The plan had started so well. Everything seemed perfect. My brother, Eric "Blue Steel" Chaney and I decided to sign up for the Martian Marathon April 6, as a good primer for Ironman Lake Placid in July.

We plan to do a number of local races, and this was our first. We trained as often as we could throughout the harsh, cold winter, but things like snow, ice, and the flu often got in the way. Despite that fact, when we were able to get off the treadmill and outside, our training runs were going pretty well, until the week before the race.

"Something happened," he said. He wasn't sure what "something" was, and neither were the doctors. Eric was in the hospital just weeks before the marathon, and was surviving the pain in his legs with the help of Vicadin. I didn't want him to run the race. It wasn't worth the risk, I told him. I wanted him to step out of this one, but the one thing that I both love and hate about my brother is his stubbornness. He wasn't going to listen to anyone but himself.

On the Thursday before the race, Eric called me and said that he was out, that he couldn't run, and he wasn't going to chance it. Finally, sanity had settled into his numb skull. I was glad. I want him by my side at Lake Placid on July 20th. I am extremely excited about doing the Ironman with my brother. The training forces us to see each other; forces us to continue to be the best friends that we have always been. Life goes by too fast and without something like this to bring us together weekly, I'm not sure how often we would see one another. On Saturday he called and told me that he was going to do it. He was feeling better and he was going to give it a shot.

"Let's step down and do the half," I suggested, but he would not hear it. He wanted to give the full a shot. Okay, I figured, if he feels crappy, he'll step out. He's a grown man, at least physically.

In another interesting addition to race day my good friend and business associate, Todd Whyte, was going to be in town for business on Monday and decided to come in a few days early to run the Martian with us."Todd, you tried to run 10 miles last week and had to stop. Are you sure?""It's all good," he replied in classic Todd tone.Todd, a former college football player and current triathlete, has a unique training regimen. The night before a race he watches as many of the Rocky movies as he can while enjoying a beer, a steak, and perhaps a side dish of nachos. He may throw in Vision Quest, or Porky's if he has time."Okay Bro, come on down," I said. It was as if a group of us was going to Cedar Point and Todd decided to come along. Now I had two buddies to worry about.

So we were in. Me, trained up pretty well, my brother Blue Steel, currently injured, and Todd Whyte, pumped up from a night of inspirational cinema. What the hell, let's go run a marathon.Race Day. April 6.I thought everything was perfect. I had trained pretty well, but it was a rough winter. I do have a very-full time job, a family, and I had a pretty good cold for a couple of weeks, but the day of the race, everything seemed perfect. We'd been blessed with a glorious day, we were all together and most importantly perhaps, my legs felt great. Randy Step, race director and local running czar, made a few announcements at 8:00 and cracked a joke. I didn't hear anyone laugh, but perhaps we were all too filled with the pre-race jitters.

At 8:15 Step asked everyone to start lining up, and at 8:30, the race started. I was using my Nike + iPod as a pacer. I had set a goal of just under 4 hours, and 9 minute miles would get me there. I wasn't looking to qualify for Boston, I just wanted to get a good solid marathon under my belt, for both training and confidence.The Nike + iPod has a chip available that fits in your shoe and while providing you with blood pumping music, also keeps track of your pace and mileage. When we started, it told me that I was right where I wanted to be, right around nine minutes per mile. As I was finding my spot in the group, I somehow missed the one mile mark, and I began to panic that the Nike + iPod had somehow mis-calibrated itself, that I was going too slow. So I stepped it up, I put a little more into my pace. As I went past the two-mile mark, I realized that the Nike + iPod was in fact off, but in the wrong direction. I was going too fast-but it felt great.The miles rolled by, one after the other, and nothing hurt, despite the fact that my watch was telling me I was at mile three and I was actually at mile three and a half. I decided to try and hold this pace. Maybe my goal was too conservative, maybe I could blow this four hour pace away, and I did-until about mile eighteen.

