42 before 42.

 Tomorrow I turn 42. One of my goals was to run a marathon (42km) before I turn 42 years old. I've been saying '42 before 42' for a few years. Five years ago in 2020, I signed up to run the BMO marathon. I also signed Simon up without asking him. (It's easier asking for forgiveness than permission, haha). I was training hard for it and in March 2020, just 6 weeks out from race day, COVID changed everything. The BMO marathon, as well as everything else, shut down. I was so disappointed. All those long runs. All that training. The race organizers encouraged everyone to do their own 'virtual marathons' and they would mail participants the medal. Well, it wasn't the marathon I had imagined, but the Covid-edition of my first marathon was amazing. I ran 42.2km with my husband, and since all our friends were trapped inside their houses with nowhere to go, we had so many friends show up along our marathon route, holding signs, banging pots and pans, and cheering us on. We gave socially distanced hugs and high 5's to all our friends along our route and crossed the finish line at Spanish Banks with our kids holding a stream of toilet paper as the finish line. Core memory indeed.

After that amazing experience and running 42.2km together, Simon vowed he would never do a marathon again. Fair enough, I guess he never signed up to do one in the first place. But for me, even though I did run 42.2km in distance, I didn't think it counted as a 'real' marathon. So since 2020, I have wanted another attempt at the BMO marathon 'for real'. I am turning 42 this year, this was THE year to run 42 before 42. I told myself it was my last chance. My swan song. My final bow before I get too old to do it. So I signed up to run the BMO full marathon again and this time it didn't get cancelled. It was a sold-out event, and it was thrilling to run with 25,000 random strangers.

My sister and I ran it together, which was pretty special too. I was wholly fearful of having to use the porta-potty during the race so I tried to drink as little water as possible. Everything was going great for the first half of the marathon. I was LOVING every minute of it. The crowds cheering. The signs. Oh, I love the race signs. Things like "Pain is Tempory, Strava is Forever", "Toenails are overrated", "Pain is only French for bread", and "I carboloaded with you in solidarity". My own son had a sign for me that said, "Not all heroes wear capes, some wear running shoes! You carried me for 9 months, what's a marathon?"  Loved it. So fun. 

However, close to the 30km mark, the lack of water was causing my leg to cramp up and when I stopped to get a pebble out of my shoe, I almost fell over and it was SO hard to keep going but God knew what I needed and when I was mentally struggling, I saw my super-fan family - they biked and cheered me along the last stretch of the race. It was the adrenaline I needed. My sister, who was hydrating properly, even waited for me so we could hold hands and cross the finish line together. Official chip time 4:11:06.

We got our finisher medals and then I went into the medic tent. I thought I might need an IV but they just advised me hydrate so I downed a litre of water and got some muscle gel on my calf. I hobbled over to my cheer squad family. I was so proud that I actually did it. I had eaten so many caffeine energy gels that my heart was racing abnormally fast even after the race, but I was also feeling so depleted. I wanted to jump for joy and collapse and sleep at the same time. 

So bucket list completed. Tomorrow I turn 42, and I am happy to say that I was able to check that box: 42 before 42. And I don't think I will ever run a full marathon ever again.