2012 Derby Festival Marathon

The original plan for this race was concocted last fall and Rob and I had planned on running it together. We were going to drive over stay with Joel and participate in the marathon. Well, my work plans changed slightly and I was going to be in Lexington, KY the week before making me unavailable to split resources/driving with Rob so he opted to save Kentucky for later.

Joel next to the course map.

My good friend and co-worker Lynn loaned me her car to drive over to Joel's place and Joel and I headed in to pick up our race packets on Friday. After an early lunch at Q-doba, Joel and I picked up our packets then walked around downtown Louisville. We stopped by the Louisville Slugger museum and store. We each took turns in the batting cage. It's been awhile since I've hit in the batting cage. We headed back to Elizabethtown and Joel met his sister for a brief visit at the local truck stop (she was traveling with her husband the truck driver). 

KC Maniac and friend Amy Reed (met her in Jackson 1/2012) 

Cade and Adam. I met Cade at Myrtle Beach. Adam is from Springfield, MO

We enjoyed a great meal at Cheddars and went back to his place to chill and get a good night's rest. We headed to the race early Saturday morning and found a parking spot about 3/4 mile from the start. The weather was shaping up to be pretty nice for the day. I hustled to the start for the Maniac picture. There I saw Adam Irvin, Cade Remsburg, Amy Reed, and Tim Nave as well as quite a few other maniacs.

The day was shaping up to be a fun time. I had decided to change my strategy a little. I was going to run 4 minutes and walk 30 seconds. Adam and I talked about how fast he would be running. He had never tried run-walking before.

For the first 13.1 I yo-yoed back and forth with him as we passed the miles. We ran through Churchill Downs at mile 8 and it was pretty cool. The biggest climb in the race came at mile 11.6. This was when I stopped to use the port a potty. After spending about a minute in the port a potty, I was able to charge up the hill and quickly caught up to Adam. The next several miles Adam struggled to keep up with me. I had changed my strategy to 4:1 and around mile 15 Adam caught me and I asked him if he wanted to run/walk with me the rest of the way. He agreed and we had fun running the next 11 miles. I spent time bringing up some good music on Spotify to include the Beastie Boys. Our pace slowed a little, but I was having so much fun that I didn't care about my time. I wanted to get Adam in under his recent best time. 

We came around the corner and I actually did a 360 at the finish line. We came in under 4:20 and he was very pleased.The food at the finish was pretty disappointing. Joel quickly found me and we walked back to the car to head back to Elizabethtown to his place. 

After grabbing a quick shower at Joel's, I drove back to Lexington to where I was staying with Lynn and her husband Dwight. They cooked me an amazing steak dinner and we had some great conversation. Lynn graciously gave me a ride to the airport the next morning. 

That's when the real adventure began. We got fully boarded on my return trip to Chicago. We taxied all the way out to the runway and then they informed us that there was an instrumentation error and that we were returning to the terminal to de-plane. They were canceling our flight because the repairs were going to have to wait for a part to be flown in from Chicago. Due to all of the happenings at Lexington that week, there were no available outbound flights for the next several days. I spent the next 45 minutes on the phone with United trying to secure a way home. I was able to get a flight out of Cincinnati getting me home around 8:15. I had to get a cab (courtesy of United) to drive me the 80 miles from Lexington, KY to Cincinnati. I had plenty of time to spare as my flight didn't leave for another couple of hours. I finally made it back home around 8:15 and Susan was waiting for me at the airport. It was an enjoyable trip but I was glad to be home.