Boston Marathon: Fueled by Liquid Schwartz

Okay, I'm going to try to keep this one relatively short. The problem is that I had SEVEN AWESOME PEOPLE DONATE FOR THE BOSTON MARATHON. So between the greatness of my fabulous siblings/siblings-in-law/niece, and the amazingness that was Boston Marathon 2012 this will be hard.

To start BIG thanks to Michelle, Carolyn, Elaine, Pete, Mike, Derek, and Lindsay! You guys are amazing. I couldn't ask for better people in my life.

Growing up with my 3 older sisters and little brother was an interesting experience to say the least - probably more so for Pete than the rest of us... Our childhoods consisted of a lot of kickball/wiffle ball in the back yard, frequent viewings of quality movies such as Spaceballs, productions of plays for our parents (...did anyone else notice that they tended to be written, casted, directed, and starring Michelle?), and lets not forget the amazing Christmas movies we made for mom, under the careful guidance of dad. Seriously, we NEED to get those converted to DVDs. Somewhere, there is a market for those gems.

Needless to say, Mike and Derek are brave men for deciding to become a part of this crazy family, and I'm very happy to be able to call them my brothers-in-law. I know we (or at least I) can be a lot to handle and I think they enjoy the shenanigans, or at least pretend to very well! I don't think Lindsay is aware of her amazing genetics/environment yet, but nature or nurture, that girl is going to be a champ.

Oddly enough, running was not part of our young lives, except for monster tag on the front porch, and by default in various sports. But in the past couple of years, we've all embraced it. Last summer, we had our first annual Kratz 5K in Cape May. Unfortunately, I will be missing the second annual, since I will be in Tanzania for it. I will be attempting to run a 5K on the same day though... we'll see how that pans out. All of the genetic siblings and I (and our parents!) did the Ragnar Relay Florida Keys in January of this year, in the second appearance of team Ludicrous Speed!

I'd photoshop Derek and Mike and Lindsay in, but I'm not good at computer stuff...

This is the closest I have to all of us... 

I think we need to get a full family picture at some point...

Obviously, getting full family pictures is difficult for us... Michelle, Mike, Lindsay, Carolyn, and Derek are in the Philly area, Elaine recently moved from Florida to Arizona, Pete goes to school in New York, and I'm up in Boston.

So, as you may already know, yesterday was a bit unseasonably warm. The Boston Athletic Association was encouraging people to run slower than planned or even defer until next year. To put this into perspective: Boston NEVER lets people defer. This was serious. Last year, I was so cold walking to the starting line that a stranger gave me his space blanket going "You need this more than me." This year, I'm pretty sure I was sweating before we started walking from the Athletes' Village to the start line.

About 5 miles in, I was paced for a PR. Usually that would be good. But it was hot out, and I had been training in snow. I turned my head too fast at one point and got lightheaded. That was when I decided I had to really hold back. Luckily I had a great finishing time in Philly this past fall, so time wasn't a concern, because I had my qualifying time for 2013 already. The volunteers and spectators were great yesterday. There were water and Gatorade stops just about every mile, and then spectators were handing out ice and more water too. I had some boombas along the way (that's what Pete used to call them). And when I remembered, I yelled "LIQUID SCHWARTZ" at water and Gatorade stops, per the request of my lovely donors.

Once I had thrown any goals out the window (I decided that a PR was impossible, and a decent time was much better than a DNF), I started actually enjoying the race. I was running on Schwartz and high fives (and GU). I managed to see a lot people who had come out to see me and other people on my Back on My Feet team, and even remembered to yell a "Happy birthday!" to Noelle's mom! My parents, aunt, and friend Katie were all at the top of heartbreak with sweet signs, and I saw them too! At that point I felt like a million bucks. And then... I just about hit the wall.

The last four miles or so were brutal. I have never wanted to quit so badly in my life. Around mile 24, when I'm usually flying and feeling like a rock star, and I wanted to just sit down and cry. So instead of thinking about how my quads were on fire and every step hurt, I thought about my siblings/siblings-in-law/niece, and how much I wanted to be able to tell them that I managed to stick it out and finish strong. It probably wasn't the prettiest finish, and it wasn't my fastest, but it also wasn't my slowest! I crossed the finish line in 3:34:10 - still a BQ (although barely...)! Another BOMFer was watching at the finish line and managed to snap a picture... you can tell I was very happy to be done and seeing a familiar face... or I was delirious.

Not only did I manage to finish despite the heat, but so did everyone else from my BOMF team! We were all hobbling, sunburned, and tired, but so happy when we saw each other afterwards!

So a big thank you to everyone who made yesterday so awesome, especially Michelle, Carolyn, Elaine, Pete, Mike, Derek, and Lindsay! Even though you guys couldn't make it to Boston, you were in my thoughts and really helped me finish at the end! Love you guys!!!

Natalie