Boylston Street from Hereford to the Finish line is
everything it is made out to be. Reverberating
amid the towering glass and stone of downtown Boston skyscrapers, the voices of
tens of thousands offer shouts of encouragement and cheers of
appreciation. One foot in front of the
other, not able to see anyone in particular, but everyone at once. In the distance the distinct shape of the
bridge marking the finish line approaches all too quickly. It is a passage only 600m long lasting all of
3 minutes, but one that took 4 and a half years to reach.
Many of my friends and family witnessed how running for me
went from being a plodding pain to a perennial pursuit as I set a big hairy
audacious goal to run a marathon. I
reached that goal, completing the 2013 Phoenix Marathon and enjoyed the
experience enough to sign up for another.
A few short weeks later I was drawn in to the drama of the Boston
Marathon bombings and marveled at the courage displayed that day and in the
days and months that followed. It was
during this time that I first learned about the qualification standards to run
the marathon. For a male my age, the time
was 3:25, nearly 30 minutes faster than what I had run at Phoenix, a pace I
thought was entirely out of reach. And
that was that.
Another year of running and triathlon passed and the next
year I toed the line again at the 2014 Phoenix Marathon. It was a perfect day for running with no
wind, cloud cover, cool temperatures, and a little rain early on. I completely surprised myself with a 3:31
time and later that day it dawned on me that I was only 6 minutes away from
qualifying for Boston. That is when my
curiosity about Boston transformed into a legitimate goal to run it.
On my journey to complete an Ironman triathlon, I started
learning more about nutrition and worked on eating cleaner and started using
high quality protein, BCAAs, and creatine from Isagenix. I researched more about training programs and
worked to get faster and fitter, leaning on the knowledge and experience of
friends I met through Cadence group runs.
Soon I was ready to run the 2015 Phoenix Marathon for a shot at
qualifying. The day started out great
and I soon found AC on course, a strong runner that I knew from Cadence. She and I were running similar pace, so we
paced each other for several miles. The
pace we were on was in the 3:15 to 3:17 range, which was well ahead of what I
needed. The wind and the work of that
pace got to me and I slowed down about mile 19 as she pushed on. Somewhere in central Mesa I realized that the
several minutes of cushion that I had was evaporating quickly and I had to get
moving to avoid missing my goal. I
mustered what energy and will I could and pushed through the last two miles to
get to the finish at 3:23:09. I made it. Barely.
I finished with a PR, and more importantly, I qualified for Boston!
The registration for Boston is in September and I learned
that running a qualifying time does not guarantee entry to the race. In the previous two years, so many had
registered to run that they had to cap the entries and the slowest registrants
didn’t get in. The cutoff margin was 1
minute 38 seconds and 1:09 previously so I thought I was safe with the 1:51
margin. I paid my fee and waited. On the last Wednesday of September, I
received an email with the news that I was not granted entry. The cutoff this year was 2:28, so I missed by
37 seconds! I knew there was a chance of
this happening, but I thought it was very low.
I was very disappointed, but I also knew of others who had missed by
less.
I was already registered for St. George Marathon on the
first Saturday in October. I had a good
build up for the race so I felt I could set a new PR. The marathon was 3 days after I received the
bad news about Boston, so that just gave me extra motivation to crush that
run! And crush it I did. The favorable conditions and downhill ending
helped propel me to a 3:16:59, a BQ time with a full 8 minutes of margin. The unfortunate thing was that I had to wait
until September 2016 to register, and that would be for the 2017 Boston
Marathon. But, I was assured a spot to
run this time.
At the 2015 Phoenix Marathon I proved to myself that St.
George was not a fluke by running it in 3:18:04 for a course PR. I started thinking of how I would approach
the following running season and I decided I wanted to continue doing
triathlon, but focus mainly on the run and I explored hiring a coach. Two friends were planning to run the Big
Cottonwood Marathon in September, so I thought I would join them. Then I wanted to try for a PR at the 2017
Phoenix Marathon and then run Boston.
Coach DD started giving me guidance in July and I ramped up
quickly for the September race. It was
mainly a practice run for me, but I wanted to do well and with the downhill I
thought it was possible to aim for another PR.
The downhill is extreme however with over 5,000 feet of descent, and
most of it by mile 18. By the late
stages, my calves were very tight and I slowed down to avoid injury and
finished in 3:28. I came to appreciate
the difficulty of the hills and learned how ill prepared I was to run so much downhill. I did enjoy the course and scenery and I
learned a great deal from the experience.
