We made our way quickly down Main street in Speedway, which had the most spectators thus far and rounded the turn onto 16th street and very quickly made the turn to head down the hill and back up into the Indianapolis Motor Speedway grounds. We went up the hill and there were a group of cheerleaders waiting for us and cheering people on, which we soon found there were cheerleaders nearly all the way around the track cheering for all the participants.
Here at the track we had our second hitch of the day as Steve needed to make a pit stop and he got in line for the port-o-lets and I kept on going, as he said he'd catch up to me. So we kept right on moving and had just merged onto the track itself when a young girl was doing something silly up higher on the track, to my right and she spun around and came down in front of us. She wound up between Rei and I, so I dropped the harness handle to keep from getting my arm yanked off and she was somewhat tangled in the leash. She apologized profusely and I said no problem and as soon as she was clear, picked up the handle and we kept on going. Steve came up behind us pretty quickly after that, a little out of breath as he was jogging it to catch up with us. LOL!
So we worked our way around the track and it was pretty fun, as the cheerleader groups got really loud and were a lot of fun as they noticed Rei and were specifically cheering us on. It was on the track that I started to feel the blisters form. I think it was from the angle of the track, but I was determined to walk through them and we did! We got around to the straight away and Steve let me know that they took pictures as you cross the bricks, so I took my wrap-around sunglasses off and put them on my hat and turned the hat around too so I didn't look quite like a Dude in the pics. The sun actually made a peek from behind the clouds about this time too, which was nice and the within the track it was really nice to be protected from the winds that had been blowing so hard all morning. So we made our way on around and I was feeling pretty good at this point and we were just past Mile 7 and then we went out onto an access road and down around the end of the Grandstands along 16th street. We did a sharp turn off of this road and around the corner out onto 16th street and a guy came running over to the curb, peering to read my bib- as the bibs have your number, your first name, and the corral you started in. He immediately yells back to a woman, I assume his wife, "IT'S KACIE!!!!!" and runs to her and as we round the corner there is a dark hard lady with a camera snapping all kinds of pictures and screaming at the top of her lungs "GO KACIE & REI!!!!"
I later learned from Mike that our good friends Julie and Suzette had arrived at the finish line/Military Park about this time and as they were walking around that they heard my voice and looked up on the large screens and the interview was being aired at that time. So while I don't think it was someone I knew - though it very well could have been since I was trying to focus on Steve in front of me and the terrain we were going over at the time, but it could have been too the person had just seen the story on the big screen that Mike said was there at the end of the grandstands too and then we came around the corner. But that was kind of a surprise as it happened and Steve and I got a little bit of a chuckle out of it.
We then quickly turned onto Olin Ave and there were several turns to negotiate here and it was obvious that people were starting to get tired and slowing down, as we seemed to start passing more and more people at this point. We then passed the 15K marker which is 9.1 miles and I was telling myself OK, 3 more miles! and was feeling pretty good. We turned left onto 10th street and the 10 mile marker, people were really starting to slow down, so we walked a good ways down the middle of the street where it was more open and not as many people to fight to get around. As we approached the 11 mile marker, Rei then started pulling hard to the left side, as that meant one of two things. She was really starting to get tired or she was needing bathroom stop. She wasn't indicating the latter so we moved to the left and she really began to slow down. I told Steve to slow the pace a bit as we'd been moving along at about a 15 minute mile pace most of the way after mile 4ish and I was trying to watch for her cues and such.
I had arranged with our small group friends, Joe and Julia to be just past mile marker 11 across from the water station, however they had water stations on both sides and we missed them. Which since Rei was really sagging at this point I was looking hard for them as they had a banana and a bowl of water for her, but alas it wasn't meant to meet up. They were looking for us too and missed us as well since we were on the other side of the road from them. Steve and I did grab water from the water station and stopped and gave her water as she was panting pretty good. We were soon rounding the corner to head back onto White River Parkway - along the river and Rei pulled real hard to the left and to the grass indicating that she did need a bathroom break, which upon taking the harness off, she really had to pee. She seemed good so we harnessed up and she took off at full speed again so I thought we were going to make it to the end without another stop, but just before the 12 mile marker, she pulled over again needing to finish the job. So once done with that, she was ready to move again and was feeling much better.
Mile Marker 12 was right before the left hand turn onto New York Street- the last stretch to the finish line! We rounded the corner and went over the bridge and she started pulling to pass people again, which the break in the stops she needed to make did us both good to rest even for those short periods of time. So we head over the bridge and walk down the middle of the street again as people could see the finish line so they were pushing hard and then very soon running out of gas as they had just over a mile left to go. We maintained a steady pace and had 3/4's of a mile left and Rei started to slow down as Steve was walking on my right side and she was becoming lax in where she was headed. I asked Steve to move to Rei's left side just at her head and she immediately picked up pace as she now was following him with a sense of direction on where she was to head. So we plugged on full speed ahead at back to the mile eating 15 min mile pace again. Soon we were down to 1/4 mile left and there were people on both sides and Mike was to our right yelling out to us that we were almost there and he followed us along. People were yelling and cheering as we approached the finish line and I honestly couldn't believe we'd did it!
Julie and Suzette had come down- to have stuff for Rei once we finished and she got some pictures as well as Steve's wife of us approaching the finish line. Here we are nearly there:
Mike, Rei and I together
Distance HALF MAR
Clock Finish Time 3:46:21
Chip Finish Time 3:22:25
Gender Place 13498th place of 16574 female participants
Division Place 2379 / 2767
Age Grade 32.8%
Overall place 26929 of 30994 finishers
Ctz US
5Mile time 1:14:23
10Mile time 2:30:10
Division FEMALES 30-34
Divt 2767
Sext 16574
