36
Speaker 1: nowhere running after me with a Gatorade bottle. Tommy Talty,
20:41
Speaker 1: you win. When I'm worried again that I'm completely on
20:45
Speaker 1: my own until the next person I know that I'm
20:47
Speaker 1: going to pick up, not until mile twenty two ish,
20:52
Speaker 1: I'm like, all right, let's call in a favor. So
20:54
Speaker 1: I call one of my dearest friends that lives near
20:56
Speaker 1: the base of the Manhattan Bridge, which I'm going to
20:58
Speaker 1: take to go back into my and she brings me
21:02
Speaker 1: a huge gain raid and a cliff bar, and oh man,
21:06
Speaker 1: I was so excited to see her. She's like running
21:08
Speaker 1: alongside of me in normal clothes as she's like trying
21:11
Speaker 1: to unscrew the gatorade and give me and open the
21:14
Speaker 1: bar so that I can chew it, and we pour
21:16
Speaker 1: some of it out and I carry this massive gatorade
21:18
Speaker 1: and then luckily at this point, I have a friend
21:21
Speaker 1: who shows up out of nowhere on a bike and
21:23
Speaker 1: he can help me with all of these things, and
21:25
Speaker 1: we make our way up the bridge. And at this
21:28
Speaker 1: point I start audibly talking to myself because this is,
21:31
Speaker 1: as I know it to be, going to be the
21:33
Speaker 1: hardest part. It's the last hill on this course that
21:36
Speaker 1: I've set out, and I know that if I get
21:38
Speaker 1: up this hill and I can keep a decent pace,
21:40
Speaker 1: that like the next six miles left at this point
21:44
Speaker 1: are going to be downhill and then mostly flat. And
21:48
Speaker 1: so that's what happens. And when we get over the
21:51
Speaker 1: bridge and we're down on the West Side Highway and
21:54
Speaker 1: at mile twenty one that's when I start to realize, like,
21:57
Speaker 1: what's actually happening here? Like, of course I've seen the
22:00
Speaker 1: clip by and I've seen that they are, you know,
22:02
Speaker 1: really good paces, but I haven't done any math because
22:05
Speaker 1: math is not entirely my strong suit. So as I'm
22:08
Speaker 1: running and I get to mile twenty one, I can
22:10
Speaker 1: figure out in my head, Okay, you have five miles left,
22:13
Speaker 1: and this is what your PR is, and this is
22:15
Speaker 1: what you need to do to beat it. And in
22:17
Speaker 1: this moment, my friend's riding next to me on his
22:20
Speaker 1: bike and I look at him and I say, if
22:22
Speaker 1: I run the next five miles sub eight forty five pace,
22:25
Speaker 1: I'm gonna have a new PR. And he says, you're
22:29
Speaker 1: gonna run the next five miles at a suba forty
22:31
Speaker 1: five pace, and you're gonna have a new PR.
22:34
Speaker 2: And I just say, fuck fuck, We're gonna do it.
22:40
Speaker 1: And so I don't think I really hit the wall,
22:43
Speaker 1: so to speak. But toward the end of it, after
22:46
Speaker 1: picking up my girlfriend that ran the last two and
22:50
Speaker 1: a half miles with me, I started to feel some
22:53
Speaker 1: discomfort in my left hamstring, but other than that, I
22:56
Speaker 1: felt really good, which is crazy when I reflect, and
23:00
Speaker 1: the fact that I didn't consume any fluids until almost
23:04
Speaker 1: mile thirteen. We're in the home stretch. I run by
23:07
Speaker 1: Oh bless the Hurdler's. I run by a Hurdler's cheer
23:10
Speaker 1: station where I stopped for maybe like two full seconds
23:15
Speaker 1: to snap a quick photo. And I feel as though
23:19
Speaker 1: within the blink of an eye, the next maybe sixteen
23:24
Speaker 1: minutes go by and before I know it.
23:28
Speaker 2: We're done.
23:30
Speaker 1: I did it, And like when I finished in Chicago,
23:35
Speaker 1: I felt so overwhelmed by what had happened, because I
23:39
Speaker 1: completely never thought that I was capable of doing something
23:42
Speaker 1: like that. But when I finished in New York and
23:47
Speaker 1: I just watched my garment clicked to twenty six point
23:52
Speaker 1: two and I didn't have a finish line, and I
23:59
Speaker 1: sat down on the side of the West Side Highway,
24:02
Speaker 1: no metal, no nothing. I felt like I had gone
24:07
Speaker 1: after something that I deserved. Last year, I truly felt
24:11
Speaker 1: like maybe Chicago was a blip, Like there were just
24:15
Speaker 1: all of these perfect things that happened to make it happen.
