I arrived at the train station in Harrisburg where I joined both of my brothers and my dad for the long drive up to Boston. The drive was a drive with nothing remarkable happening, but it was nice to be in the same place with those three. I'm not sure of the last time we all got the chance to spend some time together. I'm excited everyday to think about how my athletic endeavors often bring us to the same place after such a long time of seeing each other mostly only on holidays.
On Sunday, I still had to pick up my registration packet. Luckily the building where I had to go was right across the street from the finish line of the Women's Olympic Marathon Trials so we go there a little early and caught the end. After hanging around the finish area for a bit, we headed to the convention center that, because of the Trials was absolutely packed. I think it took me about twenty minutes to get my packet and t-shirt. I very much wanted to check out the expo as it was the last day for it, but it was a mad house and not worth it. We had tickets to catch the Sox game later that day and if it worked out, we'd be able to get back to the convention center before it closed for the day (which later worked out perfectly).
I was naive to think that a 10:00 am start time meant that I could sleep in a little bit longer than most races. Then I realized on race morning that moving 25,000 people from Boston to Hopkinton by shuttle actually takes that long! We got up about five in the morning. I packed my pasta to eat later at the athlete village, on-site microwave discovery or not. The fam dropped me off across from the park where the shuttles were at a little after six or six thirty and headed out to do some sight-seeing until they had to stake out a spot along the course to cheer me on later in the morning.
The organization and logistics of moving that many people are so well put together that it has be commended. Beside the park was a line of school buses that stretched up the road and out of sight. About ten buses would be loaded up to capacity, depart for Hopkinton, and another ten would pull in their place immediately to start the process all over again. I ended up sitting next to an older woman from Wisconsin and had a great conversation with her. After hearing about some of her experiences with getting outside for a run in the bitter cold of Wisconsin in the preceding months, I felt like a bit of a whiner complaining about dealing with the winter weather in Pennsylvania.
I luckily got to the athlete village (no microwave to be found...hello, cold pasta) early enough that finding an open portable toilet was no problem. I hung out on a bench with a guy from Canada for most of the morning and ate my pasta and went to the bathroom again...and again and again. Nerves, I think. After a while, we were given the signal to start the short walk to the starting corrals. As my number was 4701, I was in the fourth corral and close to five thousand people back from the starting line. I was finally going to experience what the people at the back of the pack at a normal marathon would experience. As I was standing ready with my arm warmers, running gloves and low-light lenses (it was a crappy, cold and dreary day all morning long), the sun broke out and warmed everything up pretty quickly. I didn't have much time to consider this because the gun went off a few minutes later.
We crested the very small hill in front of us and I'll never forget what I saw: nearly five thousand people stretched out in the valley in front of me like one giant, moving mass. It was a pretty remarkable horde of people and I can't imagine how it looked from all the way back. About two miles into the race, I ditched my arm warmers and tucked my gloves into my shorts. Before the race, I figured out that I needed to run 21:15 5ks to hit my target time of sub-3 hours. I started nailing my target times right away and felt great. I was even putting a little time in the bank with every passing mile.
The first half of the race was surreal and I hardly remember it going by. I was feeling great and giddy at the prospect of hitting my ambitious target. We passed Wellesley College to the tune of a flock of college students shrieking at the top of their lungs. I had heard that they were loud, but loud was a huge understatement.
After 30k, all was still going to plan. I think I still had something like fifty-two minutes to finish the final 12k. Then something went wrong. I still have no idea what it was but I was slowing down. Late into mile 19, I knew that if things didn't turn around quickly, I would not be hitting my goal. But I don't think things very often turn around after 19 miles. After mile 20, I had pretty much accepted that my chances of under three hours had gone out the window, but I was content in thinking that I would at least shave some time from my PR of 3:08 (the previous November in Richmond, my only other marathon). But the Newton hills had gotten the better of me and I was forced to start walking after 21 miles. This was the biggest mistake of any race I have ever done. I have never had the experience of having to walk and quickly found out that, once you stop running, your legs get so tight that to get that running motion back is nearly impossible.
I started to run again after a few minutes at probably the slowest pace that's allowed to be called something other than walking. Time disappeared at an alarming rate. I walked for the second time (of three total) around mile 23. I couldn't believe that I didn't have anything left to even finish out a 5k. The crowds were three and four people deep all along the barricades for the last few miles. This would have been the coolest thing if not for the fact that I felt like I was letting all of them down by walking. It was the exact, crushing opposite of the feeling it should be having that many people cheering you to the finish. I wanted to run if for no other reason than to make them happy. But at the same time I was seeing people around me being pulled off of the course because they couldn't stand up anymore or because they were weaving all over the road in a painfully lifeless walk. The second to last thing I would have wanted was to walk the closing miles of the Boston Marathon. The last thing I would have wanted was to be one of those people not even allowed to finish.
I did my best to run down the final street to the finish line and stop the clock at an incredibly disheartening 3:52. I struggled through the timing chip lines, the food lines and the medal lines just in time to get my race bag and find my family, who I had also felt like I had let down enormously by dragging them to Boston so they could see me struggle in for such a pedestrian finish.
I arrived back in Pittsburgh the next day, disappointed, but in awe of what an experience it all was. I don't like to have to find a silver lining in anything, I'd much rather just have it all be a glowing spectacle. But I could find some comfort in little things that actually went according to plan up until the point it all fell apart. I can also find comfort in the fact that I qualified for Boston, the holy grail of marathons, on my first try and that many more opportunities to go there will come. There is no way I'm letting a 3:52 stand as my only result at such a hallowed race. And finally I can take comfort in looking at my wall and seeing that finishers medal. It's a pretty cool feeling having one.
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