November 11, 2007
NYC Marathon 2007: Ouuuuuch
DisclaimerBefore we even get started here, I'll just get this out of the way: No, I did not see Katie Holmes on the course. Yes, I know we ran about the same time, but from the pictures I saw, she was starting in the elite women's corral whereas I was in the back of the green corral. What does that mean? It means that due to the wave start that the green corral had, she started the race a good 35 minutes before I did, so I never would have seen her. Although, knowing me, I could have been standing next to her in the start corral and would have found myself thinking, "Huh, that girl looks sort of like Katie Holmes. Go figure." I'm just on top of things like that.
Getting There
My training for this race, was, shall we say, somewhat inconsistent. Through circumstances that were either entirely under my control or entirely of my own creation, I wound up either skipping or cutting short a lot of my long runs. This meant that by the time the race rolled around, I'd done a bunch of 12-14 mile runs and a 20-mile run. Absolutely nothing in the 16-18 mile range. I had a bad feeling about this, and seriously considered deferring the race until next year when I could go into it better trained. But I was going to be out there anyway, travel and hotel were all set, and my hotel for Saturday and Sunday night had been prepaid so it's not like it would have saved me anything to fly home early. I told myself it would be OK. I kept my fingers crossed that my good looks and charming personality would, combined with my somewhat half-assed training, be enough to at least get me through the race. (And on an easier course, it probably would have been.) As I entered the expo, I took one more serious look at the "cancel" checkbox on my registration confirmation and wondered if I should just bag it. Then I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and traded it in for my number. For better or for worse, I was in.
Race Morning: Getting To The Start
In the weeks before the race, my inbox was filled with messages of increasing urgency from the marathon organization. Construction on the Verazano-Narrows Bridge! Green start corrals will be strictly enforced! Wave start for green runners! Buses may or may not get you there in time! Don't take buses from Midtown! Take the Staten Island ferry! Other buses? Take the ferry! Considering I was spending these weeks counting down to what was going to be a 5-day break from work, I had absolutely no mental capacity to deal with any of this. It all got filed under "things to worry about later," and my official plan for race morning was to wing it. Dealing with the corrals? Once I got to the start area, I'd just go where they told me to go, when they told me to go there. Easy enough. As for getting to the start? Well, I'd think about that later. Like on Saturday night. I knew what I'd have to do if I took the ferry in, and I knew what I'd have to do if I took the bus in. It was all going to be A-OK.
Ultimately, we opted for the buses. Our hotel was running a shuttle across to the Meadowlands, where the buses were picking up from, so we decided that if we got on one of the early shuttles, we'd be good to go. And we were. However, it meant that we were up at 5:30 for a 10:10 race start. Ugh. We were in the "athletes village" on Staten Island by 7 or so, which gave us plenty of time to walk around, pick up a bagel and a PowerBar, eat, relax, use the facilities.... all of the normal pre-race stuff. I spent a lot of time sitting around and relaxing, and I'd really wished that I'd brought a book because I had all sorts of time. Instead, I played with the internets on my new cell phone. Shortly before 9, I stripped off my extra layers that were going to gear-check, made one last visit to the port-o-lets, and then found a spot in my corral. And waited.
The Start
Promptly at 10:10, I heard a cannon go off signaling the start of the race. A few minutes later I heard cheering, and looking up to my left, could see runners on both levels of the bridge. They waved to us and we waved back. And still we waited. Our corral wasn't going anywhere, at least not anytime soon. Finally, around 10:30, we started moving forward.
The good news is that once we started moving, we moved at a pretty steady pace to the start line. Shortly before getting to the start, I took off the long-sleeved cotton tee I'd been wearing (I had both a short-sleeved and long-sleeved tech shirt layered under it) and tossed it aside. Of course, when I tossed it, I was in the middle of the crowd, so I attempted to throw it over everyone's heads into a clear spot. I slightly underestimated how hard I'd have to throw the shirt and it landed squarely on some dude's head. Oops. Sorry! I blended back into the crowd and crossed the chip mat shortly after 10:45.