By late December, coach had me
running 50+ miles a week and my speed had picked up. For the 2017 Phoenix Marathon I aimed for
3:10 and narrowly missed it, finishing in 3:12:04 for a PR by 5 minutes. I was very happy with the run and managed to
push harder and further into the pain late in the race. However, I had room to
improve in my execution as the last 2 miles were about a minute off my target pace
and I stopped to stretch out quickly 2 times and that certainly cost several
precious seconds. Next step was Boston
in 7 weeks.
I recovered quickly and got
back to 50+ miles a week. I avoided
serious injury and sickness and despite a busy travel schedule, was able to
complete all of my scheduled runs. Coach
had me run hills several times to get ready for the famous and dreaded Newton
Hills that are late in the Boston race.
Since Jan 1, I logged 82 runs
totaling 673 miles in Scotland, Canada, Mexico, California, Nevada, New York,
Texas, Massachusetts, and Arizona. January
was my peak month with 223 miles and 9 weeks exceeded 50 miles. There have been super fun runs with friends
at Cadence and the Delancey Loopers and there have been tough runs at
inconvenient times when on the road and in rough conditions including ice in
Canada, rain in Scotland, and sand in Mexico (well that was by choice:-). One particularly tough run was a 20-miler in
Central Park on a cold drizzling morning, but the heavy rain held off and I got
it done. Several of the runs were on
hilly roads to simulate the Boston course profile including running several
miles uphill at the end of a 16-mile long run.
Through all that, I didn’t miss a scheduled run except once during taper
week (don’t tell coach!), and I stuck to the plan prescribed. One time I had to cut a 10-mile run down to
6.5 due to time constraint, but I still did the main workout for that day. All this to prepare to reach the finish line
on Boylston St with a few thousand friends on Patriot's Day. I definitely felt like I did the work to
prepare as best I could and I managed to avoid injury and illness.
My original plan was to aim
for PR at Phoenix and then just enjoy Boston with no pressure to run hard. But since I was feeling so good and running
so well, I thought that it would be a waste not to try hard at Boston. So, coach gave me a race plan that would give
me a chance to PR if conditions warranted and if I felt good late in the
run. 
The weekend of the rate was
magical. We met our friends MP and CP
from Calgary and the ladies ran the BAA 5k on Saturday morning and it was fun to cheer and spectate. The winner set a record and was finished before all the runners were started. We heard Meb Kaflezighi speak about running
and his career and that just inspired me more.
The expo was full of people and energy and even at church on Sunday the
congregation was overflowing with visitors for the marathon. Each passing moment my excitement and
anticipation grew. The weather forecast
looked clear but on the warm side in the low 70s with a west wind. MP knew that this was bad news for him as he
was not used to running in heat. I felt
I was fairly accustomed to warm weather running, so I thought I could stick to
my plan. I was not nervous and I managed
to sleep well.  |
| Finish line |
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| BAA 5k |
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| Finished! |
Gear: Newton Gravity VI shoes, Wright double layer socks
with blue and green stripes, Adidas Delancey Loopers singlet, Lululemon shorts,
BAA Headsweats cap, sunglasses, and SPI Belt with phone (but no music this
time). 3 AMPED Fuel gels, chapstick, and
BASE salt in pockets. Sweatshirt and
garbage bag for athlete village.
Nutrition: IsaLean shake, IsaLean bar and banana early
morning, AMPED Power and e+Shot before the race. AMPED Fuel, BASE salt, water, some orange
slices and Gatorade during the race.
 |
| Race morning |
Race morning went like
clockwork. We got up, ate, dressed,
dropped gear bags, met friends including HD and her brother, and headed to the bus line in Boston
Common. There were busses lined up as
far as you could see and people moving everywhere. The loading process was smooth and
quick. After a long drive, we arrived at
the athlete village at Hopkinton High School and joined thousands of runners in
lines to use the port-a-johns. We made our
way to the tents where we could sit in the shade. It was warmer than forecast with temps above
70 even at 9am. It started to dawn on me
just how warm that is.
The screaming roar of a pair
of YF-22s overhead preceded the Wave 1 start.
Not long after that, our wave was called and we started to make our way
down to the starting area. There were so
many runners! The road was packed with
people in both directions as far as I could see. I would love to get an overhead
perspective. Along the way there were
people on the side handing out water, Vaseline, pins, sharpies, and anything
else a runner might need. No need to
pack anything next time! Another quick
pit stop, then we shed our jackets along the way and we were ready. I told MP if I saw him on course that was bad
news for me!
