Too much information time.
I missed my goal time in my last half marathon and I'm really mad but I haven't told anyone why. The race started at 8 AM. But my daily poop time is about 9 AM. I tried my hardest to push it to 7:45 AM but it just wasn't happening. So I line up at the start line and get going. The first 7 miles were so great. I was way ahead of my goal time, I think to myself that I set way too easy of a pace I'll be more than 5 minutes ahead of it even if I slow a bit after mile 10 (most races I run are 10 miles, it's my favorite distance). But all the sudden I'm running past the 8 mile marker and I start to feel my 9 AM poop coming in right on schedule. But I can push through it, right? Well yeah, mile 9 I'm feeling alright. Mile 10 is the last port-o-potty but I've got this, don't want to lose my time, right!? No. Absolutely wrong because at mile 10.5 I realize every step is basically pushing my entire bowels closer to the point of me shiting myself in front of like 5,000 people.
But I can endure. My athleticism is far beyond just running, I can tighten up and be fine, right?
Wrong.
Because this race is no longer a race of my feet. It's a race of my sphincter holding myself from what would be the absolutely most humiliating moment of my life.
Mile 11.
Hey, I've got an idea. I'll walk for a few minutes, I'm way ahead of my goal time and three minutes of fast walking is like two minutes of running, right? I'll be fine.
Mile 11.2 lets try running again.
Mile 11.25 lets not.
Mile 11.5 Me: can we try running again?
Mile 11.51 Sphincter: not unless you wanna shit yourself.
And so starts 1.5 miles of fast walking. Not because I was too tired, but because I just couldn't chance my poop schedule.
Mile 13: run the last .2 so you don't embarase yourself. Spend the whole time praying you don't shit yourself AT the finish line. I crossed but the real race was the last 200 feet to the bathroom.
Lord help whoever had to clean that port-o-potty. I made it in time, but like damn 13.2 miles of running does nothing good to your digestive tract.
For extra TMI, I was so dehydrated that I drank two bottles of water at the end of the race. Jumped on the train home which was a 25 minute ride normally. Had to jump off the train home to go be sick in a Target. Jumped off the train home again to be sick at a hotel bathroom. Then finally got home and was sick for four hours.
One of my friends who had run a marathon a few weeks prior and was raving about those gatorade jell energy things. It turns out some people have somewhat diuretic reactions to these and you should absolutely not ever ever ever ever ever try those for the first time on a race day. Which I didn't know and tried. I can't image it helped.