After a good stretch through the summer's triathlons and the fall marathons, I finally pushed the envelope a bit too much again and find myself out of action with a sore left knee and this week a bad back.
Thankfully, all this didn't happen until AFTER a couple of fun and successful marathon efforts in Denver and New York City with NYC being the goal race. Denver was a most enjoyable trip with everything at the time seemingly done well within myself as far as the race itself went. Slight soreness of the left knee was only noticeable a couple of days after. The major race problem was having to take two long potty breaks at seven and sixteen miles, the first time I've ever needed even one of those during a race. Since I was doing it basically as a trainingrun for New York, I was happy with a finish time of 3:53 and change. The altitude only seemed to really get to me over the last five miles or so or maybe I was just stetched out by then. Kelly and Austin were great hosts, arranging some terrific places to breakfast, lunch and dinner. AND---Kelly ran her first half marathon on not all that much training that she managed to sneak in around all her PhD work and dragged Austin to 2:07 in the upper third of her age group!! The weather was nearly perfect, cool at the start, but quickly warming, then sunny and warm for the postrace.
New York City's weather, on the other hand seemed much more questionable heading into our midweek trip there, however. Delayed arrivals by nearly every Thursday flight meant that Gretchen, flying in from Seattle, missed getting to the Broadway Billy Elliott show with Chris and me on Thursday night. With all the cabs tied up because of the rain, we ourselves (Chris and I) only made it to the theater dry and on time by taking one of the bicycle rickshaw things officially called pedicabs. Fun and maneuverable, but definitely a slightly more dangerous way to navigate the streets of the City. Friday and Saturday rain continued off and on with a five mile race in Central Park for me Friday morning followed by a test subway trip to the Staten Island Ferry----I felt like I needed to figure out where I needed to go for the race and the girls were nice enough to come join me. In the afternoon-- some shopping and a trip to MOMA for us all and then the girls headed to the Met to take in the opera after we ate at Picholine on Friday night.
Probably the most exciting thing to happen for me, though was an elevator encounter. Elevator? Ah, Yes. We were staying at the Hilton New York City on the Avenue of the Americas (Seventh Avenue) just south of Central Park and this must be where ING, the major race sponsor was housing the elite runners becuzzzzzz, jumping into an elevator on the ground floor (and we were staying on the 43rd) it became clear that one of the occupants was Meb Keflezighi, last year's winner. I didn't get all autograph goofy and I never actually called him by name, acting all cool and everything, but just said I'd be pulling for him on Sunday as I left the elevator, WHERE-UP-ON, he asked my name and wished me a good race. A wow moment for me. Saturday was low key with some shopping and a trip to MOMA, an early pasta dinner at Trattoria del Arte and early bedtime. Usually, I fall asleep easily the night before a big race and then wake up at 3 or 4 unable to sleep anymore. This night I was wide awake until at least 11, then up at 3 but I've never felt that sleep before a race is really all that kind of a critical deal. So, up and awake and bundled in five layers or so, I ate more than usual and then off to the Ferry. Met a nice couple from Dallas in the lobby also headed for the race and we shared a cab, a ride on the ferry and a bus and walk to the staging area. It was pretty frigid and we all appreciated all our clothing, but the excitement level was amazing with 45,000 of us assembling at the foot of the Verrazano Narrows Bridge, the huge suspension bridge which spans the mouth of New York Harbor. Once the sun came up it got a bit better but the wind still made it cold. I think they pull off the logistics of this thing impessively wel, though, for such a big event. It's a three wave start--15,000 runners per wave spaced a half hour apart, starting at 9:40 am. I was assigned the first wave because I'm so speedy and after loading into the corrals at 8:55 literally tons of clothing shed by us all and an exciting start, I crossed the start line ONLY three minutes after the horn sounded.
One of the most amazing things about the three American Majors (Boston, Chicago and New York) is the percentage of foreign runners. This is most impressive at NYC though. Twenty thousand of the entries are from overseas and you could hear all kinds of languages and see flags from everywhere before and during the race. I had conversations with people from France, Germany, Norway, Columbia, New Zealand, Argentina and Japan before the race. Pretty fun for an old man with a lifetime in the Midwest.
