The race started at 8am so we had 2 hours to get there, park, and get to our corral at the starting line. This seemed like plenty of time, but it was 7:45 when we pulled into the parking lot. Traffic from the 20,000 plus runners was insane, but we made it to our corral just in time.
Although Gary did not train for this race, we opted for the 2:15 minute corral. We didn't stay together this time, because I was set on reaching my 2:15 goal.
For the first 10 miles I was running a steady 10 minute mile and feeling good. But, at mile 10 I hit a wall. The guy I was trying to pace myself off of headed the other direction for the full marathon. I had been pushing myself to keep this guy in my sight, because I could tell he was maintaining a good pace. When he turned off, I felt a little discouraged. I also began to feel an intense pain in my right knee that was causing my right leg to give out.
My knees started giving me trouble at the last half I did in Conway. I had slowed my running routine to about once or twice a week since that race to give my knees a break. I've been icing them after every run and putting heat on them every night. This has helped tremendously, but by mile 10 they were worn out.
For the final 3.1 I had to slow my run to about an 11 minute mile and walk for a few minutes here and there when the pain got too intense. I finished just over my goal in 2:16:52. This sill broke my personal record of 2:19:48 that I had set just a month and a half earlier. I felt pretty good about my time considering I had slowed my training down considerably since October due to my knee pain.
Gary finished in just over 2:30. This was a great time since he had run only once since running a 5k back in July!
I'm hoping to get my knees back in shape soon so I can run the half at the Little Rock Marathon in March.
Overall, we had a great experience in Dallas. I'm proud of our times, and I'm looking forward to setting new records for myself in the coming year.
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