Pushing to the end: For mile 26 I actually manage to drop back under ten minutes after having run a number of 11 minute miles earlier. I usually never speed up, but in this race, I never warmed up until the end. Photo courtesy of Lee Kauffmann
Two weeks after achieving my best marathon time (4:07:59) in
several years at the Delaware Marathon, I went to the Vermont City Marathon in
Burlington, VT with the thought of attempting to run a better time. Maybe the thought was a bit foolish
with only two weeks in-between, but you don’t know unless you try.
In checking the course profile, there were some serious
hills, but the rest appeared relatively flat. Wrong! There were more hills than
I bargained for. Complicating the attempt was the weather… but I’m getting
ahead of the story.
I was going up with Ray Christensen, with the first leg of
the trip to his family farm in the Catskills in New York. On Friday he picked me up just before
three. We figured to cover the 220 miles with a stop for food in less than five
hours What we didn’t figure on was
the back-up from an accident on the Northeast Extension of the PA Turnpike. We
virtually stayed in the same part of the road for an hour and fifteen minutes. We pulled in at the farm around nine,
took some small refreshment and hit the hay.
The next morning we were off by nine. Ray’s mother, Claire, and a thirteen
year-old niece, Kaylin, came along.
Claire had never seen Ray run a marathon. The motive for Kaylin to come was perhaps just a couple days
from home. Off we went in what was
soon a steady rain, which made the driving fairly slow.
Getting to Burlington, we decided to hit the expo
first. I had an extra mission
since I had been reminded after calling home that I had forgotten my
watch. Getting to the massive
Sheraton Hotel, we drove to one side to park. Nothing was available, except the handicapped spaces. But we were in Claire’s car and she had
a handicapped placard, which she deservedly used regularly. So we found a space, popped right in an
out-of-the-way side door and moseyed on up to lobby past a huge swimming pool,
which impressed Kaylin.
Getting our bags was easy, but none of the vendors had
watches. On the way out, I asked
someone where to find a sports store and we were directed to the big running
store right in town near the race start.
It only took a few minutes to get there and I jumped out while Ray
looked for a parking spot. A few
minutes later I was out and Ray was waving from up the street. He had found another handicapped
spot. We decided that it might be
a good plan to try to park there tomorrow for the race.
In rapid order, we got to our motel and checked into the
rooms, Ray and his relatives went to church, and I cleaned up, put the number
on my shirt, and checked my Ipad for e-mail. Shortly after their return, we went out for a meal. First we went to a pasta place that Ray
had found online. But it was very
busy and the wait (outside in the rain) would have been an hour. We left a phone number for a call back
when a spot was open, but decided to find something else. We went out a road that was supposed to
have a couple of other places Ray had written down, but we couldn’t find
them. We drove several more miles and
just as we were about to turn around, a restaurant turned up. It worked out great as it wasn’t busy,
it had pasta and a big screen TV facing our way on which we got the bartender
to tune in the Rangers-Bruins game (unfortunately for Ray, the Rangers lost). I ordered Mac & Cheese (that’s
pasta, right?) and a couple of brews.
Between the driving, the food and the brews, I soon conked
out once we got back to our rooms.
The place we had was like a suite, so I had the bedroom and Ray took a
rollaway. This allowed me to play
music quietly on my Ipad. Getting
to sleep by nine, I was awake at four a.m. and started to get up at 4:30. I always want my breakfast in my stomach
three hours before a marathon. So
I had eaten a couple of bananas and a granola bar before five. By then Ray was stirring and I started
to make coffee. It wasn’t that
good, but it was a stimulant and soon I was heading for the bathroom. Then I was good to go for the race.
Race day presented some unique weather for late May in
Vermont. A massive Northeaster had
parked itself over New England for days.
Most of the rain was seemingly being dumped on Vermont, which had taken
at least five inches over the last several days, causing local flooding. While the forecast no longer called for
heavy rain, it was going to keep lightly raining and the wind was going to
blow. The temperature wasn’t going
over to 50 before noon. I decided
to wear a long sleeve shirt with my short sleeve 50 states marathon shirt over
top. Originally, I had cut holes
in a trash bag to wear at the start until I warmed up. But I decided to wear the bag in
between my shirts. I could still
tear it out if I wanted to do so, but I left it on for the entire run.
At six thirty, we went to the room where Ray’s relatives
were staying and gathered for the ride into town. Looking for the space Ray found the previous day, we saw
that access was blocked. But in
turning around, fortune presented a space right there on the street. Ray wanted to get going towards the
start to position his mother and niece for watching and to hit the
portajohns. I persuaded him to sit
for another 15 minutes before going.
Once we did take the five or six block walk, we left his
mother and niece at possibly the best spot for watching the runners go by
several times. Then we got in the
portajohn lines. Standing there, I
was shivering, so I was glad we hadn’t left the relative warmth of the car
earlier. Although Ray had fretted
over getting through that line and into the proper spots in the race on time,
we did get through with about ten minutes to go. We wished each other luck. Ray moved up to the 3:30 pace group, while I fell behind the
4:00 hour group.
