Marathon Expectations. What’s your mindset?

In my experience, we get too damn attached to expectations! We create this idea in our minds of how we want something to be, and in the process of trying to make it happen, we typically don’t create space for the chance that things don’t play out the way we think they should. The more attached we are to the expectation, the more we suffer if we fall short…

I’m not one to promote low expectations or standards. In my opinion, you don’t have to set the bar low to save your feelings from being hurt. I’ve for sure learned some lessons about the best ways to interact with my expectations: personally, professionally, and in my world of running. Because of these lessons, my philosophy has become, “Set a goal, but don’t marry the expectation”.

It’s is all about how we interact with our expectations – how much we cling to the “idea” of what’s to come or what could be. As cliché as it may sound, I find so much more happiness in everything that I do when I make an effort to live in the moment and let my actions be motivated by the here and now. Similarly, I’ve found this to even be true for my running.

Expectations and Running

It has been an awesome year of running. In the last year, I’ve trained for 3 big races: the Cincinnati Flying Pig Marathon, the Chicago Marathon, and the Zydeco Half Marathon. However, two of these races were a lot more enjoyable than the other. What were the similarities between those two races? I went into them both with the mindset of just enjoying the ride, no matter where it took me. For the other, I was determined to have a specific outcome. Not reaching the goal wasn’t an option.

In 2018, I ran three marathons – The Disney Marathon, The Flying Pig, & The Chicago Marathon. Out of them all, I set my heart on the Chicago Marathon being my big PR race for the year; I wanted to run a sub 4-hour marathon. As for the Flying Pig, my goals were to just go out and enjoy the race and walk away with whatever PR I could get on the extremely hilly course. Spoiler alert: Chicago was the gut wrenching (literally) disappointment of 2018.

2018 Cincinnati Flying Pig Marathon – May 2018

The Flying Pig Marathon was my 3^rd marathon attempt. My first two marathon finish times were 5:11 & 4:45 for the New Orleans Rock ‘n’ Roll and the 25^th Walt Disney World Marathon. You can check out my Disney Dopey Challenge & First Marathon for recaps of those interesting experiences. Cincinnati’s course is described as uphill for the first half of the race, with gently rolling hills on the backend. On the other hand, I live and train in New Orleans where it is flatter than flat! Therefore, I knew that Cincinnati would be a challenge!

The Flying Pig was only a few months after the Dopey Challenge. So, I took off a few weeks between the races. Meanwhile, I created a training plan that would keep me in shape while allowing my body some recovery time. I wasn’t going into this race for a massive PR, and summer training for the 2018 Chicago Marathon wasn’t far off. I made sure to keep this training as minimalistic as possible.

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Goals – Positive Attitude

My race day goals were to keep a positive attitude throughout the race, smile at the spectators, high-five ALL of the kids, and to not beat myself up if the hills got rough; and I did just that. For this race, my family stayed back home and I traveled to Cincinnati alone. On the morning of the race, I took my time prepping my gear and breakfast, gave myself a pep talk that my daughter usually gives me, called an Uber, and headed to the starting line. I was in a real peaceful headspace because I wasn’t pressuring myself to meet any expectations!

Cincinnati Course

The Cincinnati course is beautiful. The course takes you over a couple of bridges, into Kentucky, through many neighborhoods, an ends at an amazing festival on the Riverfront. There are people cheering the runners on throughout the entire course. The course had tons of hype squads, bands, kids, radio stations, and energized spectators for the entire 26.2 miles. The first 15-16 miles of the course were strong for me, even with the hills coming at EVERY turn! Eventually, my legs really started feeling like deadweight from the hills around mile 17, but I kept pushing.

Around mile 18, my pace slowed down, the temps started rising, and, as usual, I started questioning why I want to chase down this goal. Yet, I high-fived all of the kids and pictured my daughter cheering me on. Around mile 20 I got a text reminding me I only had a 10k left! I cried like a baby because I realized that my friends and family were cheering for me.

When I crossed the finish line I had a near 15-minute PR. In that moment, the texts were rolling in from so many people congratulating me. I WAS CONTENT. After that, I sat on the grass on the Riverfront enjoying the moment. Finally, another race was done and another city was conquered.

