Kristen McLane

Posted by Kristen McLane on October 24th, 2007 in Fitness

If you don’t already know I did finish the half marathon on Sunday and in “record time” (I can say that since it was my first).  My official time was 2:50.  Needless to say I had a lot of time to think.  There is always a lot of excitement leading up to the start of a race.  There were a record 16,000 participants at this year’s Detroit Marathon.  16,000 people = a lot of energy.  There is something special about being part of a running community.  People run for various reasons.  Some people run for exercise or personal enjoyment, some run for competition, some run for fundraising efforts such as cancer research and others run in the memory of departed loved ones.  It is rare that I have the opportunity to be in a crowd of so many people.  I was reminded that all these people had souls that mattered to God.  The Bible says that when Jesus saw the crowds, he had compassion on them.  Running for three hours gave me time to pray…for the other runners, for myself and simply to thank God for my health and ability to run.  And also to pray that I would finish the race!  I had the privilige of beginning the run with my mom.  It was comforting to run together.  We ran next to each other for the first 4 miles of the race.  One of the coolest sites was approaching the Ambassador Bridge to Canada and seeing the silhouettes of thousands of runners moving across the bridge with the sunrise in the distance.  The cruelest moments of the race were running through mexicantown and getting a whiff of the yummy food smells and also having to run past a Tim Hortons in Windsor between miles 5 and 6.  At that point, I had worked up an appetite!  By mile 8 I was glad to reach the Windsor Tunnel knowing that I would be back in Detroit soon (and therefore closer to the finish line).  The most difficult parts of the race for me were between miles 9 and 11.  I was well aware of my painful feet and several times I stopped to walk.  I learned from a spectator that it is not very encouraging to cheer the runners on by yelling “hustle”.  I did not like being passed by “competitive walkers” and my biggest motivation was not allowing the 70ish year old runner to pass me again…she did!  Knowing that the end was in sight I was able to run the rest of the way to the finish line.  It was a great feeling to run through the finish line and recieve a finisher’s medal.  I then met up with my sister who had finished her first 5k.  Together we waited for my mom to complete the race and then all three of us cheered on my dad who was running the marathon.  Interestingly up until this weekend I can’t remember the last time my parents and sister and I hung out together, just the four of us. 

It was a great day but I have no desire whatsoever to go running anytime soon.

Check out my photo proofs at http://www.runphotos.com/browse.cfm?race_id=121&bib_number=10722