I wasn’t figuring I could actually run the marathon in four
hours, but I was hoping to hold on to them through halfway. But as soon as the crowd started moving
toward the start line, the pacers were moving farther away from me. When the gun went off, it took me
exactly two minutes to cross the start.
By then, the pacers were 20 seconds ahead of me and were moving faster
than I could go in the crowd. So I
tried to settle into my own pace.
The first mile was mostly uphill, but being fresh, it didn’t
seem that way. I saw the marker,
knocked over, so that I couldn’t actually see “1 mile”. It was misplaced as my watch was at
10:30. At the second mile, my
watch read 18:15, so I was on pace.
Around then, Tom Jermyn, a local Delaware running friend, appeared and
ran along with me for a few paces.
His daughter lives in Burlington and he was out observing. He had seen Ray a minute or so
earlier. Then he peeled off and I
was on my own again.
The first five miles were actually done in ten seconds
faster than the first five I did at the Delaware Marathon. We had curled back past the start and
we now headed west out on a two mile out-and-back stretch of highway that was
totally open. I soon started feel
the effects of running into the wind.
Wind is the worst element for me.
I’m tall, so I have a lot of surface area to push through it, but I’m
not muscular, so I can’t power through.
The wind began to sap my will to run hard. My gloves were now soaked and my hands constantly stung with
pain.
Going out this stretch, the leaders came by - going the
other way. There was a pack of
about five. Trailing by about 50
yards was a short black runner - more about him later. A few minutes later I saw Lee Kauffman,
who had come up from Delaware to participate in the two- person relay, doing
the first half of the course.
About a third of a mile from the turn around there was a fluid
station. I had taken fluid the
first two stops, but passed on this one as I realized I wasn’t going to be
doing much sweating. I saw Ray on
the other side of the station, jostling, attempting to reach in for a
drink. I called out, but he didn’t
hear me.
After turning around to return into town, I was realizing
that it wasn’t going to be my day.
I consoled myself with two thoughts: 1. I was going to check off Vermont from the list of states
in which I have run a marathon. 2.
If I wasn’t running that fast (because I both couldn’t and didn’t have the will
to try), then I wasn’t going to end up that sore and I could go on to the next
event in relatively good shape.
One of the annoyances for a relatively slow marathoner was
the fact that we were running with the relay teams on the same course. So at almost any given moment, people
with fresh legs were streaming past, heaping on more discouragement. But as we approached the start/finish
area again and the transition point for the second leg of the relays, I did
notice an attractive young miss who had the words on the back of her shirt “Red
Hot Red Heads”. She did indeed
have a long red ponytail and green wet running shorts. I must not write any more about her as
she was probably young enough to be my granddaughter. But more on this group later.
Next we headed through the downtown mall, a street of brick
built for walking. There were lots
of spectators and cheers here.
Then we headed toward the half-marathon point on a southern end of
Burlington. At some point in this
segment, the next Red Hot Red Head came alongside me and commented on my 50
states shirt. In fact several
people in the course of the run said something about how I could cross off
Vermont. (The abbreviations of all the states are on the back of the shirt and
I’ve put Xs next to the ones I’ve done.)
On most of the run south, we were several blocks away from
Lake Champlain. But after the
half-marathon point, we turned north and, for a while, we were running right
along the lake. There the winds
were at their strongest, approaching gale force, with clear whitecaps being
raised in the water. After being
exposed to winds this strong for several minutes, I would start to have a few
toes become numb. I’d run through
a more sheltered part and the toes would regain feeling, but the process would
repeat again with more wind exposure.
The truth is that I knew from my one and only Did Not Finish
marathon years ago in Frederick, MD, when the temperature was in the 30s and I
was running through slush, that the one I was now running was just a bit more
moderate and that I could get through with a few numb toes. As long as my entire feet weren’t
becoming numb, as in Frederick, I’d be OK.
Next came another run through the center of town, taking on
a pretty steep hill of about ¾ of a mile.
It was steep enough that at one point, I started race walking, which was
as fast for me as running up an incline that steep. Then it was another pass by the start, actually right in
back of the aforementioned portajohns, before another last hill at mile
17. It was here that I had to
detour between some trees, realizing that my early diligent taking of fluids
had built up because I wasn’t sweating.
The time loss didn’t matter since I had long discarded any goals.
On a better day, the latter part of the race, being all flat
or slightly downhill, would have been great for running a good time. But I was still cold and not feeling
like pushing it. One part that could be changed about the race was a short
section in this area where we ran through 80 yards of woods to get from a
parking lot to a road. The section
was totally muddy. I know our shoes
were wet, but this is a road race, not a trail event. Why have all these pairs of road racing shoes become mucked
up?
