Sunday, October 07, 2007

Mile 7, meet wall

Usually I hit my marathon wall around mile 18. Today's heat changed that, along with a lot of other things. If you haven't heard, the heat was felling runners at such a rate that for the first time in its 30-year history, the Chicago Marathon was canceled three and a half hours after it started. And so far, one runner has died.

I was feeling so heat-strokey by mile 7 that I started actively looking for a medic tent so I could drop out. I still hadn't found one by mile 18 (yes, I retardedly kept going for 11 more miles) when I first got word of the cancellation. I had to slog on another mile and a half, though, before the marathon people finally routed us back toward the finish line. On the plus side, I was able to quit without technically being a quitter.

But I'm home and incredibly sleepy and still warm to the touch and I have a headache that won't go away and a big gross rash on my tummy area. The fiancé made it to mile 17.5 on a very bum ankle before he got routed back along a different path.

But we're home and doing well, and though we're disappointed and in pain, our sunscreen didn't give out on us so we're not burned and we got to snuggle in bed the moment we scrubbed the stink off us.

I'll have my full report when I get a moment to shake off this stupid headache. And gather some photos from Matthew. Stay tuned.

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