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Normally I don't run two marathons in a year,
much less two in a week's time. Nonetheless, for reasons best explained in
another forum, I found myself at the starting line of the New York City
Marathon the week-end after I had run, jogged, walked, and slogged to a
3:19 Boston qualifier at Marine Corps Marathon. On this day I would be
witness not only to the glory and grandeur that is New York City, but also
up close and personal to the heart-wrenching drama that comes in the
marathon.
After
being bussed out to the staging area at Fort Wadsworth, I discovered, that
contrary to popular legend, the corral system and start at Staten Island
seemed to be pretty well organized. At 10:20 I wandered over to the
trucks, dropped off my bags, and walked over to my corral area in the 3000
number series. It was easy to get into, and not that crowded. I will
confess that since I was not concerned about a fast time I didn't really
care if I was in the front of the corral or not. A few people sneaked in
under the netting that served as a fence, but not too many. As we were led
out to the start some people from the 5000 pen tried to shove ahead, but
it wasn't nearly as pushy as I thought it would be. Nevertheless, I
estimated that there were probably three thousand people ahead of me on
the blue start on the top of the Verrazzano Narrows Bridge. The green
start on the lower level probably had just as many people in the gap.
The start
went off at 10:50, and it took me 1:12 to reach the toll booths, which I
thought were the start lines. I jogged easily up the bridge to a 9:12
first mile. The women were on the other side of the bridge, and had a
different sort of staggered start. We were to run side by side in separate
lanes for a few miles, then the women's course veered off to make up
ground before merging into the men's course about mile 8. In the meantime,
the lower bridge merged into the blue course about mile 4. I discovered a
friend in the crowd, and he began to brief me on how the mergers would
work and create more crowded conditions. My quads and calves were already
feeling tired from last week, so I just wanted to take it easy and survive
the day.
Mile two
came in 8:56, and then I began to feel better. I was passing a lot of
people and picked up the pace even more, though I was trying to be
conservative. I didn't want to waste any energy trying to maneuver around
slower people.
Somewhere
in Brooklyn two women passed me. They were obviously running together and
were working their way through the throng. I fell in behind them because
their pace seemed comfortable to me, and they were doing the work of
separating the crowd. One of them stood out from the crowd because she was
wearing a black and orange striped outfit with her name "Maddy"
emblazoned both front and back.
I lost
them at a water stop, but later, they two caught up to me (maybe they had
been letting me do some of the work), and as they went by I fell in step.
It was a little more open, and we ran side by side. Passing a mile marker,
I hit my watch. 7:30 for the last mile, too fast for me in my condition.
"How
fast are you trying to run?" I asked them.
They
exchanged comments in a language that I did not understand, then Maddy
turned to me and said, "Five minutes per kilometer."
Well, I
was having trouble doing the math, but I knew this much. A 7:30 mile is a
lot faster than five minutes per kilometer, and told them so. They began
discussing this, and I backed off the pace
I passed
them again going up the 59th Street Bridge. This seemed to be a long
uphill mile, but I felt comfortable and passed a lot of people here. Simon
& Garfunkle kept rolling through my head - "Slow down, you move
too fast, got to make the morning last, skippin' down the cobblestones,
doo-da-doo dah, feelin' groovy".
The crowds
were huge coming off the bridge into Manhattan. On First Avenue they lined
the streets and sidewalks for miles. At the PowerGel station I
grabbed two, but they were the new chocolate flavor, so I went back and
swapped them for the more familiar lemon-lime flavor. I downed one at the
next water station, and saved the other for later.
Maddy and
her friend caught up with me at about mile 18 1/2. As we crossed the
bridge into the Bronx, Maddy began to fade. Her friend looked back at her,
then decided to maintain her pace with me. We had been running about 8
minutes a mile since hitting First Avenue. As we left the Bronx, I spotted
the 20 Mile marker. Looking over to my running partner, I lifted both
hands with fingers outstretched. "Ten kilometers," I remarked.
She nodded her head. The clock says 2:45. "3:30?", she asked. I
shook my head. "3:35," I told her. OK.
People are
now beginning to slow and walk. She told me, "This is the tough
portion of the race." "Here," I responded, "We call it
the Wall." She replied, "We call it 'The Man with a
Hammer'."
