A Mistake that I will NEVER Make Again!

Saturday was an interesting day.  I learned a very important lesson about hydration... 
Here's the story:

I set out for an 11 mile run with Polish Josh.  His longest run so far in his training was 8.25 miles, so he was a little nervous.  I had done 10 once before, but I wanted to push to 11 this week just to see if I could.  I know that most 1/2 marathon training plans only go to 10 miles, but I'm a bit anal about being prepared for big events in my life, so I wanted to go into the half knowing I could do it. Only doing 10 and having 3.1 miles left to go on race day just didn't work for me.  I wanted to do 11-12 before the race so that I knew what it was like to hit the wall and push through, but I digress.


The weather was sunny, without a cloud in the sky and around 45 degrees when we set out.  By the time we would finish it would be in the low 50's; great running weather. I drank 24 ounces of water before running, along with a cup of coffee, a vitamin and some peanut butter on wheat toast.  I felt like I had properly hydrated beforehand, even more than I usually do on long run days. 

PJ and I figured out a course so that we could leave our Gatorade/water in the car and circle around at mile 5 and again at mile 9.5.  It seemed like a great plan to me.

Miles 1-5 felt great.  With all the physical pain I'd recently been having, it felt good to run some mileage without something holding me back.  My body felt good and I was in a wonderful mood.  We kept our pace anywhere between 9:30 and 10:30 per mile.  A nice pace that allowed us to chat.  


Around mile 5 we got back to the car and I GU-ed and PJ GU Chomped and drank some Gatorade and then headed back out on the road.  


Miles 6.5-9.5 were the worst miles I have experienced in my running thus far.  It was like a switch went off.  I went from feeling like a million bucks to feeling like complete death.  I was so thirsty and my legs felt like bricks. I just had to get back to the car to get some Gatorade, just a bit more, almost there, one foot in front of the other, push through the wall, etc. That Gatorade tasted amazing.  I gulped some down, caught my breath and then headed back out again.  I almost immediately felt better. I knew the last few miles would be tough, but I wanted to finish the mileage and knew I had it in me to keep going.  I knew it couldn't be worse than the last 3 miles. Josh sped up a bit, and I slowed down a bit.  I had to just take it at my pace and push myself.  I finished feeling fine, even though PJ said I looked like complete death haha.  10:27 average pace.  Not stellar, but not bad for how terrible I felt.

Obviously ignore the pace, PJ was driving when I took the picture

We got back to the car and chugged down some more Gatorade and water.  When I sat down I told PJ I felt a little nauseous. We chatted about how awesome it felt to finish 11 miles and both of us had smiles on our faces.  We felt good and happy.  We also had plans to meet up with an old co-worker of ours for lunch an hour later.  So I walked into the house and drank some more water and then got into the shower.


All of a sudden it hit me.  I couldn't stand up straight in the shower.  I went from freezing cold to boiling hot and unable to catch my breath in the steam. My mouth started to salivate and I knew I was going to be sick.  I was midway through rinsing my hair when I had to jump out of the shower and get to the toilet, fast.  I proceeded to get violently sick.  It was not pretty.  I'm pretty sure I threw up my entire bottle of Gatorade and all of the water I drank. After I finished getting sick, I decided to try rinsing off the rest of the soap and conditioner and got out of the shower as quickly as possible.


With the towel still wrapped around my body, I laid down on my bed and texted PJ to let him know what happened and that I wouldn't be able to go to lunch, and texted Omar to tell him as well (he was at work).  I could barely hold my head up or keep my eyes open.  I curled up in the fetal position under the covers and fell asleep for over an hour. My body just shut down. When I woke up, I felt a million times better.  I knew I needed to eat and hydrate myself.  I made some spinach stuffed tortellini's and drank some electrolyte water and then laid back down on the couch.  I stayed there until Omar got to my house after work at 8:45.  I felt fine, I was just really tired.

I can't lie, that was one of the scariest experiences of my life, especially because I was home alone.  I've never felt so weak in my life, and it just hit me so hard and so fast in the shower.  I'm assuming I was dehydrated from not having drank enough during my run.  I learned a very important lesson about hydration on Saturday and even though I hate running with a water bottle, I will do it anyway, because it's so important to stay hydrated.  Lesson learned, fronds.