My plan was to sit down and give a detailed race report.

I love replaying a race (good or bad) with an eye towards what I liked and what I didn’t; what I did well, and where I can improve for the next race.

But here it is, 30 hours after I crossed the finish line, and I’ve discovered that I’m missing huge chunks of my memory from yesterday.

I can’t remember specific details about the race.  I can remember passing by mile markers yesterday and making mental notes to put this or that on the blog when I get home, but now that I’m here in front of my computer, I’ve become painfully aware that I left a huge number of brain cells on the hills of Derry. NH.

Yesterday’s race has become a mental kaleidoscope of hills, ice, sweat and pain.

Some things that I do remember:
I remember being cold.

I remember the volunteer’s warning at mile 5 to save something for the hill at mile 12.

I remember being scared because the hill at mile 5 made my quads twitch and my butt pucker.

I remember wishing I was Keith, bum ankle & all, handing out water @ mile 6.

I remember thinking I was going blind – wondering why everything was blurry,  and then realizing it was because of the ice crystals on my eye lashes.

I remember walking up a hill around mile 10.5.

I remember still walking up the same hill around mile 12.

I remember wishing for a third pair of gloves around mile 14.

I remember wanting to punch the person who’s sarcastic sense of humor advertised this race as “moderately challenging.”

I remember dreaming up excuses why I wouldn’t be able to run Stu’s 30K in March (pregnant, hemorrhoids, spastic colon …  anything would be better than facing another potentially frigid race).

I remember the finish line and the impossibly long line for food afterwards.

I remember eating Pizza Hut two pieces at at time back at our friends house in Goffstown and thinking that I had died and gone to pizza heaven.  The chefs @ the Hut had created the perfect pie ever sold in the Granite State, and they saved it especially for me.

Everything else from yesterday –> specifics from the race, a post-race shower, the 140-mile drive back to the Cape … it’s somewhere in the cobwebs of my memories.  I have no doubt it will come rushing back if I ever consider putting my body through that torture again.

For now, I have a feeling that I’m better off remembering what I can and filtering out the rest.