Blogging Boston

Okay, I ran the Boston marathon this weekend. I'll try and kind of organize this a little, so day by day, here's what we did:

Saturday - Kate and I drove up to Boston in the morning and got lunch with Jen. Jen told us she wanted to go to some place to get an omelette, and we were up for anything, so we went and ate. She took us to "some place in Central Square" in Cambridge... yeah, it was The Middle East.

I'd only been there before to see American Steel and the Murder City Devils back on '02, so it was kind of weird. Good kebabs, though.

Jen is a fun person to hang out with. Because she is single, she is constantly letting us know whether she thinks random dudes are attractive or not, and letting us know which sketchy dudes are hitting on her when she rides her bike and stuff. It's a side of the world that we married folk are not normally privy to.

After hanging out with Jen for the rest of the afternoon, we took her to Kate's brother's house to meet their new puppy and eat some thai food. It was great, and the puppy was cute and mega-exciteable. Then we went to sleep.

Sunday - Sunday we got up early and Kristen met us at Kate's brother's house to go watch the US Women's Marathon Trials in Cambridge. It was a ton of fun! We got to see some of the fastest women in the country just tear around the course... so fast. And we got very close to some famous people for a very short amount of time! Aside from the great race between Magdalena (gutsy race, ran way out ahead from the beginning from what we could tell) and Deena, we were wicked pumped to see Joan Benoit Samuelson go out there and kill it! She is 50, and she ran a 2:49, setting an age-group record, among her other dozens of notable racing accomplishments. We got some decent photos:



That is Joan with about a mile or two to go to the finish. Incredible! And here is a picture that we took of what really looked like two young boys making out with each other on the grass. It was really weird.



The rest of the day was spent eating, playing with the puppy, and playing video games. I highly recommend video games for day-before-the-race jitters. I may make Windwaker a pre-marathon tradition.

Monday - or - The Best Laid Plans
Ha ha ha, I'm so dramatic it's awesome. Kate and I woke up on time and I crapped as much as I could (if toilet discussion turns your stomach, you'd best switch blogs, because I love to talk about my crappin'). Crapping mid-run plagued my marathon training, and nothing puts a damper on a race more than having to crap in the middle of it. Anywho, I crapped. I ate a bagel, and Kate, with a trooper-like grimace, drove me into the heart of Boston to drop me off. I got in line to ride the buses to Hopkinton.

The way the start was organized was this: There were two waves, one leaving at 10 AM, the other at 10:30 AM. The people in Wave 1 wore bib numbers 1-13,999, and 14,000 and up were in wave 2.

Immediately I noticed that a lot of the people in line had bib numbers WAY higher than 14,000, even though they weren't supposed to get on the buses until 7 AM. Jerks. After a 1 hour bus ride to go 26 miles (booo) I arrived at the athlete's villate. I've never seen more porta-potties. And they were all in use. Mind-boggling.

After an hour or two of waiting around, we went to the start line. More waiting, this time in our individual corrals (1000 people/corral, I was #4056, so I was in corral 4). After a while I finally ditched the sweatshirt that Kate's brother gave me to wear and throw away, and the garbage-bag pants that I was wearing. Both were very necessary, because it was cold in the early morning, around 40 degrees or so.

When the gun went off, there was a lot of stop-and-go, but eventually I crossed the starting line and started to move. My first 8 miles all kind of blended together. I was trying hard to hold back, especially because of the downhills, but I couldn't go slower than 6:45/mile.

After 15 miles, I started to feel the tinge of pain in my left thigh. I knew what that meant, so I started taking water and gatorade at the stops (previously I had just been drinking from my fuel belt). At 18 miles, I was starting to hurt enough to walk the uphills. That sucked. Those hills were not fun. I was already looking for the next mile marker constantly. I pushed through the hills of Newton, and eventually made it down the other side of Heartbreak. I walked a lot of the last few miles, I was going pretty slow. My last few splits were 9:30 or so. But, luckily, I had enough time in the bank that it wasn't too terrible of a finish, and I had enough left in the tank to finish the last mile running nearly the entire way.

At the finish, I waded through the staggering masses and tried to get to my baggage buss. I was really annoyed with all the people who were taking their time, because I just wanted to get out of there. I got my bag quickly (very quickly, actually), and looked around... no Kate. That was our designated meeting point, so I was kind of bummed. I waited around for another 10 minutes, and started to get cold, so I pulled my mylar blanket close. It actually worked! It's the first time I've ever needed one of those things and it came through in the clutch. Way to go mylar.

Anywho, I called up Kate with a volunteer's phone (super-nice lady), and I found out that they were stuck in Newton because the trains were full. So I got on a train to Newton (runners ride free on Monday!) and met them there. Kate was crying, but I was just happy to see her. Then we went to Kate's brothers house and relaxed and I showered and ate super-fast and then Kate drove me to the airport.

Race-wise, I shouldn't have really been surprised, because I went too fast on my long runs. On my 20-mile long run, my legs were hurting and I was beat at the end, so I really shouldn't have been too surprised when that happened during the race. It's probably a combination of not enough base training and going out too fast.

Altogether, I'm not too disappointed because 3:13 isn't a bad time. It's 7 minutes slower than my qualifying time, which is pretty standard because most people qualify on an easier course. But, on the other hand, I kind of feel like a slacker for feeling satisfied, since it's really nowhere near where I wanted to run, and I really should have done better. I think if I had started training seriously earlier it would have helped a lot. I basically took off about 4 months after Cincinnatti and it showed. So, less of a break this time. I was only able to do as well as I did because of the constant encouragement and support of Kate "little coach" Nydam Meberg. She absolutely made sure that I didn't get lazy during my training, so my finisher's medal is at least half hers.

Okay, that's enough sap. Read nydampress for Kate's perspective. It was a fun weekend, but my legs still hurt (seriously ouch).