The New York Marathon

Or, how Younger, Faster, Taller Blondes Keep You on Your Toes.

Sitting there, shivering in the half-open tent in the Local Competitive area for almost 4 hours before the start, I chatted with Dancer, tried to avoid conversation with a really chatty woman next to us (unsuccessfully) and tried to do the crossword (also unsuccessfully: see the second comment). Well, I was barely shivering. Against all my anti-throw away tendencies, I had brought 2 towels, a comforter and a mini blanket to the start, as well as multiple layers of checkable clothes and throwaways.

"But I had to get rid of that old, 1980's sweatshirt with the paint stain that you lent me!" I was actually heard to exclaim into my phone when talking to my dad later that night. He laughed at me. "There are more where that came from!"

So, we're sitting there and I'm also trying to plot my race. But here's the thing: I didn't really have clear-cut goals for this race. Which is really weird for me. I might not tell people that I've got a clear-cut goal but I always do. Sure, I have lots of other goals:

Get to the Start
Finish
Finish under 4:30
Finish under 4:00

Etc.

But those are ancilliary goals, ones that will comfort me if/when I miss my actual goal - after all, by my reckoning (and I'm the only person that would really know!) I only hit my real goal about 40% of the time or less.

Sure, wild ideas would pass through my head: maybe I'd get wings and magically run under 3 hours! But those flitted through lik the ephemera they were.

I had wristbands for 3:10, 3:15 and 3:20. 3:10 was to show that I was going too fast. 3:20 was to show that I was in trouble and ought to stop looking at the wristbands. I used to always love wristbands: why, I don't know, because I can't actually read them very well during the race. After Phoenix, though, I've found the best thing is large print and Sharpie (or some other indellible marker) down the arm. But I was afraid I'd never see my arm in this race, as it was so cold. So I wore wristbands.

But I didn't even look at them to see what splits I needed beforehand. I was oddly sanguine about the whole thing. Which is quite unlike me.

Then the Speedy Blonde bopped by, after having spent most of the morning with Out West in the Blue tent. We start talking. Sometime between Dancer and I dropping off our bags and the Speedy Blonde and I huddling over our knees on the curb in the corral (ok: I was the only one who was huddling. Did I mention that I HATE the cold?! Warm-weather races only for me, here on out!) I had heard the following words come out of my mouth:

"Ok. So I think I'll start the race with you. After all, I can always drop back when you start going too fast for me."

Was I crazy?! This woman just did at 1:27 half on a hilly course, something that could only happen in my dreams for the time being. I was going to run with the woman who has smoked me by minutes on every single race we've started together during the past year?!

I chalk it up to hunger. My oatmeal at 4:00am was not cutting it at 9:30am. Even though I had been carbo-loading and not really exercising for the past several days. My stomach must have stretched.

