Running Thread 2014 - Page 31

Slept better than I thought I would–only woke up once, around 3am, worried that the double alarms I set off didn’t work. At 5am, they did. Got up, made oatmeal, drank coffee, felt nervous.

I’d spent the last five months getting ready for this and obsessing about it. I’m not sure why I care so much about running–it would certainly be more socially beneficial to love volunteering, or more profitable to love working overtime–but it seems that I do. During my run on Saturday, it finally hit me that I was as ready as I would ever be and that agonizing further would not be constructive.

In light of this, after my shakeout run yesterday, I’d asked my dad and my girlfriend, who traveled with me to the race, not to discuss it with me. This made conversation around the breakfast table a little awkward, but that soon passed and we headed out into the morning gloom.

Waiting for the train to the start line, we fell into conversation with two locals on their way to the race. They were wearing garbage bags, I suppose to keep warm, though Portland has been so hot this week (about 29 C or 84 F high each day) that they seemed unnecessary to me. The couple were lovely and friendly, though, just like almost everyone else in the city. When my girlfriend finishes her residency in 2016, there’s an outside chance we’ll have to move to the States. I would not mind living in Portland. Everyone is friendly and the place seems positively magical.

Then off the train, two or three block walk to the starting pen. I’d planned on a 20 minute warmup (jog for 5, stretch for 10, jog for 5 with a few race-pace accelerations), but that got shot to pieces when I entered the pen. Forty minutes before the start, the place was jammed like a sardine tin. Stood in line to pee for 20 minutes, spent another 10 getting my watch to sync, and realized I wouldn’t get to warm up at all. So I just stretched my achilles tendons and my neck a bit and tried to stay calm.

Wound up standing next to an older dude with a BMI of about 30 who told me he was running his 51st marathon and hoped to finish in five hours. When I asked him how he got into the “A” corral with an ETA like that, he said he knew the race director. I asked him for Portland advice and he said “I don’t really have any. There really aren’t any hills on this course.” My online research made me think this was wrong–Portland’s course has a very famous ascent to the St. John’s suspension bridge over the Wilamette River around mile 17. His words would turn out to be wrong, but not for the reasons I suspected.

Then a bunch of Yanks sang the national anthem and the wheelchair racers went off and then we got going.

I’m told that there are two certainties in life: death and taxes. I submit that the list needs an addition: starting too fast in a race.

Here, in the “A” corral, where the most experienced runners gather, everyone went out like bats out of hell. I tried to hold back a bit, but for the first 800m or so you’re pinned in like a buffalo in the middle of a stampeding herd. It didn’t help matters any that the race organizers put the first two musical acts in this section, and they both went in for lots of fast-paced drumming.

But things thinned out reasonably, right around the time I saw my dad and girlfriend for the first time. The course peeled out onto an uphill section next to the Wilamette, under overpasses and past big cheering crowds. We climbed for about 4k, which went fine. I was right around my goal pace and feeling good. Then we turned around and came back down. In retrospect, this is where I sowed the seeds of my later suffering.

I consciously tried to float down this prolonged, gentle downhill, letting gravity do some of the work while not attacking in any sense. But I hadn’t really practiced running at race pace going down a hill at any point in training. I hadn’t thought it was necessary. So I went a little faster than I meant to coming down here, passing a guy and closing in on the lead pack more than I wanted to. By the time things leveled out around 9k, the watch read 3:35/km, five seconds faster than I wanted to.

The doubling-back of the course also let me see the later waves getting going here. An absolutely mind-boggling number of people ran this race. I can’t imagine what the experience in Boston or New York or Chicago or Berlin is like.

The course leveled out here, and I settled in a bit, pulling things up to 3:38/km. The dude I passed came back up and we chatted for 5k or so. He told me he was shooting for a 2:40. Then a guy running the half in a Reed College singlet came by and I latched onto him until about 18k where the half and full courses split.

This bit goes into an industrial area, which would have been a bit boring if not for the gorgeous weather and the on-course entertainment. We ran past a bitchin’ funk band promoting gay rights and then, right after, an evangelical Christian gospel band. I thought the organizers probably had a good laugh when they made that decision. Then we hit the pirates, who were just a bunch of middle-aged people in really awesome pirate costumes. Lots of people on the course were trying to promote their radio station or their fitness business or their particular flavour of eternal salvation, but the only thing the pirates wanted us to do was “run, ye scurvy dogs!”

I liked them.

Then I saw my girlfriend and dad for the second last time before finishing. The course split so I lost my running buddies and I went off on my own to face the second half of the course.

It started out pretty well. The course wound through a beautiful neighbourhood with lots of fans, including one group that gave me a raucous cheer, and a couple sweet conver bands. My watch still said 3:38/km and I felt good, though a little worried about my effort level. My plan was to coast through the first half, make of focused effort to stay on pace for the next quarter, then give’er for all I was worth in the last quarter.

I felt like I was a little ahead of this schedule as the mileage got into the low 20k range. The course left the cozy neighbourhood and hit another industrial stretch, this one next to a highway. There were several gentle climbs here, but it was pretty flat on the whole.

The long site lines of the highway let me spot another runner in a neon singlet ahead of me. Without consciously deciding to, I reeled him in over about 3k, riding his shoulder until we hit the hill going up to St. John’s. We passed a Scottish band here, with two dudes puffing for all they were worth on the bagpipes. Turned out they were worth quite a bit.