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2018 Chicago Marathon

Next up was the Chicago Marathon. To start, there was so much damn hype leading into the Chicago Marathon for me. I felt so great when I finished the hilly Flying Pig Marathon. As a result, I declared to my friends that I could run a sub 4-hr marathon. I just knew I could dominate on Chicago’s flat course. I set the goal, I married the expectations, I shared it with the world for accountability, and I began training a few weeks after the Flying Pig on Memorial Day weekend.

For the first time, I would be working with a running coach, Mel Becker. She helped me be more intentional with my training by incorporating workouts tailored towards my goals vs me just randomly running long and longer miles fast and faster with no rhyme or reason. Over the summer, I would begin to incorporate different workout and effort runs: speed days, threshold runs, endurance days, and making sure not to disregard the importance of an easy run.

Summer Slacking

Unlike my previous marathons, I did not strength train like I had over the last year. That was a mistake. Distance running and strength training go hand in hand. I need to cover the miles to build endurance, but I need to simultaneously strengthen the muscles I am asking to carry me for all those miles!

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Summer Heat Training

Even though I slacked up on strength training, I was making sure to log the miles! Summer marathon training in New Orleans was BRUTAL, but I rarely missed a training run. I was running early in the morning before the sun and was still dying in the humidity, but I was persistent. One of my dear friends, Loraine, would be running both the Chicago Marathon and New York marathon that fall, so we suffered together all summer long – TOGETHER!

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Friends that run together

Several of our friends and loved ones decided to go to Chicago with Loraine and I. In that way alone, having so many of my people with us made me feel so incredibly supported. Unfortunately, I had so much anxiety going into the race because of my expectations. It was my third marathon of the year, I turned 33 a few days prior, and I wanted so badly to run 3:59 or below. The build-up to this race was surreal and so many people were excited with me for the potential. Over the summer, I had the awesome opportunity to be a guest on the Rambling Runner podcast (Episode 94 – Ebony Blackwell @livinginthebreeze) to talk about my journey to Chicago, and I had made so many connections on Instagram with other runners tackling Chicago and runners just supporting my journey!

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Chicago Race Day

Physically, I was prepared for my race. Emotionally, I was anxious, but I found comfort in having support around me. When the race started, it was in the low 60s and raining, but after training in Louisiana heat, I welcomed the cool temps and sprinkles. My spirits were high. Yet, somewhere between miles 3-5, I lost all of my chill! The back of my left knee got this weird cramp and I freaked out. I had on my Nathan VaporHowe hydration vest with my water and Nuun electrolytes, but, for some reason, in that moment, I told myself to save my hydration for the back end of the course and to take the Gatorade on the front end. THE BIGGEST MISTAKE!

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Trust Your Training

This is where I learned the lesson to trust my training. I never trained with Gatorade. I can’t drink it because it’s too sugary and disrupts my stomach. I know this, it’s one of the main reasons I turned to Nuun for electrolytes (it only has 1 gram of sugar). Yet, there I was, attempting to run my best race, meet everyone’s expectations (mainly my own), drinking Gatorade with 23 miles left to run lol. Well I started to pay for it by miles 9-11. My stomach started grumbling. Instead of running my race, I started running from port-o-potty to port-o-potty!

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I forgot to enjoy the course

The rest of the race is a blur after the half-way point. I remember crying to a friend at mile 20 who was yelling at me to keep pushing, and I remember running into another friend at mile 25 who was on his own struggle bus. My legs were hurting and dead weight from all of the stops, but I crossed the finish line in 4:30; a 4-minute PR from Cincinnati. Yet, my feelings were so hurt; I was crushed, collapsed into my friends crying at the finish, sat on the ground in front of the port-o-potties crying some more, and just felt defeated.

Defeated

I left Chicago not knowing if I wanted to run another marathon ever again. I was hard on myself. My expectations were hard on myself, and I felt like I didn’t meet other people’s expectations either.

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2019 Zydeco Half Marathon

After Chicago, my coach told me to take some time off – and NOT TO SIGN UP FOR ANOTHER MARATHON ANY TIME SOON (I was considering the Philly marathon to seek redemption). I took my coaches advice and took some time off from running to rest and lick my wounds. A few weeks later, my coach helped me decide on a couple of Spring races. My next race was the Zydeco Half Marathon in March 2019. The goal here was to work on my speed, and I would also be prepping for Mountains 2 Beach Marathon at the end of May. Although I set a goal, I did not set any expectations or demands on my performance.

