The post-marathon celebration started pretty much as soon as I crossed the finish line. As I'm pretty sure I mentioned in my playlist post, putting on Teenage Dream was my first order of business after finishing. Then I just wanted to dance because I was happy, but I thought these other fatigued strangers would think I'm weird and I guess the movement I considered dancing after 26.2 miles was a bit funky because a few of the finish line workers asked if I was OK.
I made it though most of the chute area, collecting my free beverages (water, Gatorade protein shake, beer) and found Mac. We briefed each other on our races and tried to spot Angela, but we must have missed her because we when finally got hold of her, she was already at gear check. I pretty much "ran" there to meet her. It was obviously more of a shuffle, but I was cruising compared to everyone else because I wanted to be reunited with her after separating around mile 15.
After reuniting with all our fans and hanging out in the park for awhile, it was time to head home for a necessary shower. I was surprisingly mobile and not having as hard of a time getting to the car parked really far away as I did last time I ran Chicago.
I went straight to my bed after showering, but I couldn't fall asleep. "Exercise gives you endorphins; Endorphins make you happy." (Legally Blonde) A few phone calls later and I was at Nookie's with the Conlons for a 4pm champagne brunch.
Yup, that's the cheap stuff. After the brunch dinner, I was tired but we had more celebrating to do. Mac, Drew, Michael, and Angela came over and we sat around, ate, drank a little, talked about the marathon, etc. Then we went to meet up with the Conlons again at Benchmark. We did do a shot there to celebrate, but other than that I think we were all pretty much wiped out and just sat at the table and ate tots with ranch...probably one of the most amazing combos ever.
After making it out of bed successfully without falling over on Monday, I started the day off with Angela at Starbucks, or should I say "Asha."
Then we headed to Fleet Feet. I actually don't remember why we went to Fleet Feet - I think we just had some time to kill - and found they had a bunch of the official Chicago Marathon gear, so we each bought a post-marathon gift for ourselves.
Angela had to head back to St. Louis, but Michael and Drew were still in town, so we met up and went to Moe's for a Mexican lunch and did a lot of walking. Fleet Feet had free medal engraving so we dropped our medals off there and then sat very lethargically in Starbucks for awhile. After they left that afternoon, I lounged for awhile and ordered myself a small Lou's pizza (and no, I didn't eat all of it; I had leftovers for lunch and dinner the next day!)
And for the recovery.....
I was SORE until Wednesday. I considered going to a spinning class on Thursday, but decided I was going to take full advantage of the "I just ran a marathon and need time off" excuse to not work out while I could.
I did short runs of 3 miles each on Saturday and Sunday mornings...and had a fun full day of tailgating and football at Notre Dame with Catherine & friends.
Even though I love UD and the Flyers, it was fun to tailgate for a real college football team.
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