Marathoning in the big easy

Ummmmm....I think we has a problem....

   This was a bad idea; I can't grow a mustache...I can't grow a mustache...I can't grow a mustache... This repetitive sentence, along with me having my shaking head buried in my hands on the plane is what almost prevented me from getting to New Orleans to actually race.
   I had been prepping for five months or so for the Rock n' Roll New Orleans marathon, with the bet that if I lost to my friend, I'd have to grow a cop sized mustache. Meanwhile my friend uprooted his entire life and moved to the city of Denver for altitude training and hired one of the fastest ultra runners in the world as a coach. (I maintain this was all in an effort to win in New Orleans as the second half of the bet was that he would have to shave his head if he lost.) The time had come and as I boarded the plane to head south I was terrified; counting all the days I had missed running, wondering if I had hydrated enough this week, was it going to be too hot on race day???All of these thoughts and more plagued me as I tried to settle into seat 34-B.

Philip wasn't excited about losing the bet either

     Upon touching down in New Orleans I expected it to be similar to letting a lei in Hawaii, only with beads. What I got instead was an airport filled with moldy carpet and wood paneling that looked like it received its last update while Nixon was denying Watergate. Leaving the airport via a cabbie who looked like he learned to drive by playing Mario Kart (Turns out all New Orleans cabbies drive like this.) I arrived at the hotel and met my friend who informed me that even though we had booked a double, the hotel had screwed up and given us a single. The hotel staff, realizing that we had a race in two days was kind enough to give me a cot that was made out of burlap sacks sewn together, until they could get us a room the next day.
 

They've got nothing on us

   With 2 days to kill we managed to break every rule ever layed out for anyone planning on running a marathon. Friday night we both shrugged off our last short runs in favor of beer and mexican food while early Saturday we decided to walk all over New Orleans and see what we could find. (I, all the while sampling local beers and food.) That night, looking to carb load, we walked around another hour or so before we finally found a pizza and pasta place where each of the 20,000 runners participating in tomorrow's marathon had arrived five minutes before us. 3 hours later we had eaten, and were headed back to the hotel to get some sleep before the big event in just a few hours.

   Terrified I would oversleep, forget something,or just not have enough energy the next morning I got a rough couple of hours of sleep and awoke to find my friend and competition ready to go. Dressing quickly and stuffing any pocket I had with a combination of gels, shot blocks and jelly beans. Running for a while I've learned exactly how important using the bathroom is before a race. With friends you often race and run with you learn to time it fantastically and slip by each other as one exits the bathroom and another enters, with all the grace of a pairs figure skating competition. Unfortunately my body seemed to have other plans, as I didn't seem to need to use the bathroom at all that morning. Shrugging it off as a good race omen we walked our half mile to the start line and as we stood beneath it in our corral as the weight of what we were about to attempt hit me.

   About the same time the weight of what I previously thought a good omen hit my stomach. I looked around at the port-a-potties whose lines stretched around corners and decided that the best bet would be to get to one on the course. Within minutes our race had started and the elites (including U.S. team members Kara Goucher and Shalane Flanagan) had taken off. Shortly afterwards we were let go and took off in a mass like a herd of buffalo, but my garmin had not caught signal just yet. Turning to my friend I asked what our pace was. He replied with what I thought was 8:15, to which I shook my head, mouthed the words "too slow," and cranked the pace. (He asked me after the race what I was thinking when he told me we were running a 5:15 pace in response to my question.)

No idea how I missed that timing mat...

   After a half mile or so my garmin finally found the satellite and I had a better idea of what I was running. At the first water stop I noticed a few more port-a-potties and ducked in one of the open ones and back out quickly, figuring that I had made enough time to prevent the competition from catching me. A few more miles went by, I enjoyed conversation with different groups of people as we all noticed that while the heat wasn't bad, it was definitely getting warmer quickly. In response I tried to walk through a few more water stops, to ensure that I didn't get dehydrated on the course. In response to that my body demanded that I once again find a bathroom. And thats where things get a bit tricky. Apparently I crossed the 5k timing mat with my exact predicted pace time...but somehow missed the 10k timing mat completely. I maintain that it must have happened when I ran off-course to use the bathroom, but who knows.

One visor to rule them all

   After the second, unanticipated trip to the bathroom the heat began to ratchet up to around 80 degrees and I was sure that the competition had found me. Seeing a flat course ahead I set out to try and chase him down, determined to snap whatever limb I needed to in order to close the gap. Another mile or two and I still hadn't seen him, but I noticed that our perfectly flat course abated and gave way to a hill as soon as the half marathoners split away from us. Sighing, I tried to push the hill (which would give way to more hills and bridges as it turned out) in order to catch him. Looking around for his trademark visor that he wore to the race I discovered two things. The first was a new mantra I repeated to myself Find the visor, destroy the visor. Find the visor, destroy the visor. The second, and more problematic discovery, was that almost every male marathoner present seemed to be wearing a white visor that day. (I've since looked up the statistics and visor sales in Denver have gone up by 36.8% in the last six months. Coincidence? I think not.)
everytime I wanted to slow the pace even a little.
 
 For me, it was very much like the scene from the Matrix movies where Agent Smith replicates himself over and over and no matter how many our hero takes down, there are always more Agent Smiths. As the heat continually increased I found myself sprinting up to white visors only to find that I still had not achieved my goal. Find the visor, destroy the visor.

