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In January 2014 Donna and I were at Disney World for a vacation (it helps that I work for Disney and I get nice perks).  Anyway, one of my aspiring professional poker player friends, Sarah, was also going to be down there with her husband Jesse.  I really had no idea why, but we all decided to meet up.  When we met up, Sarah proudly told me that she was here to run the marathon.

“What?”, I asked in amazement.

Now mind you, Sarah did not look like a “typical” runner.  She was neither tall nor build like a bean pole.  We were all fighting post-college weight gain that you can never seem to lose.  Donna and I had been to Sarah and Jesse’s house MANY times to play cards, but she never even remotely mentioned that she runs.

She replied that it was hard to get her to do long runs in the New England winters, and she did not know whether she was going to run the marathon, let alone finish.

My ultra-competitive mind thought, “Well, if she can run a marathon, then I can certainly run one, and I am going to run this marathon next year.”  Now, I love sports and I have tried a LOT of them, but running was never something that I enjoyed.  Why I decided at that moment to do something that I never really enjoyed is a mystery to me (maybe it has something to do with that ultra-competitiveness).  Right after vacation, I went home, put on a pair of sneakers, and started my training for next year’s Disney marathon (11 months later).  I learned a lot over the next year- like I did not need 11 months to prepare for a race, but I was determined to finish a marathon nonetheless.

At Disney’s running event in January, they offer a 5k, 10k, half marathon, and full marathon all on successive days.  I decided that I was going to run the 5k, 10k, and full marathon.  I did not want to run a half marathon the day before I was supposed to complete my first full.

About a week before my departure, I was the linesman in a minor-league professional hockey game.  At one point two players crashed into me from the side and I twisted my left knee.  I swore at them for not going around, but the damage was done.  I hobbled around the ice for the rest of the game, worried whether I would be able to run the marathon the following week.

I went to Disney, got checked into my hotel, went to the expo to get all of my racing bibs and collect whatever other free swag I could.  My knee definitely was tender, but I was not park-hopping like I normally did.  My plan was to run a VERY easy 5k on Thursday.  If my knee left up for it, I would run a LITTLE harder (but not too hard) on Friday for the 10k.  If that passed, then I would stay off my feet as much as I could on Saturday, and then run the full marathon on Sunday.  I know, I know…  I am ultra-competitive and would I ACTUALLY not run if my knee hurt badly?  As much as I wanted to run, the answer was yes.  I was going to listen to my body.  I did not want to injure my knee any further and risk missing the rest of my hockey season.

Thursday morning came, and I ran a nice and easy 5k, and my knee felt good!

The next morning, I lined up to run the 10k.  Sticking to the plan, I ran the 10k a little harder, but nothing too aggressive.  My knee felt good, so I decided to run the full marathon.

 

Sunday morning came around and off to the start line I went.  I submitted a time that allowed me to be placed in corral J, which was pretty far up from the walkers (corral P).  I was nervous.  Would I be able to finish?  In training, I only ever ran 22 miles.  Was that enough to get me to 26.2?  My goal was to finish in about 6:30:00 because that was the most common cutoff time for a marathon.  At long last, our corral started, and off I went.  The first 6 miles are between EPCOT and Magic Kingdom.  I ran at a slower pace and was feeling good… until mile 7.  All of a sudden I felt a sharp pain in my RIGHT (WTF?) knee.  This pain felt like somebody stuck a knife in my knee and was twisting it.  Why my right knee?  I injured my LEFT knee a week ago, not my right.  As I slowed way down and actually walked for a bit, I figured that between the 5k, 10k, the walking that I had done, and now the running that I was doing, I must have been compensating for the injury, and now it was catching up with me.   If this level of pain continued, I would have to stop.  However, I have a VERY high pain tolerance, so I kept pushing onward.  After a while, the pain subsided and I kept going.

After exiting Magic Kingdom, we were routed to the Disney World Speedway.  This facility hosts several Nascar and Indy car events.  Most people hated this part, but I thought it was absolutely fantastic being able to actually run on a Nascar track.  I ran up halfway up the embanked track (it is a LOT steeper than you would think) and back down to the apron several times.

After Disney Speedway, I was on my way to Animal Kingdom.  One of the really neat things that I had read about for the Disney Marathon is that when you go into Animal Kingdom, you can absolutely veer off-course and ride the Expedition Everest roller coaster.  That was my second goal for this race (the first being to cross the finish line).  As I crossed into Animal Kingdom, I realized that the park was not open yet (and obviously the rides were not operating).  I had entered the park about 30 minutes too early!  What a bummer.  Since this was my first full marathon, I was not sure what to expect.  I decided that it would be better for me to continue rather than wait for the ride to open.

As I continued on, we made out way through ESPN Wide World of Sports.  This was pretty cool for me because after all, I worked at ESPN (and if you have ever been the ESPN webite, you have probably seen/used some of my handiwork)!  We ran around the complex, by soccer fields with games going on, and even did a lap on a track (400m repeats at mile 17 anybody).  After exiting we made our way to Hollywood Studios and then back to Epcot.

As I entered Epcot and I reached mile 25, BOTH of my knees experience the same sharp knife-like pain that I felt at mile 7.  I was more than on pace to finish in the allotted time, so I walked for a bit.  After the pain subsided, I ran again and crossed the finish line in 5:12:38, beating my goal of 6:30:00 by quite a bit!

As I crossed the finish line, my first thought was “Wow, that was so fun, I can’t wait to do that again!”

WAIT – STOP THE PRESS

HUH?  What?  What did I think?  Was I hallucinating?  Was I sick?  Was I dreaming?  When most people cross the finish line of a marathon they think “Never again will I do that.”  Nope.  Not me.  I could not wait to torture myself again.

With that thought, my “running” career began.