CA Notice at Collection, Deena Kastor, 46, was comforting her eight-year-old daughter, Piper, on the sidelines. It was cold and drizzling outside, and Piper was worried that her mom would slip and fall in the race.
“I told her to not worry, because even if I did fall, I’d get right back up on my feet and keep going,” Kastor told Runner’s World. “Running Shoes - Gear.”
Unfortunately, the rain intensified once the race kicked off. But the wet and chilly conditions didn’t bother Kastor too much, since she’d trained through a particularly snowy winter at her home in Mammoth Lakes, California. Plus, Kastor said, no race day weather could be worse than last year’s Boston Marathon, Mammoth Track Club.
“It was rainy and windy in Tokyo, but it didn’t seem too bad at first,” Kastor said. “Still, I went into the race with the naive thought that an Olympic Trials qualifying time [of sub-2:45] was in the bag. I figured that on a good day, I could run around 2:30. And even if it was a bad day, I had those extra minutes to make up for it.”
For the first miles of the race, everything was going according to plan, with Kastor splitting 1:17:14 at the half marathon mark. Then around this time, a runner accidentally shoved her from behind, and she tumbled to the ground.
“I was pretty shaken by it,” she said. “At first, I was angry. We had the whole road to run on! But then, while I was lying on the pavement, I was thinking about what I told Piper before the race. I knew I had to get up and keep going. ”
Luckily, Kastor was able to jump up and resume her stride quickly, without any major scratches or soreness. Still, her momentum had been interrupted—and it stalled again when she had to make a bathroom stop a few miles later. Then, right around mile 20, she was knocked to the ground for a second time by an oblivious runner reentering the race course from the side. This time, the fall was much harder to rebound from.
“After the second guy clocked me, I knew I was injured,” said Kastor. “For the last 10K of the race, my knees, hip, and shoulder were sore and stiff, and it was a fight to get to the line. In a good marathon, I hope that I’m fighting in that last 5K, but sometimes it’s a lot more miles than that. I’ve had so many years to respect the marathon distance, and it never gets easier.”
Kastor ended up crossing the Tokyo finish line in 2:51:58, which was far off her goal time. She said she allowed herself to feel angry and frustrated in the finish chute. “You have to give yourself a moment to be upset,” she explained. “I definitely had a pity party in Tokyo. But then I dug myself out of that.”
Kastor’s quick fix for bad race blues? Focusing on the positive, like the fact that she finished 26.2 miles despite the conditions and tumbles she encountered.
“A DNF is an ugly thing,” she said. “The guilt of dropping out of a race is hard to shake. In Boston, I had hypothermia and physically couldn’t go any further, and I still felt guilty for weeks after the race. But in Tokyo, it was just a matter of rising up and fighting. I’m up for that challenge.”
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It’s safe to say that Kastor, who still holds the American record in the marathon (she ran 2:19:36 at the 2006 London Marathon, when she was 33) and won bronze in the marathon at the 2004 Olympics, is still competitive.
But she’s also self-aware. She knows that she’s in her “slower stage” of running now, and that while her life is still dedicated to the sport—Kastor and her husband, Andrew, coach the Mammoth Track Club Watch: The simple tweak that extended Deena Kastors running career Asics ambassador—her days are filled with much more than miles nowadays. Faster, more efficient speed workouts and tempos give her more time to spend cross-country skiing and snow-shoeing in the woods with Piper, she said.
“I don’t think I’m ever going run 2:19 again, or be able to run 140 miles a week like I did 20 years ago,” said Kastor, whose weekly mileage now hovers between 100 and 110. “But I can still push myself in the same way as I get older. I still approach racing and training in the same way. I just have different fitness and time goals in mind.”
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As for her next race, Kastor’s considering running this fall’s Berlin Marathon, the last on her Abbott World Marathon Majors bucket list. She’s excited to start training again this summer, and is also eager to see how the Aging Doesnt Slow Your Running Down That Much keeps improving.
“It’s stunning, the depth the men’s and women’s field in our country right now,” she said. “I’m excited to watch them succeed. They inspire me to keep pushing every day.”
All About 75 Hard Running Times, and now she reports on elite runners and cyclists, feel-good stories, and training pieces for Runner's World and Bicycling magazines.