24:19
Speaker 1: The weather was great, the spectators were great, I had
24:23
Speaker 1: really good fueling leading up to it.
24:25
Speaker 2: I had a.
24:26
Speaker 1: Perfect fueling strategy during the race, like so many things,
24:31
Speaker 1: and I sat there and I thought to myself, like.
24:36
Speaker 2: This is who I am.
24:39
Speaker 1: I am capable of this, of this thing that I
24:43
Speaker 1: just did twenty six point two ridiculous miles running through Manhattan,
24:50
Speaker 1: feeling like I'm flying by the seat of my pants.
24:52
Speaker 1: And it was nothing I ever envisioned, but everything I
24:55
Speaker 1: could have ever asked for.
24:57
Speaker 2: It didn't need to be extra.
25:00
Speaker 1: I didn't need extra, because at the end of the day,
25:03
Speaker 1: really all I needed was just.
25:07
Speaker 2: To believe in me. This time it felt earned.
25:13
Speaker 1: Like in Chicago, I felt overwhelmed, but standing there in
25:18
Speaker 1: New York City, in my own hometown, I just felt
25:22
Speaker 1: fucking proud. One small note, it's a little scary, I think,
25:29
Speaker 1: feeling so firm in the fact that I can do
25:34
Speaker 1: hard things by myself, because I don't always want to
25:38
Speaker 1: do things by myself. And when I think about that day,
25:45
Speaker 1: it was all about me proving to me that I
25:47
Speaker 1: could just handle it. When the timing was off and
25:51
Speaker 1: things didn't go to plan and I didn't have people
25:54
Speaker 1: supporting me, I just kept running.
25:58
Speaker 2: It's a really good metaphor for what's what we have
26:03
Speaker 2: to handle sometimes. What we have to go through to
26:07
Speaker 2: be better and to learn to learn lessons.
26:11
Speaker 1: You know, it's not always that people don't want to
26:14
Speaker 1: be there for you, but sometimes you're going to have
26:17
Speaker 1: to take matters into your own hands and let go
26:21
Speaker 1: of the people that aren't showing up for you and
26:24
Speaker 1: do the damn thing anyway because you can. That's so
26:29
Speaker 1: much what this year has been about, right, It's just
26:32
Speaker 1: been about showing up for you in the best way
26:35
Speaker 1: that you know how, even when you don't have all
26:38
Speaker 1: of the answers, and trust me, I had, I had
26:42
Speaker 1: no idea what was going to happen, none, But what
26:48
Speaker 1: I knew is that there was never a point during
26:50
Speaker 1: that three hours, twenty three minutes and fifty six seconds
26:55
Speaker 1: that I was ever.
26:56
Speaker 2: Going to give up on me getting my act together here. Listen.
27:05
Speaker 1: It was a really special day, and I think a
27:09
Speaker 1: majority of this was earned, but there is definitely a
27:12
Speaker 1: little bit of luck in the mix, you know. The
27:14
Speaker 1: fact that I only really had to stop once blows
27:17
Speaker 1: my mind. The fact that I must have hydrated well
27:20
Speaker 1: enough in the days leading up to the race to
27:23
Speaker 1: handle that first chunk of time without any fluids whatsoever.
27:27
Speaker 1: The fact that I had a beautiful day. Like here,
27:32
Speaker 1: I am talking about things that it's just like when
27:35
Speaker 1: I made excuses for my talent in Chicago, and honestly,
27:38
Speaker 1: fuck that that day was everything, and I'm proud of me,
27:43
Speaker 1: and beyond that, I'm just really grateful for all of
27:46
Speaker 1: the lessons that running teaches me every single time I
27:48
Speaker 1: lace up my shoes. This story, this recap, it's not
27:52
Speaker 1: just to give something to other runners, this recording, this
27:57
Speaker 1: is me bearing to you my feelings about the fact
28:01
Speaker 1: that shit gets hard sometimes and we can show up anyway,
28:06
Speaker 1: and that day I decided to show up as my
28:10
Speaker 1: most dominant and confident self. Thanks for listening to me
28:16
Speaker 1: talk about this, Thanks for motivating me to be better.
28:19
Speaker 1: And I know today I talked a lot about relying
28:23
Speaker 1: on myself and doing hard things alone. But at the
28:26
Speaker 1: end of the day, y'all make me feel like I'm
28:28
Speaker 1: just part of something so much bigger than me.
28:31
Speaker 2: Another hurdle conquered. Catch you guys next time.