The good news is that the wait was worth it - the reason they'd done the green runners in the wave start was because construction had half of the lower level of the bridge closed off, and they didn't want us to be too crowded. They certainly succeeded there - the bridge was wide open, all the way across. I settled into a nice easy pace, prepared to take my time to get over the bridge since it looked like a total monster on the elevation chart. (It was only a 150-foot high monster, but it was still the biggest hill on the course by far.) Crossing over the bridge, we had a great view of Manhattan to our left. I thought about stopping for a picture, but I knew there was no way it would turn out on my camera phone. The one thought I kept having was how far away it looked, and how by the end of the day I was going to run all the way over there. The thought I tried to keep myself from having was that we were going to take the long way around.
I crossed the first mile marker shortly after the bridge crested and looked at my watch: 11:30. 11:30? What? I knew I was going to have to bring that way down in the coming miles if I wanted to make it through the day in one piece - that was way, way too fast for a mile that was all uphill. I promised myself I'd slow down, take it even easier than I had been.... as soon as I got to the bottom of the bridge. Hey, it was all downhill, and I am not opposed to picking up a little free speed where I can get it.
Brooklyn
As soon as we came off the bridge, the overpasses were full of people waving, screaming, and holding signs saying "Welcome to Brooklyn!" They were pumped. They were psyched. Having us run through their neighborhood was clearly the highlight of their day, and it was awesome. As we came up off the freeway, the streets were absolutely lined with people cheering, screaming, waving, welcoming us into their little chunk of the city. As I passed the mile 3 marker, I noticed I was still clocking 11:30s. I did a quick check - I felt good, the pace felt really easy, although I was wary of the extra energy that the cheering crowds were giving me. I made another mental note to try and slow it down a bit, at least to something closer to 12:00s than 11:00s, and then we turned onto 4th Avenue.
Words simply cannot describe 4th Avenue. If I thought the crowd support on the streets leading up to that was good, then this can only be described as amazing. Miles and miles of crowds lining both sides of the street. People screaming, kids standing on the side of the course holding their hands out for high-fives, grown-ups clapping and high-fiving the runners. I've never seen anything like it, and the miles just flew by, both figuratively and literally. I was still clocking 11:25-11:30 per mile, and around mile 8, I just gave up. The pace still felt easy enough to be sustainable, even though it was a good 30 seconds per mile faster than I expected. I went with it, promised to not to roll with it if my pace slowed down in the later miles, and figured I was either about to have a really good day, or I was really going to be hating life by mile 20.
As we continued to wind through Brooklyn, I was amazed at how varied and diverse the neighborhoods were. Once we passed through Park Slope and Prospect Heights, we made a few turns and suddenly we were running through parts of town with street signs in just about every language except English. It was also around here that I realized just how far behind the orange and blue runners we were. I hadn't seen any on the course up to this point, but now I was starting to pass some of the slower walkers from the orange group. This bummed me out, since I knew now that I had absolutely no chance of catching up to Mike unless he had one hell of a bad day. Likewise, that explained why I hadn't seen Barb on the course at mile 6, and I knew then that it'd be unlikely for me to catch her at 16.5 She'd probably hang out for a while, assume she missed me and then move on. (Which is exactly what happened.) Oh well. Looks like I was on my own for this one, but I was OK with that.
Just before the bridge into Queens and the halfway point, I took a quick inventory as I stopped for a bathroom break. I felt pretty good, although my legs were starting to get a little hurty. I'd run a good solid first half in 2:37, and I was feeling good about the rest of the race. I stretched as I waited for my turn, then took a deep breath as I headed up the bridge and out of Brooklyn.
Queens
I'll admit, when I came down off the bridge, I was amazed that we were just getting into Queens. I'd looked at the course map, but had somehow failed to notice that the entire first half of the race was in Brooklyn. Here it became obvious that we were pretty far behind the bulk of the pack, since crowd support, while still amazing, had thinned out considerably since those first few ridiculous miles.