   Around the mile 16 mark I took a second to notice the beautiful ocean view that the course had provided us. Had this been any other day the scene would have been amazing. Calm blue waters, plenty of sun, and small white triangles of sails bobbing along in the ocean. The moment passed and I continued to push along, stopping only to walk through water stations. I haven't been to enough Rock n' Roll marathons to say whether they are all like this, but I will say New Orleans does a fantastic job at hydration and making sure there are plenty of aid stations. The crowds are also fantastic with so many people driving out to "dead spots" and playing their stereos, car radios, or my personal favorite, a middle aged man standing in the middle of the road with a serving tray, offering runners martinis. He may just be the greatest man alive, and had I not needed so badly to catch up to my target, I would have taken him up on his offer as I ran past and up the final bridge. 

We've qualified for Boston for six consecutive years....Mr. Anderson.

   My ascent up the bridge was the worst part of the marathon. A slow, seemingly never ending climb in which I could not catch the target in front of me. In fact, for the entirety of the bridge run, I didn't even see a white visor! I wanted to walk so many times, thinking that it was already over, but I would repeat my mantra out loud and keep plodding along instead, walking only to pass through an aid satiation. (At this point it had become so hot that I needed to stop at every aid station along the course. Once again--outstanding job to Rock n' Roll NO for anticipating this for the runners.) 

   I kept looking to the horizon to see exactly where the runners ahead of me were turning around, signaling that we would only be a few scant miles from finishing. And there it was! There are few times in my life where I can say I have seen anything as marvelous, beautiful and breathtaking as that small orange cone that day. Ad with it, it brought not only the promise of almost being finished with the marathon, but of heading back downhill.

   Thoughts of weary feet, a back that wanted to lock up, and exhaustion were not banished, but they were suppressed as I tried use the downhill to my advantage. After a mile of gleefully staring at my garmin and and watching my overall pace drop, I was startled by a runner running up the bridge on the other side yelling and pointing at me. At first I assumed I was going the wrong way, but then the words which had been so much mush when hitting my ears cleared up as my gatorade addled brain processed them.   Hey a**hole!! I'm coming for you, and I've got plenty of kick!!   "Awesome...?" Was the only thing that managed to play through my head. And then it dawned on me. About six feet....white shirt...white visor...oh my god.  I'M AHEAD OF PHILIP! Followed by the worst potential thought I could have at this point in the race: Crap...I have to stay ahead of Philip...

There are some things so beautiful in this world
that words don't justify them 

    Knowing full well that the marathon was his event, I told myself that if I could maintain my pace or just a second or two faster than my current pace, I might still be able to beat him. Leaning into the hill I coasted past other runners as I actively sought out other white visors, pretending they were him.  Find the visor, destroy the visor.  I passed the martini man again, nodding my thanks and hopefully conveying "next time dude, next time" as I slid past. As I ran past the wonderfully blue ocean with its tiny sailboats breaking waves I emptied my pockets of the remaining gus, gels and and shot blocks like I was riding a parade float and tossing sweaty candy out to the crowd. All the while popping as many s-caps as I could to keep some salt in my body. 

   Three miles from the finish line and my neck and shoulder hurt from continuous looks over my shoulder to see if I was being gained on. I wanted so badly to rest for just a moment that I slowed the pace as another runner came by me. Let him have it, I thought, just run your race. And then something miraculous happened. He took his iPhone out of his pocket, and called his family. He was on facetime with them and I could hear his wife and daughter saying that they would see him on the finish line. I'm only about 25 minutes out honey, I'll see you then.

   How. dare. he. He was trivializing the effort I was putting forth trying to continue to breath by having a facetime conversation?!? AND he has people waiting for him at the finish line??? My mind shifted gears to overdrive, pushing my body harder and faster as my head filled with thoughts consisting along the lines of Oh, there is no way in hell i'm letting you beat me. 

   One last look behind me ton check on the competition and I was sprinting ahead once more, knowing I wasn't to far from the finish line. Rounding one corner, then another I reached a small bridge as a runner in front of, less than a half a mile from the finish line, began to walk. As I came up behind her I yelled (probably a little more frantically thanI should have) YOU DO NOT STOP HERE!!! You are SO CLOSE!! She smiled at me as she began to run again; and while I have no idea if she kept running to the line or not, I'd like to think she did.
 
   We hit a straightway and logically I knew that the finish line HAD to be close, but I couldn't see it. Doubt began to creep through my head, was the marathon going to run long? Was my garmin miles off? Was this hell ever going to end?? And just then, as we passed round the museum I saw them. Photographers. Blessed angels of the marathon, heralding the the end of the race with cameras instead of trumpets. I saw them perched high taking our pictures and I tried to smile as I realized it was over.

   But whats this? There appears to be a....second...finish line? The photographers had posted themselves under early under a sponsor's ad. RUN!! It was probably less than fifteen yards away, but I've probably never run harder or looked worse doing it than that awful day at fifth grade field day.

   I crossed the real finish line and felt relief like I've never felt before as I looked around one more time to make sure that my competition hadn't snuck by me and finished before me. Thanking all the volunteers, and knowing that my friend wouldn't be far behind, I planted myself on a curb close by and waited. i wasn't waiting long before he came through the finish line and we embraced in the manliest of hugs. While he felt great and stated that he could have run another five miles, I need to rest and hobbled my way to a nearby tree so that we could rest.

   Another half an hour passed by and we made our way down to the free beer, eager to celebrate the close of the race and ending the pressure cooker that had filled our lives for so long. I really don't remember how we finished celebrating the race in New Orleans that night. I know we headed to Bourbon street, but thats about all. Fairly certain it isn't even the amount of alcohol consumed, just the exhaustion from having run great races.

   The hardest part about the race being over is that afterwards it feels as though something is missing in my life. Preparing for this marathon both mentally and physically was a huge part of my life for six months. I'm looking forward to having that feeling again and running future marathons with my close friends for the rest of my life. But as for right now, I'm enjoying tonight's easy three mile training run and the post run beer that comes along with it. 

 



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