When I noticed that the "water" running towards my Asics was really the pee from some woman squatting in our corral, I should have realized that Sunday was not going to be a good day for me at the Rock-n-Roll Marathon in San Diego, CA. Never mind the fact that I'd not trained properly for this inaugural race, let alone run consistently since '94. "What was I thinking when I signed up for this?" I asked myself as I scraped the bottom of my shoe on a dry patch of asphalt.
Oh, the morning had started off innocently enough. We got up early, threw on our running clothes and headed for the hotel lobby. The cramped space was full of marathon participants chatting nervously or queuing up to go, yet again, to the bathroom. Also bumping around were several bleary-eyed spectators wondering why they were wasting perfectly good sleeping time to go outside and stand around for several hours.
The staging area for the race was a sea of color as twenty-one some thousand participants stretched, went to the bathroom, laughed, went to the bathroom, drank water, went to the bathroom, downed last minute energy drinks and went to the bathroom. Before this event, purple was my favorite color. After seeing some 6000+ Team-in-Training folks decked out in that hue, I think that I'll leave my reds and blues separate, than-you very much.
In most big races, the Star Spangled Banner usually precedes the gun or cannon. This race was no exception, except with the delay in the start, it preceded the gun by thirty-eight minutes. "Oh, say can you see…." sang the quivering off-key voice of a young child. For a few seconds the crowd around us seemed amused by the singer's attempt at the difficult tune. A couple of jokes were made but then, as if our hearts were simultaneously touched with compassion and patriotism, the tiny voice was joined by thousands of others harmoniously paying tribute to the miracle of having the freedom to come together and run in the misty morning air.
After the cheers following the song had died down the crowds were ready to rock and roll!!! The streets, however, were not and we were put into a mind and body numbing holding pattern. Wait, breathe, relax, laugh, joke…everything was ok until I noticed that long, wet puddle lurking its way down to my shoes. I could hear the theme from "Jaws" as I watched it creep my way. Why couldn't she have joined the others in the bushes? Jeezzz!!!
Hey, hey, hey...WE'RE MOVING!!! FINALLY!!! As we crossed the starting line two or three minutes later, I had the sneaking suspicion that I was in for a really bad time. I tried to "live in the moment" by breathing deeply and absorbing what was around me. (This was California, ya know.) Hundreds of people were watching and cheering, great rock-n-roll was playing, the park was beautiful and the sun was shining warmly. What? Warm? Sun? Oh sheesh, it was suppose to be cool and cloudy today. What happened?
Ok, maybe my mental state jinxed me but by mile four, I KNEW that I should not be out there. Instead of getting looser, my legs felt as though they were hard pieces of steel being clubbed on the pavement. Somewhere around there I saw Mike fly by and for a minute thought about how much pain he must be feeling with his ITB. "Ok, Patti" I thought to myself "how bad can this really be?"
I just HAD to ask that, didn't I? At mile 5 the aid station was out of water. Unbelievable - nothing, zip, nadda. Luckily, I spied several folks on the side of the road with a cooler full of small bottles of water. I put on the most pathetic look I could muster and politely asked a lady for one of her bottles. My ploy worked and she handed me the slippery nectar of the gods. GLUG, glug, glug, Ahhhhh. Selfishness, not altruism, made me offer the final third to some folks next to me. I didn't want to carry the splish, splash, splish any further. They grabbed it and profusely thanked me.
Around mile nine, I thought about how nice it would be to park my increasingly tired butt on a bench and wait for a sweep vehicle to pick me up. I rationalized that if I were feeling that lame on a training run, I would have gone home. Not today. My favorite piece of dad's advice floated through my head: "this, too, shall pass". Out loud I said to dear, 80-year old dad "happy father's day, this one is for you!" At that point I gave myself permission to "just finish". If that meant walking, petting dogs, dancing or spitting off bridges, that was o.k. As it could not, time would not matter today…..
As I trudged along, I thought a lot about how much pressure we put on ourselves over "time". There is never enough of it when we aren't racing and too much of it when we are. Did running and maybe even, WALKING - GASP, a ssssllllooooowwwww marathon make me less of a person? Would a personal worse cause all of my running pals to laugh behind my back? Would they feel smug? Do I feel smug when someone has a bad race? Do I think a slow time makes someone less of a human being? No, no, no, no and no. We were all out there doing the best that we could on that day, period. They (whoever "they" are) say that less than 1% of the population can even complete a marathon. Why do we beat ourselves up over such things and are they even really things that are important in the grand scheme of life?
Hey, there go the Elvi!! Elvi is plural for multiple men dressed up in full Elvis regalia pushing a baby jogger which contained a CD player belting out tunes from the King. These guys were amazing, or perhaps, crazy, as they were all wearing heavy, white long-sleeved jump suits complete with long, red scarves tied around their necks. How could that run in those heavy, hot outfits? Never, though, in my worst nightmares did I dream that I would be trading places with Elvi for miles. I'm all shook up!Mile 16, only ten to go!! That is just a "normal" run at the Pines. I jogged and sometimes walked those last ten miles with some really interesting characters. Somehow, we were all in the same Titanic boat together, but in this boat, we were going to make it!! One man was muttering to himself. I jogged with him a moment and asked him how his morning was going. "I ceme all de way from Brasiel and now I no do so good, I'm very ongry weth myself". We talked about how anyone can have a bad day at any time. That is the challenge of the marathon, even when you are well trained. We were both laughing by the time we hit mile eighteen.
At mile twenty-two, one of the guys handing out water had a race bib on with the number 1x on it. I asked him if had raced. When he nodded affirmatively, I thanked him and told him what a true winner he was for coming back out to help. He blushed but also smiled.
The crowds were getting thicker now and people were yelling the usual lie of "it is just around the corner". I could finally see the ship "India" in the harbor. I knew that the turn to Broadway and the finish line was only about a mile now. I picked it up a bit and was grinning like a Cheshire until I made the final turn and heard the warning bells of the train signals. "Oh, no" the crowd seemed to mutter as we watched the traffic guards come down. All around people were bobbing and cursing in their frustration to hurry the train past. We could see the balloons teasingly arch across the finish line a few blocks beyond the train. It was just too much - I started laughing like a mad woman. One lady next to me looked at me and said "you're sick"!
The train finally passed and a mass of (stinking) humanity made their way under the gates that were lifting. "Ouch" - oops, someone didn't duck low enough! The race towards the balloons was on!!! Hundreds of aching feet went flying (sort of) up the little hill toward the finish. We imagined ourselves as Kenyans as we sprinted (?) toward our hard-earned medals and finishers shirts. As I dragged my weary bones and flab back to the hotel, I thought about how really relative a marathon is to each one as an individual. No matter how fast or how slow it is, it takes a lot of effort to cross that finish line and, regardless of our times, we are all winners. I guess that is why you get a medal regardless of where you finish - you truly earned it.
Postscript: You know how people always say that it is harder to run a slower marathon? It is true - I felt much, much worse than I had ever felt after any other marathon. Being improperly trained and attempting that distance was not the smartest thing I've ever done. Luckily, I've pulled multiple bone-headed stunts so it was not the dumbest thing either.