As we went by, I thought about saying to my companion the old definition of a gentlemen (i.e. someone who knows how to play the bagpipes but does not), but something held me back. I was worried he would just look at me with disdain. Lots of people who run about as fast as I do seem to take things very seriously. I remember reading an essay once written by a runner of about my ability who had, by winning some race or other, gotten to run at an elite-only event and hang out with the people run seriously fast. The writer reported that real elites are much less uptight than sub-elites, who are too often, let’s face it, absolute assholes. This thought held me back.

We passed a gaggle of military people in camouflage and a sign reading “YOU ARE NOW ENTERING CHECKPOINT CHARLIE” and started going up. For my medium-long and long runs in training, I’d hit this hill in Edmonton coming out of Emily Murphy Park. It’s a pretty gnarly switchback that climbs around 70m over about 500m. I’d go up the hill with about 4k to go to home, but I worried all summer it wouldn’t be enough. Turned out it was too much: the dreaded St John’s hill was a very gentle incline for about half a mile, and that was pretty much it.

I’d dropped the neon singlet runner on the climb, though not from a conscious attack or anything. As I hit the sharp right turn at the end of the bridge, I could hear footsteps and heavy breathing behind me, and I thought he had picked it up and closed the gap. These footsteps shadowed me for a little bit, and then a voice said “Ah, I was kind of getting used to that nice downhill.”
I turned and saw a new face–shaved head, sunglasses, knee socks, and a singlet that said “Bowerman” down the back. I’m able to describe the back of his shirt because, shortly after this, he passed me. My legs felt heavier than I wanted them to at this point (around 26k), though my watch read 3:40/km–right on pace.

The Bowerman runner pulled away gradually. He seemed like a good pacer and I tried to keep him in sight, but I was getting tired. The course returned to a neighbourhood here, and crowds came back with it. As they cheered me on and called out my name, raising my hand to wave felt hard. Smiling was hard.

A little way past 32k, the course hit a prolonged descent on a freeway. The Bowerman runner disappeared and left me in my own private world of pain. As I went down the freeway, my hamstrings started to spasm in a way they had not for years. It reminded me of my days playing basketball, when my legs would sometimes lock up totally after a hard practice, and I would lie in bed, unable to move, and bite the pillow so I didn’t scream.

It started in my right leg, near where my hamstring meets my butt. I tried to ignore it, but every couple minutes, it would tweak again, a little stronger and a little scarier. They started in my left leg. If both legs locked up a the same time, I would collapse on the road. There was no one around. It seemed so strange: the course was jammed with people in so many places, but here, where I might need someone to pick me up and try to gather my teeth before they rolled too far away, I was on my own.

I decided that running 2:40 was better than trying to force a 2:35 and DNFing. I stopped to stretch. This helped a bit, though I could feel my body start to kind of congeal as soon as I wasn’t moving. It felt like my system was ready to shut down the second I stopped moving, so I gingerly pressed on, trying to ease back into something like race pace again.

Toward the end of the interminable descent, I almost went off the course. I only ate 10 gummy bears and about four Dixie cups of water for the race, and I think the lack of calories really started to weigh on my brain here.

Where the course passed a freeway exit, the marking wasn’t totally clear and there was no volunteer to keep me on course. I climbed about a third of the way up the exit before I noticed a group of people walking the marathon on the road down below. I asked them where the course was and they said it was down with them.

I said some bad words, swung my legs over the metal railing, and lowered myself onto the road. My legs really, really didn’t like this. I said some more bad words, stretched for a few seconds, and staggered on.

A little later, at around 37k, I hit the last climb of the race: a short ascent onto a bridge over the Wilamette. I hauled my sorry ass onto the bridge and tried to push for the finish. I passed my dad, who was taking pictures, and all I could manage was a kind of half-grimace.

Back in downtown Portland, the marathon course rejoined the half route. There were lots of people cheering and lots of people I had to pass. I brushed a couple accidentally. I saw a guy dressed as Darth Vader, riding a unicycle, and playing the bagpipes. A cyclist almost ran me over.

In my half-crazed state, I realized I had about 10 minutes to run two kilometres if I wanted to get under 2:40. I couldn’t help laughing a bit at this. Two 5:00/k! How had it come to pass that this, which usually was as easy as blowing my nose, now seemed like one of the labors of Hercules? After two previous marathons, I thought I knew how to handle the distance, but Portland taught me that I still have much to learn. I saw my girlfriend in the crowd for the last time. She cheered wildly and lifted my spirits, but all I could do was kind of raise my eyebrows and open my mouth.

I eventually staggered over the finish with 2:39:something showing on the clock. Going into this, I thought I had the strength to challenge 2:35 or maybe run 2:34:xx on a really great day. I’m proud I hung on to break 2:40 (and set a new PB after going 2:54 two years ago on a much easier course), but also a bit embarrassed that I ran such a foolish race. I went out too fast and didn’t eat or drink anywhere near enough.

My condition immediately after the race and one day later both speak to this. I was absolutely wiped out for two or three hours after the race. I was hungry but could not eat, thirsty, but could not drink, and tired, but could not sleep. I eventually had a bit of a nap and then water started to taste good again. Today I feel pretty good, with the exception of my quads, which seem to have been replaced with a cheap cardboard substitute when I wasn’t paying attention.

So I don’t think I ran as fast as I could have, but I still went faster than I’ve ever done. And I’ve got some truly world-class beer and dining to enjoy while I mull things over and think about what marathon I’ll run next year.