and are reflecting on their Chicago Marathon run — and how it ended with a trip to the hospital.
“We are not having the morning after that we were expecting to have after a marathon,” Robach, 51, said on the Monday, October 14, episode of the “Amy & T.J.” podcast. “Usually it’s celebratory, it is filled with relief and exuberance and gratitude. We have some of those things going on but we have a lot of disappointment as well but a lot of gratitude.”
Robach explained that the morning of Sunday, October 13, got off to a rocky start, with no water, food or bathroom trips before the race because she and Holmes could not locate their tent. While the twosome surprised themselves by being OK at the beginning of the race, things took a turn later on.
At the halfway point of the race (13.1 miles), Holmes, 47, explained that he nearly collided with a man who was walking on the course.
“I catch myself with my right leg going down and, when I do it, I immediately feel the tweak in my right hip and kind of my right buttcheek,” he said, explaining he suffered a previous issue with his IT band.
While Robach saw the moment, she didn’t know something went wrong with Holmes until miles later when he was running behind her.
“You were literally grunting in pain,” she said. “That was something completely new to me. I thought, ‘Oh my God, I can’t believe he’s in that much pain.’”
The pair ultimately called the race quits around mile 21 after Holmes could feel his knee swelling. Holmes was also suffering an injury on his left achilles, which he had been dealing with for the past few months. After Robach and Holmes stopped running, surrounded by a police officer and marathon volunteer, he began vomiting on the street — and the paramedics decided to call an ambulance.
“You looked awful. You were so pale. You were shivering and shaking because you’ve got this wet, sweaty clothing on and now the wind is whipping,” Robach recalled of Holmes in the ambulance. “Then you started vomiting again. They wanted to take you to the hospital at that point.”
The ambulance turned on the sirens and Holmes recalled one of the paramedics being “quite concerned” about his health. They ultimately transported Holmes to a medical tent, where Robach and the two paramedics “assisted” him since she knew he would refuse a stretcher.
While they were waiting for their Uber to take them back to their hotel, one last thing went wrong. “All of a sudden T.J. looks at me and he says, ‘Robes, you gotta help me.’ I was like ‘What?’ He was like, ‘A bird just s— on my head,’” she said. “Sure enough, you were wrapped around in this hospital blanket, I look and you just have bird crap on your forehead going down.”
Robach called the moment the “cherry on top of a rough day.”
Holmes got emotional while expressing his thanks to Robach for her support. “You performed in a way yesterday that was — I can’t think of anyone besides my mom who has taken that kind of care for me when I was desperate,” he said while getting choked up.
Holmes said Robach “not just helped,” but “sacrificed something that was very important” to her by taking herself out of the race to aid her boyfriend.
“I was begging you to keep running, keep running when I knew I couldn’t keep running,” he said. “You stuck with me and you were fully trained for a marathon and you could’ve finished. You did not finish because of my bum ass yesterday. I loved you before we started, I didn’t know how possible it was to love and adore you possibly more.”
Robach, for her part, said it “wasn’t even an option” to not stay by his side. “That is what love is. And if you didn’t know or you didn’t fully trust how much I love you, if anything, if yesterday proved that to you, then it was worth it,” she said.
Now, Holmes has his eyes set on his next competition — the New York Marathon on November 3. “I cannot wait to get back out there because I’m so frustrated with what happened here in Chicago,” he said.
Robach isn’t slated to run New York but now she’s contemplating joining to complete another race. While she’s game to continue running half marathons, Robach envisioned Chicago being her last marathon.
“I had said that I was thinking the Chicago Marathon might be my last marathon, because it does take a toll on your body,” she said.