During the last five miles we were on a paved path in
parkland. The winds seemed to have
diminished and I finally felt relatively warm. On those miles I gradually picked up the pace, from having
slowed to 11:00 minutes a mile to eventually running the last mile under
10:00. I also found that running
on a narrow bare dirt groove worn next to the trail was more forgiving on my
aching legs and helped me stride a bit longer. Somewhere along here I passed
the female running the last leg for the Red Hot Red Heads team. A statistic presented by the race
organization showed, that in the segment from 20 miles to the finish, while I
was passed by 21 people, I, in turn, passed 97.
During the last mile, we were along Lake Champlain
again. But now the sun was out,
the wind had lessened, and the mountains on the other side of the lake were
visible. Pushing to the end, we
turned off the pavement onto grass for the last tenth of a mile. Oops! It was grass before thousands of pairs of feet turned it
into mud. I tried to run on the
least used part, up against the retaining barrier next to the crowd
watching. I heard the announcer
apologize as he mispronounced my name while I was finishing. No big deal – I’m used to it. Done in
4:24:54, which is OK.
But then we had to walk straight through a puddle of
mud. Really? Some mats couldn’t have been put down
to avoid that?
Taking my medal and a water bottle, I headed for the reunion
area, where Ray and family were waiting.
Ray said I should go over and grab some food and a beer while they
waited for me just outside the park.
When I got to the food, I realized it was going to take a while to get
through, so I passed on waiting.
And I was getting cold, so the beer was not appealing. I did check the results. For some reason, the results for 60
year olds were all lumped together, instead of being separated into five-year
groups. I was listed at 33rd. Later I found I was ninth out of 22 in
the 65-69 men’s group.
Anyway, I decided to forego the refreshments. I wanted to get back to the vehicle and
get warmed up. Meeting Ray, we all
started walking. I realized that
Ray’s mother was going to take a while getting up into town. So I suggested that I take the key and
Kaylin and I would walk ahead and start the car. Kaylin sat in the front and that afforded me the opportunity
to change out of most of my wet running clothes. When Ray and his mother arrived, we decided to leave
Burlington because all the eateries were already packed with runners.
We went just a couple miles and stopped at a Denny’s for
some lunch. Ray had a nice bathroom in which to change. We all had an
opportunity to put away some needed calories. We told the waitress we had just run the marathon and she
told us that her manager had had a runner stop at his house. While paying the tab, the manager came
out and told me that story. One of
the elite runners was from Kenya (remember the black runner I saw trailing the
other leaders?) and he was not used to the cold. Somewhere after twenty miles he had had enough. He just decided to knock on a random
door to escape the cold and it happened to be that of the Denny’s manager. The manager took him in. They contacted the race organization
and, after 20 minutes, a car came and picked up the runner.
Having eaten, it was time to head back to the farm. But Ray knew that the Magic Hat Brewery
was on the way out of town, so we stopped in. It was too late for a tour. The inside was a big tourist shop with a bar on one
side. The bartenders were giving
out two-ounce samples and there were six varieties. But that seemed like too much work. I bought a six-pack of Magic Hat #9 and
had three on the trip back. As the
owner of the Dogfish Head Brewery recently said, “Beer is liquid food!” and I
was glad to be carbo-reloading!
It seems the clouds were just hanging over Vermont. As we crossed into New York, the rain
stopped and we watched the temperature on the car indicator rise from the 40s
to almost 70 by the time we arrived at the farm.
On Monday it was time for giving back to the Christensens
for the free grub and a place to sleep.
The day was gorgeously clear and dry. After hosing and brushing the mud off our running shoes, we
left them in the sun to dry. Ray
and I tackled separating bad barn siding from salvageable siding and pulled
nails, keeping the really big ones for straightening and reuse as well as the
old pounded-out pre-industrial nails.
Yes the barn is that old.
Ray’s brother Ken was building the floor for a chicken coop and it took
the three of us to move it into position on the spot where the coop will
stand. At lunch we each had one of
the remaining #9’s. As we prepared
to leave, I thanked Ray’s mother and said I expected Ray to bring me some eggs
from the farm soon.
By three we were on our way back to Delaware and found the
going much easier than the trip up.
Travelers seemed sparse for the end of the Memorial Day weekend.
Here are some closing thoughts on the Vermont City
Marathon:
- I feel the course could use some tweaking to avoid the muddy section and to eliminate so many twists and turns.
- There are really too many people on the road – marathoners, two-person teams, and five-person teams, about 6,600 in all. The course is too narrow for all these people. The marathoners seem to be getting little respect with all the fresh runners constantly going by them. Some separation is needed.
- The course is tougher than I thought. Even on a good day, there are some serious hills, plus other uphills that aren’t as obvious on the course map.
- Despite these criticisms, the events are well run and well organized. Burlington is worth visiting for more than a day. So plan accordingly if you decide to do this event.
Ray Christensen has written his own version with a number of pictures. See here: http://runmarathonman.com/vermont13.php
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