As I was reading my watch, calculating my splits by nines, I passed each mile mark, and beat my times, coming in faster and faster. Along the way, my PRs were getting smashed, I ran my fastest 10k, my fastest 10 mile and my fastest half marathon. I still felt good-I was drinking enough, I was eating enough, at least that's what I thought.As I hit the turnaround, I started to see my friends. Behind me. Todd Whyte was first, looking amazingly strong. He was on his longest run ever. Todd and I passed each other as he headed into the turnaround, and we high-fived. We were having a blast. He said something to me, twice actually, that I didn't figure out until later. "Where is your brother?" he asked. Next, I saw Kevin Marinkovich of South Lyon, he looked strong as well, and we too high-fived.

I continued my stride, still feeling like Chris McCormack at Kona, still smacking my nine minute pace right in the face. Suddenly, around mile eighteen, I wasn't hitting my splits, I wasn't making my time. My legs were still moving, my heart felt good and was pumping right around 160 beats per minute, but something was happening. I was slowing down. By mile 20, the doubt began to creep in. Okay, I thought, so you can't hit nines, go for tens. I started calculating the miles with tens and still couldn't hold on. Whatever was wrong was now horribly wrong.

Mr. Chaney, meet "The Wall!"

"Blue Steel" and I had run the Marine Corps Marathon last fall, and I thought that I hit the wall then, but today I understood that I really didn't. When you hit the wall, you know it. As Iron-Jim Dawson says, there is nothing easy about running 26.2 miles, and that's the truth. But hitting the wall is essentially like tossing an anchor out into the concrete, which sucks the life out of your legs, and wreaks havoc on your mind.Around mile 21, I heard someone yell, "C'mon 34 let's pick up the pace." It was Todd, and he was looking strong, surely replaying a scene from one of the Rocky films in his head, and he passed me. I tried to keep up with him, but there wasn't any gas in the tank, and my stomach was starting to feel queasy. Next came Kevin. "You okay?" he asked, as if he knew the answer was not really."Yeah, I think I hit the wall. How are you?" I said as he passed."The wall hit me in the face," he responded, now 15 yards ahead. He didn't look like anything had hit him, except maybe a dose of adrenalin.

There is a moment in every race where it is you versus the race. I had heard that somewhere, perhaps read it, I don't remember. But that moment happened for ma at mile 23.5. I was walking. I was walking right down the middle of the road, right on the yellow stripes. It was just me, and the race. I didn't feel good, I had nothing left and I was staring at 2.5 more miles of yellow stripes and orange cones. I decided that I would beat the race, perhaps stealing a Karate Kid moment from Todd. I would walk to the next aid station and then run in the rest of the way.And that's what I did.As I came to mile 25.5, I heard someone yell, "Tom Chaney, what the hell are you doing back here?" It was Jim Dawsaon, multiple Ironman, he was jogging this one as a trainer for Boston in a few weeks. "I hit the wall," I told him."C'mon, finish with us. Doreen says that the last mile doesn't count." I knew what he meant, but today the last mile counted.I came around, finishing with an injured basketball player from Olivete. I saw my brother. He jogged with me for a few seconds and my first thought was how good he looked. "I ran the half," he told me.I was glad. There is hope."Good job," he yelled, "finish up strong."

I saw my wife and kids as I came across the line in a time of 4:28. I knew I had to be happy with that time. Don't beat yourself up. Don't get down. Todd Whyte, who had never run longer than 14 miles, finished in 4:15. Kevin came in at 4:11. We all should be proud, we learned something today. We learned about our bodies, about life, about what is inside each of us. We asked ourselves if we have what it takes to finish? The answer was yes, today.

Next stop, Running Fit's Trail Marathon on April 27th.

Editor's Note: This is the first in a series of articlesjournaling the training of two"average Joes" as they make their wayto Ironman Lake Placid in July 2008.