THE RACE
I see one of the Tacoma runners – his time was about 1 minute slower than mine, but his number was nearly 700 higher – and tap him on the shoulder, shaking his hand, wishing him luck. I wait. And wait. Finally, we start walking. I insist on walking the whole way to the start line. This takes nearly 8 minutes. The temptation to break into a run is almost overpowering, as the way is lined with thousands of spectators, all urging me to “Go, go, go!!!” The energy here, at the start, is humbling and overwhelming. At the very top of the hill, the start line, and pads for our chips to start our own personal clock. Finally, I can start to unwind my top. But slowly, gently.
The downhill start unfolds with precision. I do not run into any crowds, and run the first mile near 8 minutes – just perfect. I walk into each aid station, grab a Gatorade, chug it, and start up again. For 20 minutes or so, the way is almost quiet, save for the sloshy padding of thousands of racing shoes on the asphalt. Only a few people out here in the New England exurbs are bothering to cheer us on. We hit Ashland, and the crowds appear. For the rest of the race, we are not alone – there will always be hundreds in sight, and more important, in earshot, importuning us on. Anything written on a runner’s shirt or number gets a response. I must hear “Go Wesleyan” at least 10 times a minute all the way into Boston. I also hear the same names over and over – “Dave”, Patti”, and “New Orleans” seem to be the folks I’m traveling with.
In Framingham, I start to look for kids to high-, or actually low-five. The smaller the better. The ones about 4-6 years old seem to get the biggest kick out of it. They’ve been primed by 10,000 others before me, and have learned that only a few of us will do the hand thing. I’m glad to oblige. I’d rather think about them than about how slow I’m probably going. It feels too easy – just the way I’ve planned.
After nine miles, I start to actually feel the work. But I try to hold things back, to not think about the future, and I’ve certainly forgotten the past already. I’m paying no real attention to my time, just hitting the lap button on my watch every mile, noting they’re all 8-something.
At about 12 miles, we start to anticipate the Wellesley girls. Through Framingham, I’ve noticed that some people are having trouble with my shirt – “Uh, go, uh, WELLES – leyan?” No matter; once or twice I try to correct them, but mostly I just smile or wave when I hear my alma mater shouted out.
I love crowds like the Wellesley girls. They know they’ve got a rep to protect, so they are easy to pump up. All I do is raise one or both hands in the air a few times, like a basketball player trying to pump up the home crowd. They screech a little louder, but, frankly, I think they’re getting tired out. At this point they’ve probably been cheering for an hour, and know they’re going to get a little break about now between the waves, with another hour or more to go. I also start to see my first beer drinkers, who see us as basically the entertainment on a bogus holiday.
After Wellesley, I start to look for an open porta potti, but they all have lines 2-3 deep. So behind an electrical substation in the woods by the railroad track leaving town, I join a few other guys to lighten the load a bit for the second half of the race. 40 extra seconds added to my time, I note.
Right after this, the hills start. Boston is famous for “Heartbreak Hill”, where an early victor put the hammer down on his competition. Heartbreak is actually the fourth in a series of five hills through Newton, which carry you from 14.5 to 20.5 miles in the race. And, I think it’s only the third worst in the series of five. The first one is always a surprise, as you’re not quite ready for it. It’s not very steep but it is long, and can start to sap your will if you let it. The hills are a double whammy. They come just at the point where you want to pick up steam. You do so, but going uphill, your pace actually slows down. This is mentally debilitating. And, physically, the hills take so much out of you that by the end, you run the risk of giving up on the final long gentle downhill into town.
The weather had been totally benign all race up to now – about 55F, and mostly overcast, with a nominal breeze. But as we turned the corner at the Newton fire station, and headed up towards the Mass Pike overpass, the sun came out, and the wind started blowing from our back. Sweat began to pour down my arms, and I tried to roll my short sleeves up. They kept falling down, and finally, I started grabbing the proferred water from road side helpers. This bandit water I wouldn’t trust to drink, but I would pour it over my head and onto my back. Just the stuff. Some rich soul was actually handing out sealed water bottles – I took one, and drank about half. Over the top (this is the worst hill), I knew I was working, but still felt strong on the downhill. Folks would pass me on the upslope, but I was passing scores on each downslope.
Heartbreak arrived. 3/4ths of the way up, I knew I wasn’t going to crack, that there would be no wall for me, not here at least, so I raised both arms in jubilation, to carry me over the top. Flying down hill following the inner curve, I had to start watching out for people in my way. I was passing most everyone at this point, but there was one more hill, the last and second worst, to go. It’s second worst, because you tend to forget about it after the thrill of passing Heartbreak and the 10K to go mark. But slog up it I did, and started kicking into a new gear on the way down.
If the first eight miles had felt like a long run training pace, and miles 8-14 had felt like a marathon pace, and the hills had felt like work and fun (the downhills at least), now I felt like I was moving into a new, unknown pace. It felt about as hard as a half-marathon, but my legs were so much deader than in that shorter race. There were thousands of people surrounding us now, as we moved by Cleveland Circle and Boston College. The BC kids were way more numerous and much much louder the the Wellesley girls. I don’t know why they don’t get the same publicity – maybe because some of them can be too rowdy. Anyway, it was almost deafening. But I was moving; working hard, but moving at a good pace. And passing hundreds of people each mile, so many I had to weave around among them.
I was also starting to get the message from somewhere – my legs? – that I was working too hard, and that it would be really nice to slow down and rest. My head felt clear, though, well hydrated and still cooking, still insisting that I could indeed maintain this manic yet debilitating pace through town. At this point I was not using any particular motivation. No landmarks, no interaction with crowd, no racing with those around me. I was just on some catabolic autopilot, eating myself up as I plowed on to the finish.
This year, at about mile 25, the route headed under Mass Ave, and back up again. Around mile 24, I gave myself a promise – I would let myself walk a bit up that underground hill, while I was out of sight of the crowd, and, once back in the light, would kick in for the final drive home. It worked, as did passing up the last aid station – I didn’t even have the energy to stop, drink, and swallow any more.
The final quarter mile of the Boston course takes a right off of Commonwealth, and then a block or two later, a left on Boylston for the final push home. During the dogleg, I spied a familiar head of hair up in front. Peter, one of the docs I work with, had been trying to qualify for Boston for several years. A year ago, he missed the cut off by about a minute. This year, he made it by about the same amount. He was hurting. I tapped him on the left shoulder (I was going to go around him on the INSIDE as we hit Boylston, for sure), and said, “Hey Peter!” Once he’d registered my face, I told him he would make it. He said, “The only reason I’m still running is that I’ll get done faster!” For a moment, I contemplated going in to the finish with him, but he was clearly laboring, and I still had a small amount of juice left. I just said, “Keep going, you’ve got it”, and ramped back up to my finishing “kick”.
The finish at Boston has two chutes. The one on the left is preceded by a timing pad (for the announcer to see who’s coming in) with about 150 yards to go. I made sure to pass over it, and, sure enough, as I came up on the finish line, I heard the announcer shouting, “Al Truscott, 57 years young, from Gig Harbor, Washington!” Then I hit the finish, raising my arms and smiling for the camera, hit my watch and stopped running.
This one felt good at the end. So good, I turned around and waited for Peter, to congratulate him and have someone to shuffle through the sea of silver mylar blankets, waiting water bottles and medals, and to do a little decompression with.