Starting the race on the big bridge is just great for a couple of reasons. The view across the harbor and the Manhattan skyline is really impressive on the left, but it is also a long steady climb for about a mile and nice to do while your legs are fresh and excitement is high. They use both levels of the bridge and despite being the start of the race, it didn't feel that congested. Downhill and off the bridge was sweet too and care had to be taken to hold back the pace. Coming into Brooklyn any number of overhydrated folks ducked into the bushes (or not) and we converged with the people from the upper level of the bridge. Things were tighter through the next few miles and that was really the top concern for awhile. The worst moment in this regard came when a young woman elbowed me hard as she pushed through the crowd and dislodged my Garmin running watch from my its snap-on perch on my velcro wristband. This isn't that easy to do or so I thought and I gasped in horror as I heard it skittering on the pavement behind me. I turned into the sea of moving humanity in my minds eye seeing the headline of the Death of the Trampled Marathoner in the next day's NY Times when a wonderful human from New Jersey yelled, "I've got your watch". He'd seen what happened, been able to pick it up and quickly thrust it into my grasping hand. After profusely thanking him, I would love to tell you that I ran the rest of the race with him, but he hadn't been able to train much and dropped off soon after that.
The rest of Brooklyn and Queens were pretty even and steady as the miles clicked by and the sun angle rose a bit higher. There was some trash talking between runners from Queens and Brooklyn to pass the time and the accents were great fun. The mark for the half marathon point is just before the assent of the Queensboro Bridge and I hit it in 1:45 something feeling very good about time, pace and effort level. Things changed a few minutes later as by the middle of the Queensboro and passing a bunch of folks and being passed a lot, I felt much more drained. I hadn't expected such a protracted uphill. The trip down was nice though and then the curl off the bridge and up First Avenue was exhilerating with the masses of cheering fans and wide open street. Easy miles. By the time we crossed into the Bronx, the crowds had thinned quite a bit, most everyone was tiring but I was still passing more than being passed. Having just crossed back into Manhattan, the watch again was knocked off, again by a young female and no New Jersey savior in sight. This time though, by mile nineteen, things had thinned out enough that I was able with artful dodging to backtrack and retrieve it successfully. Relieved again that it was ticking off the (wasted) seconds, I reclipped and headed on, still feeling fairly strong. Gel management, fluid management and the lack of a need for a portapotty had all gone well and I now knew that if I didn't cramp up badly or hit the wall completely that I had a shot at a really good time. I was still high (I guess low) fiving kids along the way up until about mile 22 when I slowly went into survival mode with the left knee starting to ache slightly and the legs just trying to continue at the best sustainable pace possible. I was beginning to run on fumes at this point after a few minutes earlier having actually entertaining the idea of picking up the pace toward the end. Dream on. The fact that I had run the race in Central Park just two days before was both good and bad. On the one hand, I knew how much further it was to the finish and on the other, I knew how much further it was to the finish. By now people were running and walking very disparate speeds and attention needed to be paid to the road ahead even more than before. The 40K and subsequent Mile signs were all welcome sights, though, baby and the final two tenths to the finish I gave it most everything I had. ----Garmin and official time of 3:35:37 ----two minutes faster than my previous PR in Chicago a year ago and on a tougher course. I was one very happy dude. Very rewarding after all the training.
Once through the finish, it was still only about 49 degrees and breezy, and I cooled off pretty rapidly after deciding not to bother to retreive my bagged stuff on down from the finish line. But----there had been no rain all day and Chris met me with a rickshaw at our predetermined corner and got us back to the hotel through the crowds quicker than we probably would have made it any other way. The throngs of cheering people were spilling out into the street making walking on the sidewalk nearly impossible with runners just continuing to flow along the race route. Back to the Hilton. Shower. Bed. Lunch. Bed. Then actually out to dinner at Rosa Mexiano, which Austin recommended and which was great. Then a good night's sleep.
My "friend" Meb finished sixth this year. We saw him again at the buffet breakfast the next morning along with the second place finisher Emmanuel Mutai. Did not see the rescued Chilean miner who ran or Al Roker who both finished about five hours and forty minutes to great applause. All in all a fantastic trip for me and wonderful of Chris to put up with all of my prerace paranoia and postrace shuffle. Gretchen's contact driver guy, Tom Izzo, yes TOM IZZO, got us to La Guardia for another delayed (wind and rain) flight back home.
So----- four weeks after, I still have the sore left knee, a bit of a cartilage issue with the right knee and a sore back. Hopefully all resolvable. Ted says after checking the left knee at Thanksgiving that he guesses Patella Femoral Syndrome which should return to normal eventually even with no surgery, just ice and excercises. I would really rather still be able to run a bit, but I suppose a forced rest after eleven months of training is probably a good idea. We'll see.
All in all, a most satisfactory 2010 racing season with fewer races, but PR's in the 5K and marathon. Now no running for a while.
At the very least there are the Holidays and Zach and Leah for diversion anyway. Cheers!
