Some more Mohican Trail marathon talk!

Here’s the aftermath of Mohican Trail marathon for me…

1.  A big blister under my big toenail.  Not a blood blister, just regular clear fluid.  I smacked my toe one too many times on the rocks!  I keep draining it, but still not sure if I’ll be losing it or not.  I tried poking a hole through it with hot paperclip, but nothing really drained and the pressure is still there.  So boo to that!!!
2. A raging case of POISON IVY RASH.  Oh yes, my arch enemy the poison ivy.  To keep it to a minimum graphic description, I’ll just describe it as “large and oozing”.  Remember I said “I’ll take my chances” about wearing the compression sleeves?  Turned out that might not have even mattered because the rash is across my lower back, and up my side.  No spots on my legs at all!!  I have no idea why I get the rash in odd places like that.  I NEVER exposed those parts of my body to the wilderness.  Heck, I didn’t even GO to the bathroom once in that entire marathon!

In case you missed it, you can see my full race recap here!

Before the race we went to pre-race Q & A meeting.  It was really geared for the “important” 50 & 100 mile runners instead of the marathon runners, but it’s a fun gathering, and it’s a must that I arrived there early to get a race shirt that fit correctly.

…and did I mention there was free beer from Great Lakes Brewery??  Why yes, I will have 2 or 3!

Here’s a fun story about that night before the race… we went to visit our friends in the neighboring campground.  When it was time to go home, we tried a path in the woods between the two campgrounds.  The challenging part was that we had rode our bikes, and it was pitch dark out.  Luckily I had my iPhone as our guiding light.   As I was walking my bike through the hilly single track path, I turned around to catch a glimpse of Alan flying down the trail on his bike, missing the turn, and landing head over feet in the bushes!!  Luckily the worst that happened was a scraped knee.  Apparently all of those free beers made him think riding his bike was a good idea 🙂

During the race we found a few special things in the trees – some gnomes!  Alan could not resist touching them.  My favorite is the dinosaur eating the gnome.

Guess what – Mohican still gives out “normal” size race medals!  Medals are getting so big and blingy these days, and although that is cool, some good old fashion “regular” size ones are pretty great too.  I didn’t even realize that we were going to get medals because I had never seen anyone finish other than the 100 milers – who got belt buckles!

And the night after the race – I had vivid dreams of continuously running through the woods on the trails!  I felt like I hadn’t slept at all because I couldn’t get that image out of my mind!  You’d think I would have been much more tired after the race.

On the way home from the camping weekend, Alan and I treated ourselves to some huge ice cream cones.  I rarely say things like this – but those were actually too much ice cream!!  But they were good.

All in all, it was a very fun “adult” weekend.  My parents were supposed to be camping with us, to watch the kids, but my Dad had another knee surgery so the kids didn’t come with us.  My Dad is recovering from this surgery pretty good so far, although he has to wear a brace and can’t bend his knee for 6 weeks!  That’s a long time to be doing nothing in the summer.

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Q:  Have you ever had to wear a brace, or cast?

Worn a boot for a stress fracture, but have never broken anything else.

Q:  Are you allergic to poison ivy?

I catch it every time the wind blows the wrong way!!

Q:  How’s your toenail count this summer – are you sporting all of them??