Brooklyn Runner

The New York City marathon is just two days away and of course there’s no shortage of marathon mania around town. Asics has had a great ad campaign this year capturing the essence of what it’s like to run in New York. . .

I am always excited about marathon Sunday — one of the best days in the city, in my humble opinion — but this year I’m particularly psyched for a distinct reason. I’m just back from the Marine Corps Marathon in Washington, DC, where I finished my third marathon with a personal record of 4:09:03.

I couldn’t have asked for a more perfect day — in the high fifties and clear, though a bit windy. The race truly evoked the dignity and discipline and spirit of the marines. It was well organized, clear, and the crowd support was amazing. And the runners themselvese were a pretty impressive lot. I felt the entire time as though I was running in good company, among people who had trained hard and well and knew how to pace themselves, who were focused and humble and self assured at the same time.

The first few miles zipped by and those mile markers kept coming at a good clip all the way through the first half. I stuck to my pace, as planned, wanting to succeed in my negative split. At 13 I let it out just a little bit, then again at 15, and ran the next four miles at a faster pace by a full half minute.

The crowds at Capitol Hill were amazing. The course narrows as you round the monuments, the spectators line both sides and are cheering at full decibel. They call your name (if you’ve got it on the front of your shirt) and the kids stick out their hands for a high five as you go by, and basking in the glory of it all you just feel like a hero.

At 19 I was having to fight a little harder for it, and at 20 I was just happy to have reached 20, and to have passed it. But then I knew there was still a whole other race left — the last six miles.

Something funny started to happen at 21. The joints were creaking and complaining and certain parts were wanting to cramp up. I finally hopped into the bathroom (one minute) and it took everything I had to keep running. I knew my pace was suffering but it was growing increasingly harder to keep one foot in front of the other. This was it: I was hitting the wall.

I remember what an old running friend told me as he coached me through my first marathon years ago. “You hit the wall and you ran through it,” he told me after the race. So this was it – I’d have to run through the wall again.

 Stopping, wallking even, was never an option. I had trained for this, and I told myself that repeatedly in those long, lonely miles between 22 and 25. This was what my training was all about, being able to do this, at mile 22 and a half. My body knows what to do; just keep lifting your feet.

At that point, every step forward was pain. There was no other option: pain was pain. There came a point — a delirious, otherworldly moment in my brain — when I came to the realization that the pain I felt was to have no impact on what my body and my mind were going to do. Pain was pain. Wind was wind. Step forward. Step forward.

Someone running behind me asked his partner, “How do you feel?”

“Like crap,” was the response. At mile 23 in the race, no one feels good.

We passed a couple of marines, volunteers. A runner must have groaned his complaint out loud. One of the marines shouted back: “IF IT DOESN’T KILL YOU IT’LL MAKE YOU STRONGER!!!” We all got a good laugh. And kept plodding.

Around 24, along a stretch where no other spectators stood, a lone woman in a warmup jacket yelled firmly, calling me by my name (which was on the front of my shirt), saying, “You look strong!”

“I don’t feel strong,” was my instant reply.

“Well, you are,” she said.

And another foot, and another.

I was walking through the water stops at this point. Just before 25, I was taking longer than usual to start back up again. Just then a woman with a blond ponytail came up alongside me, put her arm around my back and said in the kindest, gentlest voice, “You can do it.”

“Thank you,” I whimpered, threw my cup down, and started my slow run again.

I have no idea what made her stop to help me, among a sea of people, get going again. And I was a faster runner than she (I left her behind soon after starting up again). I have no idea who she was; for all I know she was an angel sent from God.

And that’s what it took. Once past 25, you could feel the home stretch begin. A windy patch over an elevated highway. Then, the crowds. They knew you were close to the finish as well. An out and back portion — you could see the runners ahead of you, on their way home. The expected incline in mile 25 — it wasn’t so bad!

Just a couple hundred yards from the finish, you turn to your right and you can see the finish line — 200 feet up in the air. A cruelly steep hill is all that separates you from the finish line, and it’s practically heartbreaking. Then you climb. “Beat the hill” is painted on the ground every few feet, and that’s exactly what you want to do. It kills, but at that point you don’t care, because you’re there, you’ve reached the finish, you see the clock and you’ve put in an incredible effort and that’s just about all anyone can ask.

It’s quite an incredible feeling.