We were only in Queens for a few miles, but it was in those few miles that I felt the race turn on me. My legs started to feel sore and crampy, and I was slowing down from the 11:30 pace I'd started out at. That was OK, though. My plan was just to keep trucking along and I'd get to the finish eventually. Everything was fine and dandy until I hit the Queensboro bridge at mile 15. Getting up the bridge was fine. It was slow, my legs were starting to feel tired, and it seemed to take forever, but it was fine. Once I reached the high point of the bridge and started heading down? All of the muscles in my calves and thighs that had been trying to cramp up for the past few miles and were no longer working to pull my ass up the bridge turned to solid, cramping, rock in unison. I couldn't believe how much it hurt, and running it out just wasn't helping since I wasn't engaging those muscles nor was I moving in a way to stretch them out. They should have been nice and relaxed, but they weren't. They hurt. Like a bitch. And the downhill of that bridge was just as long yet infinitely more painful than the uphill. I've never run through pain like that before, and I had tears in my eyes as we wound our way off the bridge and into Manhattan. Shortly before exiting the bridge, we passed a series of signs that made me smile and laugh despite the pain:
"If easier is less than 10 miles to go...."Heh. Easier. Less than 10 miles to go. I could start counting down on my fingers if I had to. I could do this. Less than 10 miles. Easier. Totally doable.
"...then welcome to easier."
Manhattan
The one good thing about coming off the Queensboro bridge was that it deposited us in a wall of sound. As we wound our way around to 1st Avenue, the streets were once again lined with tons of screaming and clapping people, happy to see us in their neck of the woods. I kept an eye out for Barb even though I wasn't realistically expecting to see her. Unfortunately, the cramping in my legs hadn't really calmed down any after getting off the bridge and back onto flat ground. Once I got through the aid station, I stopped to really stretch my legs out while I sucked down some Gu. I felt a little better and then set out again. My pace had slowed down quite a bit from where it started, but I was still running, and while I was starting to hurt I still felt strong and like I had a ton of energy left.
However, as we made our way north towards the Bronx, the cramping in my legs got to me. I was starting to feel tired. I was hurting. I was wondering what the hell I was doing out there. I was starting to think, did I really need to finish this thing? Couldn't I just go home and take a nap? At mile 18, I stopped at the port-o-lets and was faced with.... well, with a seat I didn't want to sit on. So I hovered. And it was as I was hovering over the Seat That Shall Not Be Discussed, with no problems or pain or shaking, that I realized if my legs had enough strength to keep myself suspended in the port-o-let while I did my thing, then they most certainly had enough strength to run another measly 8 miles. I told myself to stop whining, man up, and just finish this thing. At the next aid station, I stopped at the medical tent to see if they had salt packets because I had to do something about the cramping in my legs, and to my joy and happiness, they did. I grabbed a few plus some extra, washed them down with some water, and kept on running while I waited for it to kick in. A mile after that? Bridge time again.
After the Queensboro bridge I was at the point where I was just done with the damn bridges. It wasn't a particularly big one, but I was tired and cranky so I told myself I was just going to walk up this one. Screw that shit. I wasn't playing their stupid "run over every stinking bridge in town" game anymore. Of course, after walking up it and realizing how small it was, I felt a little ridiculous, but it didn't matter. I'd had my little moment of rebellion and it helped.