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| Arriving at the Athlete's Village |
 |
| Never seen so many |
 |
| Pre-race party |
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| Getting very real |
I was in corral 2 and I could
see the starting clock. Two minutes to
go. A quick selfie, a check of my watch,
and then the gun. There was no movement
at all for what seemed like a long time, even though it was only a minute or so. Finally, I started moving and before long
crossed the start line. MP had warned me
that it would be hard to run the pace I wanted because of the density of
runners for the first 10k or so. I found
that to be somewhat true, but I was able to get to the 7:20-7:30 pace I was
aiming for without too much jostling around.
I carried a water bottle so that I could avoid slowing for the water
with such large crowds. I tried to stay
to the middle third of the road where the crown of the road was flattest and so
I could avoid the first few aid stations.
Since they had water stations on both sides of the course, I had to
weave a bit first to the right, and then to the left to avoid the slowing
runners at each table. The bottle lasted
until about 10k. I think I will use that
tactic again in the future.
 |
| In the corral |
The first few miles have some
downhill sections and there is a tendency to go too fast. I held to my plan and managed a 23min 5k and
46min 10k. The course weaves through forest, and even though the trees are
mostly bare, there is only a little relief from the sun. The wind was mostly at our backs, but at
times it swirled around providing unwanted resistance. By this time, the crowds were quite steady
along both sides of the course, getting bigger and louder in the middle of each
town. It was a spectacular day to be a
spectator, but not so great for running!
The third 5k was only slightly
slower at 23:27, but I realized I was working way harder than I should have been
to hold the pace and I started to really dread the many miles ahead. At Phoenix, the middle miles melted away with
relative ease and here it was me that was melting. I continued to take water at least every mile
and I had a gel at about this time and then I took salt a mile later and hoped
I would feel better. By mile 11 I knew I
had no shot at a PR so I was reassessing my goals when suddenly I could hear
the screams from the famed Wellesley Girls College even though they were nearly
a mile away. The scream tunnel is indeed
loud and full of energy. I gave lots of
high fives and felt a boost that helped me get past the halfway mark.
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| Wellesley College Scream Tunnel |
My original plan had the first
half at 1:36 and I was now at 1:39, which is not terrible. However, the way I felt was terrible. I knew it was unrealistic to continue even at
that pace and I was struggling to stay engaged mentally with any pacing
effort. It was about mile 15 that I
decided I wa going to aim for my very first goal of having fun at the Boston
Marathon. Now it is not as though you
can immediately convert suffering into fun; no matter what, I was going to
suffer to keep going, but by embracing this new goal I put my mental energy
into enjoying the course and crowd instead of stressing about pacing and
pain. As bad as I was feeling in these
miles, I never once considered stopping to pull out. I have heard of others doing that and even
running with an MTBA train ticket, but crossing the finish line is one thing I
never lost sight of, and I didn’t doubt for a second that I could do it.
I have always loved the signs at marathons and there were many good ones. Many of the youngsters had signs that said ‘Press Here for a Power-up’ or something similar. When I noticed those, I made an effort to go hit them; the kids light up when you do. I learned early on that high fiving adults is not a good idea; they tend to smack you so hard it slows you down! So, I stuck to the low hands and probably found 200 of them.
At the top of the first hill I
was able to get running again and from that point on I probably walked for a
bit every mile or two. I do remember
blasting up one of the hills determined to not walk that one and I made it, but
I paid for it. The heat and humidity had
taken a toll. I was taking a drink every
half mile or so. There were a few spray
zones which I took advantage of. There
were also some fire hydrants hooked up with a spray nozzle that looked very
refreshing. However, when I stepped into
the spray, it nearly knocked me over from the force. I came out of that soaked. It felt good initially and my wet gear helped
with the cooling, but it also felt heavy and caused chaffing. Not bueno!
Heartbreak Hill at mile 20 did
not break my heart because it was already broken well before that point. I kept plugging away at each mile and went
from smiling at a funny sign to grimacing at the effort to giving a thumbs-up in
the general direction of a supportive yell.
I wrote my name on my bib and I heard my name shouted out several
times. While working on Heartbreak Hill
I heard someone yell out ‘go Ba La Ke!’ and that really made me smile.
