In the picture to the right my teammates and I joined hands and listened to our honorees speak. At this point, Mark Zafra, had just given us a boost of motivation by inspiring us and telling us how much it means to him that we have had a hand in saving his life. Mark has been in remission since 2005 and has survived Hairy Cell Leukemia. I honored Mark during my race by wearing his picture on my race singlet.
Don't know if you can tell but I was getting teary-eyed also thinking of my personal honoree Socorro Jauregui who passed away earlier this year.
By-the-way, the two guys next to me are soooo fast. Wish I could keep up with them.
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Our last team picture before the race. There I go at just over 3 miles. Feeling so fresh and so clean.  This is Skyline Gate. By now I've ran about 15.5 miles and feeling good. My Coach Mark told me to slow it down for the next 5 miles so that I'd have a lot of energy for the last 8-10 miles. Supposedly those were the easiest miles of the race. I took his advice and ralked the hills. |
Finally, my victory lap! As soon as I heard the crowd cheering for me across the lake I sprinted to the finish line. I couldn't wait to stop running. Although the last 8-10 miles were supposed to be the easiest, they were definitely the hardest. It's an extremely challenging goal and all you have is your mind to get you through it.
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| GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAL! |
Mental toughness is what it's all about. This is exactly what I was thinking. Why am I doing this again? Who can I think about? How many more miles? Why do I feel like this? Did I eat enough? Did I eat too much? Should I drink more water? When will I get to the finish line? How much longer is this going to take? It's so hot. I'm emotionally drained. My body is tired. I can do it. Just keep going. You can do this. You're almost there. Oh my God...I'm almost there. Just 5 more miles. I'm hyperventilating. I'm going to start to cry. No...concentrate. Wait till you get to the finish then you can cry all you want. You can do this Margarita. Mama Lisa had us do more challenging runs than this. Oh my God. There's Shawn. Good thing. Even though I'm fading and it's my last 1.25 miles I see someone I know. Shawn was great. He kept talking to me even though I wasn't talking back.
Although you probably can't tell from the picture above, I did cry. It was great proving to myself that I could do it. Everything that I was taught for the last 7 months finally came together and just like that, it was all over.
I'd like to leave this Ultra Journey with a few last thoughts. An honoree I've know for a while now, Justin, was wearing a shirt that I thought was appropriate for this event. The shirt read,
"If you think an endurance event is tough, try chemotherapy".
A MILLION THANK YOU'S TO EVERYONE WHO SUPPORTED ME THROUGH THIS. EVERYTHING COUNTS. YOUR DONATIONS IN CASH OR TIME AND YOUR LOVE, THOUGHTS AND PRAYERS ARE OUT OF THIS WORLD.
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