When I decided on the Zydeco Half, I wanted to PR the race. My current half PR was 1:58. Even though I set a goal, I never married the expectation of meeting that goal, and I never decided on a specific goal. I just wanted to give it my best effort. I wanted to be ok with just finishing. Over the next few months, life got incredibly busy with my daughter, work, and graduate school. I barely had time or energy to train like I did for Chicago, and I was ok with that. I was majorly burnt out!

Strength Training

I got back into strength training twice a week. Strength training is a major game changer for me. I can tell the difference between races when strengthen training is not a priority in my training regimen. Previously, I only strength trained once a week. Therefore, bumping up my gym time to twice a week helped me balance out the burnout from running, and helped reenergize me!

As for my runs, if I got them done that was great; if I didn’t, that was ok! There were plenty of weeks where I was running only 3 days a week. Leading into the race, I was struggling to hit my goal training paces so I didn’t really know what to expect for the race. Given my training and energy, I was happy if I walked away with a 2:05 finish time. Once again, I was running the race with my good friends Loraine; her wife, Ruthie; and one of my Youth Run NOLA runners, Larry. I was just excited to be sharing the pavement with them!

Zydeco Race Day

On the morning of the race I had a pep talk to remind myself to just enjoy the run. To stay in the moment and present with the energy around me. I had a very similar mentality as I did for the Flying Pig. I just wanted to enjoy any spectators, high-five and wave at the kids, and be appreciative of the fact that I am able to run.

I started the race not far behind the 2-hr pace group. I decided I would stay tucked behind them for the first half of the race as I tested out how I felt. To my surprise, I actually had to hold myself back from passing them. I didn’t want to expend all of my energy early and bonk later, so I stayed smart and hung with them through the first 10k.

It was a beautiful day for running considering it was March in Louisiana and could have been quite warm and humid. The temps were in the 60s and there was an overcast. It was a beautiful course that routed through Lafayette, LA but there weren’t a lot of spectators at all. Nevertheless, the folks that were out there were great!

Run Smart

After hitting the half-way point I was still feeling great! I decided to pull off in front of the 2-hr pace group, but not by too much. I rode this out for another 3-miles. In preparation for the race, my coach, Mel, told me to run conservative through mile 10, being mindful of my pace, and to let it all out the last 5k. When I hit mile 10, I did just that; I started running with everything I had in me, rarely looking down at my watch.

Finish Strong

I crossed the finish line in 1:57 with a one-minute PR. Amazingly, that one-minute PR felt as good to me as I was expecting to feel if I had run a sub 4-hr marathon! I ran a smart race, trusted my training, didn’t set any expectations, and enjoyed the ride. My people were waiting at the finish. All was well in the world! It was a great day for everyone. Larry ran his best half-marathon and took 1^st place for 19 and under runners. And, as we were leaving, I found out that I took 3^rd in my age group! I couldn’t have asked for a better race to follow Chicago’s disappointment.

Moral of the story

Here I am, literally on the flight to my next marathon – Mountains 2 Beach – reflecting on how the last year of racing has gone for me. The lesson I’ve learned is to set the goal, but don’t marry the expectation. When I got into running marathons, my goal was to run one in all 50 states (something my friend reminded me when I was sitting on the ground in front of the port-o-potty in Chicago).

As I started getting faster, I started wanting to set time goals. However, I’ve had to remind myself that every one of my 50 marathons doesn’t need to be faster than the one before it. Above all, I want to see the world while running, discover new places, meet new people, and to talk my friends into joining me for either miles or cheer or beers at the finish.

Mountains 2 Beach Goals

I have no clue how marathon Number 5 will end, but I am confident I can cross the finish line! I do not have any expectations on how it will end. Whatever the outcome, I hope that it is more like the Flying Pig and the Zydeco half! I am traveling again with my friends Loraine & Ruthie, their daughter Amelia, and my (second biggest fan) Kevin. Therefore, I want to enjoy my people, enjoy the miles, enjoy the mountains, enjoy the beach, and, hopefully, enjoy another finish line!