Day 6- The Pike's Peak Marathon

Our day started at 4:30 again… no sleep for Melinda. Rolando made oatmeal and had a bottle of Sustained Energy and went back to bed for about an hour. We both got up around 6:00 and got ready for the race. We met up with Mike and Karyn around 6:40 and took some pictures. Rolando went and lined up. Melinda had planned to run with Mike, but he hurt his heels about 2-3 weeks ago while training. He wasn’t even sure if he was going to be able to make it a mile or two today. Mike decided to start at the back and Melinda started somewhere in the middle.

Rolando’s race report: Well… it was the hardest thing that I’ve ever done. Harder than the Ironman, however I’m glad that I did it because I’ll never do it again! Today’s summit time was a little slower than yesterday’s. It was 2:46:00. The first six miles of the decent I was feeling fantastic and was passing lots of people. I high fived CJ around mile 15.5 (10.5 for him) and then around mile 16 (10 for them) I high-fived Cindy and gave Melinda a salty kiss. After mile six of the decent, I started to feel pain in my big toes from all of the banging from going down hill (12% grade). I started to curl my toes, but it didn’t work. Then… I started running sideways. That didn’t work either. I finished the decent in 2:09:00. Total time of 5:55:00. My slowest marathon ever. After the marathon, I did what I always do at any endurance event. I went to the medical tent and told them that I had a bad stomachache and was dizzy and they fed me some food through my vein. It was awesome. Afterwards, I walked back to the hotel and noticed that my favorite restaurant was open (it is normally closed on Sundays). I placed a to go order before I got in the shower. After the shower I picked up my veggie burger and sat down and ate it while I waited on Melinda to finish with her race.

Melinda’s race report: This is the hardest thing that I’ve ever done. Harder than the Ironman. I too will never do anything like this ever again. I’ve been feeling sick for a few days (stomach ache and sore throat). I went to the bathroom a few times before starting the race and had some Imodium in my pack just in case I needed it on the trail. The race started at 7:00am and it was already hot out. The sun was blistering. Thank goodness that I lathered up with sunscreen before the start.

I was able to run the first mile of the race. It was on pavement and steep, but not too bad. I just took it easy. The next 12 miles were pretty miserable. I just took it easy and “hiked” the route. Around mile 7, I started having doubts that I would finish at all. My stomach hurt so badly that I just sat on a rock and took some Immodium. I would walk 2-3 minutes and then sit for 2-3 minutes. I did this for about a mile (longest mile on the course) and started feeling better. Cindy Freeman caught up with me round mile 8.5 as I was just starting to be able to walk without stopping. She set a good pace and I got behind and followed her until a little before mile 11. Once there, I went ahead, but only finished a few minutes in front (summit time 5:39:00). It was great having someone you know to walk with. I pretty much thought that my entire day was going to be a vow of silence for me.

On the way back down, I started to run after the 16 Golden Stairs. I ran for about 3 miles and then my stomach hurt really bad, so I started walking. I did the math and figured that I could walk 20 minutes miles and still finish within the 10 hour cutoff time. It was interesting, I hadn’t had the need to go to the bathroom all day. Around 7 hours into the race I felt the urge to go immediately. I then went 6 times within about 1 hour and 30 minutes. I guess all the water I was drinking and the electrolytes were working! The only bad thing was that it really hurt my knees to squat down (men are lucky). I shuffled/walked all the way into the finish and total time was 9:14:00. My longest prior marathon was around the 4:10:00. This race was more than double that time!

Now we are both in bed resting and thinking about ordering food... You guested it right! From Adam's Cafe :-) Thanks for reading!