The Bronx
As I came down the bridge into the Bronx, all I could think about were pretzels. I'd been searching for pretzels for miles, but no one had any. I'd been living on Gu and Shot Bloks and Gatorade for the past 4 hours, and I was craving something solid that wasn't sweet as I was feeling totally sugared out. I came around the corner and saw a dude with a bag of pretzels on the side of the course. As I made a beeline for him, I realized that the shirt and hat he was wearing looked familiar. By the time I got to him, my brain had put it all together and I yelled out, "Hey, Dr. F!" He let me know he'd seen another member of the running board pass by earlier and that he'd looked good. And then he offered me a beer. I stood there for a few minutes, eating pretzels and drinking beer while he continued to supply pretzels to the other runners passing by. It was just the mental break I needed, and I set off for the last 10K feeling refreshed. The salt packets from mile 19 had kicked in so I no longer had the urge to chop my legs off, and I only had 6.2 miles left to go. 6 miles! This was totally doable. Before I knew it, I was halfway up the last bridge. Since it was a little one and I didn't even realize I was on it until halfway up, I just went ahead and ran over the damn thing. I was pretty sure it was the last bridge since we were heading back into Manhattan, and as far as I knew? There weren't any more major waterways we had to get across. The bridges were finally done. Amen.
Manhattan, Again
The thing about running for hours and hours on end is that you can go from "Woohoo! I feel awesome! Bring it on!" to "Oh dear God please shoot me now" in a matter of seconds. It starts slowly - a twinge here, an ache there - but four steps later everything has locked up again and you are hating life, the universe, and everything. That's what happened to me in Harlem. Coming off the bridge, I was fine. By the time the mile 22 aid station was in sight, I was once again ready to curl up in a little ball on the side of the road. I stopped to stretch my legs out again, and as I was stretching out my hamstrings (always, always stretch your hamstrings before your quads) (also, someone bent over to stretch out their hamstrings apparently looks a lot like someone bent over and ready to lose their lunch, so a lot of people will stop and ask you if you're OK), a woman walking down the street stopped and asked if I was OK. I told her I was, and she asked where we were running to. I told her Central Park. Then she asked where we'd started running from. I told her Staten Island and I could just about see her brain curl up into a little tiny ball as she tried to fit what I'd just said into anything that even remotely resembled here definition of reality. She sort of shook her head and said, "Good luck" as she walked away.
I salted up as I made my way through the next aid station and tried to run, but we were heading up the steady incline of Madison Avenue next to Central Park and I was too tired to keep pushing that hard. So I walked. I walked with purpose, and I moved my butt along like I meant it, but I was walking. I was tired. Everything hurt. I'd been going for close to 5 hours and I was so, so ready to be done. I told myself I'd start running again when I got to mile 23, but when 23 came and went, we were still heading uphill and I was still hurting. So I kept walking. I hated that I was walking, I really, really did, but I knew that as long as I kept moving forward I'd get there eventually. Except eventually wasn't good enough - I'd been hoping for a much better time than I was going to end up with, and here I was, exhausted and sore and walking. What. Ever.
As we turned into Central Park just before mile 24, I told myself I was going to start running. Except I didn't. I jogged a few steps and then decided it hurt too much, and I wasn't ready to be running again yet. Then, as the mile 24 marker came into view, I realized something. I could walk it in to mile 26 and then run in the final .2 miles. I could. Except if I did that, I was looking at another 30-40 minutes of time on my feet. Or, I could take off like a bat out of hell when I hit the mile 24 marker, run the last 2.2 in as fast as I possibly could, and be done a lot faster. Yeah, it was going to hurt like hell, but so would walking, and if I ran I'd be hurting for less time. Clearly, running was the way to go.
I passed the mile marker. I hit up the aid station for one last swig of water and Gatorade. And then I ran. It hurt like hell, but I kept on running. I wanted to lay down and cry, but I kept on running. I cursed the rolling hills of Central Park, but I. kept. running. Nothing was going to stop me. I was weaving in and out of the walkers on the course, cursing them in my head (and probably out loud, too, although I doubt anyone would have understood me) for getting in my way because didn't they realize I was trying to get somewhere? Of course, in their defense, you don't normally have someone barreling along at a sub-10:00/pace 6 hours into a marathon, you know? But I went. I found holes and pockets and wound my way through the crowd, up and down the hills until I found myself making the turn at the southern end of the park.
