Los Angeles Marathon 2002
LA Times Article, with quote from Sleeve!
This is
Los Angeles, the City of Angels, where superficiality may shave a few seconds off your
marathon time and you have to imagine you’re running 26 miles on a red carpet, with
the paparazzi continuously pointing cameras at your feet the entire distance. All the course is a stage. So you better look GOOD if you want to make it in
this marathon, or this town for that matter. Why
else in the world would the volunteers and spectators be so obsessed with chanting,
“Lookin’ good! Lookin’
gooooood!”
With this
in mind……..Around 2AM the night before the marathon, I was still tossing and
turning in bed. Then I felt one of my several
loose, black toenails scrape my blanket. "Ow,
that kinda hurt. Can’t have them nails
messing with my run tomorrow," I thought. So,
in my insomnia, I jumped outta bed and looked for the nail clippers so I could give myself
a pedicure for the big day, only four hours away. In
the still of the night, "clip......snip.....clip, clip." Perfect, my nails looked like a million rusty
pesos.
This was
your typical, world-renowned sunny Southern California day.
Clear skies and warm temperatures made for a sweaty marathon, but promised
runners a grrrreat Baywatch tan at the finish.
This was
supposed to be another training run for Boston in April, so I really didn’t have a
particular time in mind to run. Four weeks
earlier, on January 27th, I had run the Pacific Shoreline Marathon in
Huntington Beach after 6 weeks of training. It
wasn’t an ideal way to run a marathon, but I had planned on only running 17 miles of
the course as a long training run but felt good enough to finish the thing, and besides, I
paid the full marathon fee and had to get my money’s worth. Ended up running a 3:20 there, so I figured I
should at least be able to run a 3:15 at LA. Then
again, if I could run a 3:15, there was a chance I could run a 3:10 and qualify for Boston
2003. Fat chance I could run sub-3 today, but
I just wanted that Boston qualifying albatross off my neck.
I saw the ClifBar 3:15 pacing group at the start--it was the fastest time
for which they had a pacing group, so I decided I'd run with them and break off at some
point. The leader of the group was a 2:40
marathoner, so this was gonna be a cakewalk for him.
The race
was supposed to start at 8:45AM, but we were kept waiting for an unbearable 30 minutes. The delay led to a liter of Gatorade screaming to
get out of my system and almost wreaked havoc on my Boston plans. The start delay, it was claimed, was caused by
security concerns. During that time,
everyone’s legs got nice and stiff due to standing in one erect position with nowhere
to move or stretch. The 23,000 runners were
entertained and agitated by local politicians, including Richard Riordan, begging for
votes on election day, two days away. Jackie
Joyner Kersee's was a welcome voice, as was the person who sang "America the
Beautiful." But the delay was at it's
worst when they played a pre-recorded version of the National Anthem. I realized this was the first marathon I’ve
run where it wasn’t sung live. So much
for being in the Entertainment Capital of the World.
When the marathon finally got under way, it was already hitting 70 degrees
and you knew it was gonna be a warm one. Throughout
the entire course, there was little shade to be had, and there was not a cloud in the sky.
A few
years ago at the 1999 San Francisco Marathon, a little bladder problem prompted a sidetrip
to some nearby bushes to take care of business with #1--this nearly cost me a Boston
qualifying time, but in the end I had 26 seconds to spare.
Well, history does have a way of repeating itself, and at this year's LA
marathon, I felt a bit of deja vous taking me back to SF again and creating another close
call at the finish with my qualifying time because of another public rendezvous with #1. After running the first mile on full bladders, we
were going through a tunnel when two other runners in the pace group and I agreed to pull
over to the side and let out the excess liquids that accumulated during the 30 minute
delay. This took about 45 seconds and I felt
like I was running on air after that. Getting
back to the pace group, it was actually a nice change not having to worry about mile
splits myself, allowing me to run mindlessly with them.
But the pace did seem a bit slow and I found myself having to slow down to keep
back with the group. I figured I could stick
with the group the whole way and finish comfortably.
But then my right hip and quad started feeling funky around mile 5 and the
tightness increased in intensity throughout the race, but it was manageable. Strange sensation to describe, but it's like the
muscles around my hip get extremely weak when I lift my leg and the quad tightens up. The exact same problem occurred last year at LA
and Boston, but I never got around to having my doc check it out. Still need to get this taken care of. It was especially tough on the downhills, with all
that pounding on the quads. Neverthenonetheless,
I ignored the discomfort pretty well.
The LA
marathon is a virtual high school Spanish, Korean, and Chinese class all wrapped up in one
big kim-chee-filled fajita dipped in sweet & sour sauce. Lotsa people screaming "Go Mei-hee-co!"
for the runners from across the border. Several
billboards were in Spanish, and I had to look around me to find anyone Hispanic to
translate. An amigo running by me translated
one billboard, "The power of one to run 26 miles." Huh, say what?
