Boston Marathon- What the hell is there to say?

Well I have been putting this blog post off for a while now and have actually written it twice only to delete it.  I think just because I exceeded my expectations so much that I have been pretty much lost for words on how to explain my feelings and my experiences, but mostly explaining my feelings which I suck at.  So with that I don't think I am going to really try because honestly I would not be able to do it any justice.  I still have people telling me, "Heard about your Boston,  good job!" and I just sort of grunt "Thanks" embarrassingly because I honestly don't know how to react. 

I did not expect that performance but others saw the possibilities based on the work they saw me put in the 16 weeks leading up to the race.  It is always something special to have friends that believe in you and push you to achieve things that you would not have done on your own.  For that I am very grateful.  Yes I worked and trained harder than I have ever done before, even harder than I did for a 100 miler, but I would not have been able to do that without the support of my friends and having them hold me accountable, especially with all the stuff going on in my personal life at the same time.  They know who they are.  All I can say is a "Thank You" from my heart.  I have learned how to get my head out of the way and just do what we train to do.

Anyway with all this emotional mumbo jumbo you may be asking, how the hell did he do if you don't know already.  So I am not going to do the normal race report and break it down mile by mile but just give you the result.  The main goal going into Boston was to try and improve my road marathon PR from 3:11:44 that I ran at Colfax Marathon in 2015 while training for Leadman to just break 3 hours.  I have always wanted to say that I am 2:xx:xx marathoner.  Well now I can, below is the outcome.  Not bad for a guy who runs mostly ultras and is now a master runner. 

Yes you are reading that correctly, 2:44:18 or almost a 27 minute PR.  So that is why I am lost for words as I talked about earlier in the post.   So that is all I am really going to say about that, if you want to see the mile breakdown you can see my Strava data here.  Below are some photos I copied off the website, yes I am to cheap to buy them.  These were all taken in the last mile of the race or so.

Shawn my college roommate from Colorado State who I stayed with the whole weekend ended up taking me to a classic Boston bar (don't remember the name) for a pitcher of Samuel Adams Boston 26.2 Special Release Lager straight from the finish line.  Hit the spot.

Am I going to go back in 2017?  Right now I am leaning that way but not sure if I am willing to train the way I did this year again.  It was a lot and took a lot out of me both physically and mentally but at the same time it helped me work through a lot personal stuff also.  Of course I am playing with the idea of going and actually enjoying the experience instead of being laser focused like I was this year, drinking beer the whole way and just having fun.  We will see.... 

Oh yeah, I did stop and get a kiss from one of the girls at Wellesley College so that did cost me 10 seconds but it was worth it.

Thanks for reading!