As I made that turn, my sense of smell was assaulted by one thing and one thing only: horse shit. I was not happy about that. Here I was, running my ass off, trying to catch a breath and keep myself moving forward as fast as I can and all I can smell is horse shit. You have got to be kidding me. Between the smell and the sudden narrowing of the course I was craaaaankyyyy. All I wanted was to be done running and there was horse crap in the air and people in my damn way. AARRRRGH. Then we got to the next turn where there was a big monitor, and people were slowing down and pausing to see themselves on the screen. I didn't want to see it - I knew I looked like ass. I just wanted to keep running so I could be done with this damn thing already. I found my way through the corner and back onto the park path. As I passed the 26 mile marker, I saw a downhill and then, right before the finish, a gentle uphill slope.
An uphill? Right before the damn finish? What the hell? (Except that's the incredibly cleaned up version of what I thought. I was not happy about that uphill.) It was small, but it was there and who were they kidding with that? Were they trying to kill us? Did the universe really hate me that much? I thought all of this as I swore and dragged my ass up that hill, happy to see that it was all downhill from there. I hit the finish mat at a full sprint, not looking at the cameras, not caring what my finish photo looked like, just simply happy to finally be done.
The Finish Chute
As soon as I crossed the finish line and stopped moving, the full realization of how much everything hurt hit me. Every piece of muscle and connective tissue in my legs locked up and the tears I'd been holding back for the past couple of miles burst free. I got my medal and my mylar blanket and just tried to keep moving. Every volunteer I passed asked if I was OK, and I assured them I was. Someone gave me a bottle of water and a bag of food, but all I could think about was getting to my gear check truck, getting my stuff, and getting back to the hotel. I knew I was in baggage truck #72, so I plodded along. After I walked for what felt like forever, I looked up and saw I was next to truck #4. This was going to be a long, ugly trip. I stopped to stretch out my legs, and as I was getting my hamstrings, another runner came up and asked me if I was OK, then told me to stand up straight and keep moving. Apparently bending over to stretch out your legs looks a lot like bending over to lose your lunch. I tried to explain that I felt fine, my stomach was fine, and that I just really needed to stretch, but he was insistent on keeping me moving. So move along I did. He stuck with me for a while, and I found out that he'd flown in from just outside of London for the race and hadn't really been a fan of it, either.
As I kept walking, a sudden and horrible realization came over me: the baggage trucks had been done alphabetically, which meant my stuff was going to be in one of the very last ones. I sat down to stretch while I absorbed this information and mentally renewed my commitment to someday marry up in the alphabet (which, really, wouldn't take much). I called the people I was supposed to meet and let them know I was on my way out, then I continued trudging on. When I got to truck #72 it was, indeed, the very last truck. Of course. Considering I'd been ready to sit down and take a nap as soon as I crossed the finish line, having to walk the extra distance (which had to have been at least a half mile, if not more) was something that could only be described as an unpleasant surprise. But I'd made it, and once I got out of the park (thankfully, the next park exit was just after my truck) I easily met up with everyone.
Getting Back to Jersey
For a number of reasons, I'd elected to stay in Jersey near the Meadowlands complex (where the buses to the start left from) instead of in the city. While it was far cheaper than getting a hotel in Manhattan, it also made the trip home a bit more involved. We hopped on the subway at 86th street, where the MTA attendant at the station was letting marathoners on the train for free. (Thank you, MTA dude!) We then rode the A train all the way down to Wall Street where we transferred to the PATH train at the WTC station. Somewhere during that ride, I realized that I was incredibly well hydrated and needed to get rid of some of that extra water. I figured there'd be a bathroom in the PATH station and I'd just stop in there before hopping the train to Jersey.