I imagined it musta been something fairly motivating or inspiring, but I
gave my newfound Spanish teacher a puzzled look and started thinking I'd maybe have
Mexican for dinner that night. Next, a
Chinese couple was carrying a large sign with Chinese characters that read "Sai Daai
Woh," though I couldn’t make sense of it either in Cantonese or Mandarin
("Xi Da He"). Literally, it means
"West-Big-Peace," but it bugged me for a mile not being able to decipher the
actual meaning. Then going through Koreatown,
I could hear the Koreans chanting and recalled how I once knew how to read and write the
Korean alphabet, though not necessarily understand what I was reading, as my mind
mindlessly gazed across all the Hangul signs and banners in the area. The best thing I could reciprocate to the Korean
spectators was, "Annyonghaseyho! Kommupsumnida!" Hopefully, it came out right and I was saying hi
and thanking them for the support, rather than pointing a politicized finger at the North
Koreans, ala George W's infamous axis speech. Otherwise,
I owe them all a profuse "mianhamnida." The
LA Marathon really gives you a feel for the city's diversity of Pacific Rim cultures, and
somewhere among this whole ethnic showcase, you hope they'll be serving fajitas, dim sum,
or bibimbap at the next water station. Prego!
And Miles to Go Before I Get
this Over With
And Miles to Go Before I Get this Over With
Around
mile 7, we passed USC and my classmates who were working a water station—imagine
that, supposedly greedy business students at the so-called University of Spoiled Children
working for free on an early Sunday morning. I
felt a good surge of energy there and found myself running a few meters ahead of the pace
group. By mile 8, our group was one minute
over pace. I figured this wasn’t looking
good if I wanted to run under 3:10, so I decided to run ahead by myself. Good decision in retrospect because I got to the
halfway mark in 1:36 and was able to run a 3-minute negative split for the second half.
Though
the temperature was climbing into the mid 70 degrees, it was a great day for running and
spectating. The weather really brought out
the crowds this year, in contrast to the past two years when the weather failed to
cooperate. Got a lot of support from
spectators chanting the "USC" that was written on my shirt, though I felt a bit
of sarcasm while running through the western part of the course, closer to Bruin stomping
grounds, when one spectator intentionally hollered "Go UCLA!" at me. I laughed, shaking my head thinking, "Heh,
heh. Don’t those kids at UCLA know how
to read?"
Running
through Santa Monica, around mile 18, a pack of kids wearing red Verizon t-shirts was
scurrying back and forth between runners, offering free calls on their cell phones. It was a group of local high school track and
cross country runners sweating and toiling away for the corporate wireless giant. "Can you hear me now? Can you hear me now?" Can you exploit me now? Can you exploit me now? Nah, seriously, they looked like they were having
fun and I was bummed that I never got to do anything like this when I ran in high school.
Yechhh. Even before the start of the marathon, I was
already on a sugar high. One liter of
Gatorade, a ClifBar, and two ClifShots comprised my pre-marathon breakfast. Then I started taking in Gatorade early on and
often during the run to beat off the heat. I
wasn’t sweating salt. No, I was sweating
sugar and had a really big urge to brush my teeth. ClifBar
had two stations handing out gel, but I bypassed them looking for the Crest relief station
instead. 4 out of 5 dentists recommend
toothpaste to goo.
By about
mile 20, I tried not to look at the clock anymore.
It was just making me nervous and I still felt relatively good, and it
felt like I was running under 7:30 pace, so I decided to run on how I was feeling, rather
than to the clock, in order to get to 3:10. But
then I had to take a sneaky peak at the clock at mile 23.
Had about 26 minutes left to finish that last 5K. At that point, I was running at a pace under 8
minutes per mile, which was all I needed to hit 3:10, but I wanted to make sure I had a
buffer at the end, just in case my knee or quads spazzed up on me, so I began to pick up
the pace a little. After mile 23, I still
felt good, though my right quad was continuing to act up. Finally, making it to mile 25 I
gave it one last push. About 100 meters out,
I squinted to see the clock read 3:09:something and thought, "Oh no, you
shouldn’t have peed, you shouldn’t have peed." But in a mad panic, I rushed in to finish with a
3:09:20; next year’s Beantown albatross
is off my neck, and now I can run DC and Boston this year in peace.
Finally,
I never thought I could ever be violated at a marathon, but I was in LA--three times over. Passing through the mile 12 water station, I was
privately enjoying a Gatorade moment, while maintaining my pace, when out of the corner of
my eye I saw a little boy (couldn’t have been older than 8 years old) pulling his arm
back, as if to pitch a baseball. Wide-eyed
and horrified at what was to come, I realized that it was no baseball, but a cup of water
he was aiming directly at me. SPLAT. "What was THAT??!!" I annoyingly cried at the little bad news bear.
Fortunately, it was only a dixie-sized cup and I wrote off the wet incident as a cute
little kid not knowing any better. Next, at
about mile 15, there was a guy on the right side of the road spraying a garden hose at
runners. I veered towards the center to avoid
being hosed down, but found myself screaming again, "NOOOOOO!" as he caught one
of my shoes and sock. AAAAARGGGHHHH.
No, this
couldn’t happen again--two times was the max, right?
Nah, let's go for a triple play. At
the mile 25 water station, I was feeling good and was on pace to finish under 3:10, so I
decided to pass on any water. It was gonna
be a dry finish. NOT. I saw a rather big dude filling up a large cup of
water. But before I could beg
“NO!!!!"......SPLASSSHHH! This
time I ended up wringing water out of my shirt and my hair was dripping wet. With less than a mile to go, and remembering that
looks and appearances go a long way in LA, I thought, "This aint gonna look good in
my finishing photo."
I imagine
there's gotta be some kind of lesson to be learned from all of this. Cant decide if it's to run better prepared next
time either wearing a wet suit or packing a loaded squirt gun and water balloons. Oh and don’t forget the hair dryer, comb,
cell phone, and pocket Spanish translator—you cant run LA any other way.