At times, I was walking next
to a fellow racer and we shared a few words of encouragement. Before the race, I thought it would be
frowned upon to walk, but I didn’t hear anything but encouragement and
positivity. One of the other runners I
spoke with after had heard a negative comment about walking, but I didn’t hear
a single one. And I was not alone
walking as the day was particularly uncomfortable for running. On the flip side, the spectators had ideal
conditions!
Overall I was still holding
together. As I took stock of the
situation, I had a bit of chaffing from wet shorts, my toes felt soggy from
being wet and I thought I might have a blister, but it wasn’t hurting. I had used gels and salt and sipped at
Gatorade so I think my electrolytes were OK.
I didn’t feel any pains or cramps and I didn’t have GI distress, so
despite how difficult it was to run, I was in decent condition. Not so for many
of my fellow runners. I saw a few
stretchers on course, volunteers stepping out to help a wobbling runner, a few
sitting down on the ground at the side, and at least one making a deposit on
the road.
I remember first seeing the
top of the Prudential Tower and shortly after that I saw the famed Citgo
sign. It marks one mile left, but
unfortunately, I was still well over a mile away from it when I first saw it! Once I got closer I took out my phone and
snapped a picture of it. And why
not?
Passing the Citgo sign, I was excited
for the finish and to be finished. A
short downhill for an underpass, then back up (ouch), and then a right turn on
Hereford St. When I saw the left turn to
Boylston ahead, I stopped to capture the moment and then I made the turn and
headed for home. My smile grew larger as
the sound grew louder. The echoing
between the buildings amplified the sounds of the throngs. I couldn’t imagine how they sustained the
energy and volume for so long, as I was finishing more than two hours after the
elite runners came through. Maybe they
were just that excited to see me! Even
here on Boylston there were several walking the final stretches. Not me this time! This moment was less than 3 minutes long and it
went by entirely too fast. Running the
same route where the best in the world had competed was like being on the field
at the Superbowl. OK, maybe just a
pickup game of flag football after the real game, but still, on the same field
and in front of a crazy wild crowd! Pure
magic.
As I crossed the finish line I
looked up at the bridge and smiled. I
made it. I went from being a Boston
Qualifier to being a Boston Finisher! All
I wanted to do was sit, however, that is not possible. You keep walking through the finishing area
to get a bottle of water, then a finisher’s medal, on to a space blanket, a bag
of food, and eventually pick up your gear bag.
Apparently, Kandyce and CP saw me and yelled over, but I did not see
them. Only then can you exit the area
and wander off to the park or a bench. Once
I had my gear bag, I was very happy to get my feet out of my soggy Newtons and
into my Oofoos sandals. I headed for the
park where I found a spot of grass to lie down and get sorted out. By this time, my hunger was starting to come
and I took AMPED Recover and ate an apple.
I downed chocolate protein drink they gave us, stretched out on the
blanket and then just watched. 
I texted Kandyce to let her know
where I was. We originally had planned
to meet up at the hotel room since it was near, but she was close to where I
was so she came to find me there. I just
relaxed there for a while enjoying the beautiful weather now that I wasn’t
running! There was a bit of a breeze and
some clouds were rolling in and it was cooling off. Sadly, the next day was in the 50s and would
have been a perfect day for a run!
We made our way up to the room
and there we found MP. We each did an
ice bath (ouch!), started comparing race experiences, and continued with the
refueling. We headed out that night for
a celebration dinner at Cheesecake Factory where we knew the calories would be
abundant!
I finished in 3:52:21, a
disappointing 40 mins slower than Phoenix marathon just 7 weeks prior. I certainly did not expect that the course
and weather would have such an effect on me!
I admit that I yielded to the suffering in the last 10 miles, but I was happy
that I could relish the experience as much as possible when in pain! I like to joke that taking more strokes in
golf just means you get more for your money…. well maybe the same applies to
the marathon; I got 40 bonus minutes of ‘enjoyment’!
So many people have helped me
on my journey. The great people at
Cadence Running, my teammates who call themselves the Delancey Loopers, my
coach DD, my nutrition advisor BS and the others at Isagenix who inspire me, the
many people in Gilbert and around the world who have shared a run with me, my 3
sisters who inspired me to run a marathon in the first place, and my family. Thank-you all. But most especially, thanks to my wife
Kandyce and my children who support me and put up with my sweaty gear, early hours,
running talk, and strange habits. I love
you.
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| Finished! |