Yeah, no such luck. By the time we got off the train in Jersey, we were approaching something of a desperate situation. I thought maybe the station in Jersey would have some sort of facilities, but, again, no such luck. We stopped in the cab dispatchers office to request a cab back to our hotel and, again, no luck. We were looking at a 15-minute wait for a cab and then a 20-minute ride back to the hotel. That was so not going to work. I looked up and down the dark street, hoping to find something that might have some sort of restroom and I spied a gas station down the road. It looked close-ish, and I was pretty sure I could make it there and back within 15 minutes. As I started walking, I realized that while my legs were still sore, they felt a lot better than they had an hour ago. So I made a run for it. I can't even imagine what I must have looked like, sprinting down a dark street in Harrison, NJ with my mylar blanket billowing out behind me like a cape, although I'm guessing it was something along the lines of "crazy person." Of course when I got to the gas station, I realized that gas stations in Jersey? Don't necessarily have a "station" to them. Which meant no bathroom. I cursed the Garden State and then spied a Wendy's across the street, so I made a run for it.
The good thing about jaywalking in the dark while wearing a mylar blanket? Everyone can see you. And they're going to stop for you, because they probably think you're highly unstable and going to run in front of them anyway. It certainly made things easier. I stopped in the Wendy's, took care of things (ahhhh), and then ran back to the station. By the time I got there, the cab was ready to go. Sweeeet.
By the time we got back to the hotel I was feeling a little creaky again, and I'm guessing my 800-yard bathroom dash probably didn't help anything. After cleaning up we headed out to a local diner for dinner (where my medium-rare burger was actually done to medium rare and not at all overcooked - I was impressed) and it was after dinner that I discovered what happened if I sat still for too long: my legs stopped working. It took a lot of upper-body strength to get myself back on my feet, and when we got out to the car? I couldn't lift my foot high enough to step into the car normally, instead needing to sit down first and then get my feet in the car. The car in question? A Civic. Yeah, I was in pretty sad shape.
The Post-Game Analysis
Initially, I was really disappointed in this race. I knew that my training could have been better, and I knew by the 15-mile mark that I'd started out way too fast, but I just wasn't it expecting to hurt as much as it did. I haven't had a race hurt that much since I ran my first marathon two years ago. You'd think I would have made some progress in there. I couldn't even take comfort in the fact that at least I ran this one faster than I ran that one, since I posted pretty much the exact same time for both races (NYC was one second slower than that first one in Detroit).
However, looking back? I'm actually pretty happy with it. Yeah, it hurt. A lot. But I still kept on running through the pain, really only walking 2-3 miles of it towards the end. That first one? I was pretty much walking it in off and on from mile 17. Plus here I was able to grit my teeth and run through the pain for a better finish. That's something that I most definitely couldn't have done two years ago. I think if I'd tried to run this course two years ago it would have chewed me up and spit me out alive. It wouldn't have been pretty, that's for sure. The New York course is tough - it's not especially hilly, but the bridges are killer and there's all sort of long, slow, slight inclines that become total ass-kickers over 26.2 miles. Especially to someone who trains in an area as flat as Chicago is.
The point is, despite the nagging feeling that I could have done better under different circumstances, I feel pretty good about the fact that I ran the best race I could have on that day. Sure, I could have gone out a bit slower, but I had no idea how badly it would come back to bite me by starting out just a wee bit too fast. What it boils down to is this: I'll take the race I ran last weekend, but this is one that I definitely need to go back and do again. I refuse to take that sort of abuse lying down, and someday I'll make it back there and show that course who's boss.
My 5K splits are below - it's obvious that I started out far, far too fast, as my average pace steadily declines until the 35K-40K point where it takes a total nosedive. (You can also tell that I hauled it in over the last couple of miles, as my average pace actually decreases between the 40K mark and the finish. Hee.)
Location/Time/Pace per mile
5 Kilometers/0:34:20/11:03
10 Kilometers/1:09:52/11:14
15 Kilometers/1:48:30/11:38
20 Kilometers/2:26:02/11:45
Half-Marathon/2:37:16/11:59
25 Kilometers/3:07:50/12:05
30 Kilometers/3:51:22/12:24
35 Kilometers/4:34:35/12:37
40 Kilometers/5:23:32/13:01
Finish/5:37:17/12:52
Posted by Dawn at November 11, 2007 10:22 AM