I'm not
sure if she knew what I was talking about, so I introduced myself. Her
name is Vivianne, and she's from Nederlands. I substituted Washington DC
for Baltimore so she could recognize my home area.
Now we had
8 kilometers to go. Running down Fifth Avenue from Harlem towards Central
Park I noticed that Vivianne's pace was beginning to falter. I still had
the packet of PowerGel with me, so I told her I wanted her to take it at
the next water station. "Will it help?" she inquired. "It
will either help or make you sick," I said. "Stay in the middle
of the road and I'll get the water." Re-energized by the shot from
the PowerGel, she resumed her 8 minute pace, but began to lag again about
a mile later.
The Apache
believed that to possess one's name was also to possess a power over the
soul. Maybe surrendering her name to me wasn't such a good idea because of
the power it gave me.
I spotted
a fire truck parked on the side of the course loaded with firemen watching
the race, so I sprinted ahead. "This is Vivianne coming up," I
shouted, "She's tired and needs your help. Yell for her when she gets
here!"
As she
pulled up to the truck, twenty male voices exploded in unison ,"GO
VIVIAN!" Her pace picked up noticeably, and I now had a mission in
life for the next few miles.
Entering
Central Park at the 23 mile mark, I told her, "5 kilometers, you can
do it." Then I ran over and incited the crowds again. "GO
VIVIAN!" they roared. She smiled at the crowds and waved, then set
her head to the task at hand.
And so it
went, all the way through Central Park. I had the crowds cheering for
Vivianne, and I had her pace pegged at 8:40 (she was a little faster but I
could calculate that...2:10 per 400m, 5:25 for 1000m. Between the crowds,
I would run back to her every 5 1/2 minutes, four kilometers, three
kilometers, two kilometers to go, and the people were screaming. She would
smile and wave, which made the crowds even more enthusiastic. I was having
a blast and not feeling the least bit tired. In Columbus Circle Maddy
caught up to us again. Vivianne stayed off my shoulder, close to the
crowds and the life- sustaining energy emanating with every roar.
"RUN VIVIAN, GO!" The Big Apple was reverberating, and Vivianne
was rocking and running. Suddenly she saw the 26 mile banner and began to
really push it. "Five hundred meters" I shouted, but she didn't
let up. At the banner I told her "Four hundred meters, come on, you
can do it." The crowd was going crazy and she was passing all kinds
of people.
Suddenly,
her pace lagged. "Come on, come on, two hundred meters Vivianne, come
on." Her arms pumping, she began racing for the finish. I was just
off her shoulder, entreating the crowds, entreating Vivianne, and we could
see the chutes flying up to greet us. With thirty meters to go she gained
rapidly on the three men between her and the chute. "Go get'em
Vivianne!" I was exhorting, the crowd in the grandstands was
hysterical, and she put on a sudden burst and surged by the remaining
obstacles between her and the finish.
From a
half step behind her she looked strong. Her stride was smooth and
powerful, without a hint of the fatigue built up from the previous miles.
She planted her right foot, and the result is fixed in my mind in slow
motion. As she began to lift her left leg up from the ground, her entire
right leg started to wobble, then buckled at the knee. Ten feet, just ten
feet from the finish line, Vivianne collapsed in a heap on the pavement.
I stopped
and went back to her, yelling for the medics. The swingman immediately
closed the area in front of that chute, directing trailing runners to our
right. "OK, I am OK," Vivianne was saying as the medic rushed
up. "Can you stand?" he asked her, and we offered assistance.
Grabbing our arms, she pulled herself up, but as soon as her legs
attempted to support her weight, she sank back to the ground. I looked at
the medic, and we each grabbed an arm, put it around our shoulders, and
picked her up. With us supporting her weight, she was finally able to move
her legs, and we crossed the finish line together.
3:38:03
We carried
her through the chute to a waiting stretcher. I got her a medal and a rose
stem as they put her on the stretcher. She flashed me a big smile,
"Thank you, thank you!" she murmured as they carried her away to
the medical station and, most likely, out of my life forever.
One of my
slowest marathons, but one of my best times
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