We get up onto the bridge. I actually took some of my throw-aways up there, much to my shame. NYRR claims that they do not donate those clothes left on the bridge. But it was so cold! I try to stay warm and pretend I don't need to pee. Directly in front of us is the Speedy Blonde and I's nemesis - in nastier moments, we've called her many names. Let's just say she's always dressed in fancy running clothes - her throwaways were things that I would love to own - and she's always super ridiculously tan and really, really skinny. She runs with the same guy all the time. I was running by her for the first part of last year's marathon and I see her at almost every single NYRR race that I do. She always cuts the course like no one's business. Oh, and she likely doesn't know that the Speedy Blonde and I exist. Much like the rivalry between the Orioles and the Yankees, it is woefully one-sided.
So, we're behind our nemesis, I'm trying not to think about how much I need to pee, and I'm trying to stretch and not think about the race when the gun goes off, 5 minutes late. I had taken the time to take an extra puff of my inhaler, even though I had taken a single puff a half hour before. Boy was I glad of that during the race! What luck, me being as paranoid as I am about getting an asthma attack on the course!
We start running on the lower part of the Verizano. A bit of a shame: we started on the top last year and the view was better - of what I could see of it. I'm not wearing my glasses, as usual. I prefer the blurry haze of a glamour shot. The Vaseline lens makes everything look better, even the mile markers that say that you've got some ridiculous amount of distance to go.
The Speedy Blonde helps me out on the bridge by slowing us down. I tend not to look at my watch except for at half hour or hour splits and, as a result, often let my adrenalin push me too much on the first mile or two. The cross-wind on the bridge makes my legs numb almost immediately. Avoided all pee coming off of the top of the bridge.
As was the rule during the first 3/4 of the race, I go faster downhill than the Speedy Blonde. Not because she couldn't go as fast but because these tired old legs have to make up distance somewhere. Might as well be on the downhills.
Now we're in Brooklyn. My hat is off and I'm figuring where to throw it and my gloves where someone might be able to pick them up. Decide on a water station and throw them, feeling regretful because it was a new orange Dunkin Donuts hat that was even awesomer than the old one. I consol myself that I've got a pink one now, too, and kept running with only another couple twinges of regret. We merge with the other colored starts and there is a mass of people, both running around us and cheering for us on the sidelines. There were only about 4 times that I smelled someone smoking - usually a cigar - on the course and, for that, I was grateful.
Our first dedicated fans yelled for us on 4th Avenue in Park Slope. Then there was a succession. Suave in Fort Greene, jumping up and down. The Vivacious Redhead and the Urban Planner, with kids, screaming their heads off. I managed to smile and wave at both of these sets of cheerers. This was before I got into that weird headspace where I hear almost no one, consciously.
The Speedy Blonde and I are still together! And the miles seem to be going in a blur. I can't tell you much about the race, itself, in this part, except the course felt like a friend I hadn't seen in a while. I seemed to remember just after the face that I had run this particular part last year, or that there was a turn right......here.
Around mile 9, though we had been pretty good at avoiding the slant in the road, my right knee starts hurting. I ignore it for a while. After all, around mile 5, the left part of my back seized up and I ran through it. But then the knee gets worse. By about mile 11, I've had several stabbing pains in it. I try to get onto the flattest part of the road. "Once we stop going downhill, it'll get better", I told myself. Meanwhile, I was praying that I wouldn't have to drop out. I don't know whether it resigned itself or I just blocked out the pain but it only flared up a couple more times before the last 2 miles. And by the last 2, I was finishing, no matter what. It was cold!
Near Williamsburg, my race was almost finished. Someone in a wheelchair and their escort - neither in the race - decide to cross right in front of me and the Speedy Blonde, and about 100 other people. "Excuse us!" they said. I had to do a crazy side-stepping leap to avoid them, as there was no way I was going to stop in time. They stepped out about 2 feet in front of me! Ack!
We haven't seen the nemesis in a while. After passing my awesome colleague - who made a sign! - in Williamsburg, I was feeling charged up and ready for the race to the half-way mark. Then, we see the nemesis.
Maybe she DOES know who we are, at least a little bit. We heard her partner remark, as we pass her, "you'll catch up with them later in the race."
Or not! Heh.
Ok. That was a bit mean. But what are nemeses for, except to be not-so-secretly happy when you pass them?!
I had pushed my arm warmers down by this time. I was already in that weird headspace where I was committed to my clothing choices, even though there was a serious cross-wind during much of the rest of the race, and much of it was in the shade. I could - and likely should - have pulled them back up but I didn't. I used them as phlem-catchers, instead. (Gross!) But I think my legs were so cold in those cross-breezes that it didn't matter what was on my arms so much.
I got a huge lift, crossing the halfway point. Turning to the Speedy Blonde, I asked if we were behind pace.
We HAD to be behind pace. I was keeping up, after all!
"No. We're actually ahead by 10 seconds."
What?! I decide to keep running with her for a while more.
More blur. I remember the bridges because they were cold and because I would run a bit ahead on the downhills. By this time, we had picked up a small man with a Mexican flag singlet on who would be racing us for much of the rest of the way. Getting down over the Queensboro and into Manhattan, I felt another surge - likely due to the crowd.
Plus, I was nervous. Miles 16-19 are usually my hardest, psychologically. I tend to slow down here, thinking that I'll never get to the finish, otherwise, or that I'll hit 'the wall'.
But the Speedy Blonde didn't slow down. So I kept going. She saved me on this part of the race. Following her was hard at a couple of points, though, because her students came down to cheer her on. Every time we passed someone who was cheering for her, she sped up. Oi! I was tired!
I had to be careful of the uneven pavement at this point. I was barely picking up my feet and almost tripped myself a couple of times, trying to finish off that fall I almost took in Williamsburg.
Once we hit about mile 20, the Speedy Blonde says "I think I'm going to slow down a bit. Go ahead if you want."
I slow down a bit, too. But not that much. And I can see her right behind me, if not beside me, for much of this stretch.
But here's where I can push it. Once we pass that magical 20, and if I haven't already hit the wall, my homing device kicks in. We're almost done!
This is when I also start concentrating on my form, and concentrating on people in front of me, trying to pick them off one by one.
Others are slowing, slowing more than us, which gives me a huge psychological boost.

Plus, I know the Speedy Blonde is right behind me.

I am so inside my own head right now that I miss Story Finder and friends screaming their heads off at me about 2 feet away. I only find out later.

Throughout the hill on 5th ave, I work on passing women who look like they are in my age group. Then we are in the park and I pretend we only have 2 miles to go. It works, even though it's a lie.

Cheering. My legs twinging as if they are going to seize. Blurry fall colors. I look at the singlets in front of me and the banners up above.

We're out of the park. Going up to Columbus Circle. A mile left. Which felt like a huge distance for a bit. When we see 1/2 mile to go, I despair. But then I see they've also marked it in meters. I concentrate on the meters. 800 to go. 400 to go. 300 to go. I pass two women but they get motivated and pass me back. I try to pick up the pace but my legs are so tired. I wait for the anticipated and inevitable. At 200 meters, it happens. The blonde ponytail swinging in the wind, the Speedy Blonde passes me. She always does have that kick!
If I had it, I'd use it. I'm proud that I came in only 4 seconds behind her.
For the first time in a long time, my legs were too tired to sprint while my lungs were, if not ok, ok enough that I don't dry heave and almost puke going over the finish line.
I'm also proud of that. Especially since, as the Speedy Blonde pointed out later, "You were hacking up a lung the whole race!"
Asthma and cold weather don't go so well together. The phlegm was thick and ever present during the run. I actually almost choked on it a couple of times.
Yes, gross. But you are reading a running story. If there weren't a gross element, it wouldn't ring true-to-life!
I thanked the Speedy Blonde for the race and we hobbled off, chatting with another woman who we had seen just in front of us for most of the marathon.
Boy was I cold. And glad that was over with! I'm hapy not to run this whole week.
I know that the lower-numbered bibs have their bag pickups furthest away to prevent logjams but I was definitely grumbling as I walked all the way up to 88th street, freezing.
Although the walk was likely good for me.
Over to the school PPTC rented for some much-needed hot cocoa and a change of clothes, then off to brunch.
I ate myself almost sick on mac and cheese. Leading up to the race, I wasn't eating cheese, trying to help out my lungs. They are not happy this morning- nor is my stomach - but I don't care.
I don't have to run in the cold today!
I couldn't have done it without you, Speedy Blonde!
3:08:04, I think......