Friday 4 July 2008

FOOT TRAFFIC FLAT MARATHON, Portland OR

This is a good event with some unique features.

Debbie Hill and I drive over to the site in my Saturn. It’s about 20 minutes away from the motel. We arrive around 6:15am. Jim Hill will join us later in their rental car.

Sauvie Island is unaccustomed to the amount of automobile traffic this event produces so it’s slow going by car for the last couple miles but we get parked and Debbie goes off to register for the half marathon while I eat my last bits of breakfast: Power Bar, water, and peanut butter on some bread left over from last night’s dinner. I get to the starting line just two minutes before the 6:45am air horn sounds signaling the start. The half marathon starts at 7am.

It’s a nice morning to be running. The temperature is neither too hot nor too cold. It’s humid and overcast. I’m dressed lightly.

I may have lost some of my competitive spirit. Formerly, for nearly every event I’d go out (too) fast trying to get positioned for a fast time. More recently when the gun or air horn goes off I’m thinking “whatever” as I allow just about everyone to go ahead of me. My first mile is at 9:12 pace which is okay but not enough to break 4 hours unless I plan to get some reverse splits going (unlikely).

The course loop surface is asphalt paved throughout. My favorite part is around mile 4 where there is a long low dock at water level that is covered with small residences. There are also many houseboats parked along side. I guess this waterway does not fluctuate much with the tides since it looks as if the thresholds of these little homes are right at the water line. A small wave or tidal surge would flood the bottom floor. Perhaps it’s a floating dock that rises and falls with the tides or possibly the bottom floors of the homes are not used for fancy furniture and or family photographs and may be relegated to patio status.

At 4 miles the first of the half-marathoners start passing me at a brisk pace. They are numerous and even though they started 15 minutes later, they know they’ll be out for only 13.1 miles and are obviously putting it all out there on the road. The frontrunners have about a 5:30/miles pace going.

There’s a half-mile out-and-back finger appendage on the course loop where one can partially assess their relative position to the field since the bib numbers are color-coded by event. I count at least 30 marathoners behind me.

Around mile six I begin passing and being re-overtaken by a strongly-constructed fellow in a bright pink shirt labeled to indicate he’s honoring someone with his run. He’s carrying a large bottle of red fluid. I kid him that his steroid cocktail is really helping him and he plays along. He has an impressive speaking voice and an outgoing manner. It all makes sense when I learn later he’s an on-air personality for a Houston radio Station. His name is Kevin Kline (Same as the actor but different spelling; the other one is Klein)). We agree after the third time of passing and re-passing one another that whichever of us finishes first will save some of the advertised post-race hotdogs and strawberry shortcake for the other. I pull away from him for the last time at about mile 12 but wait for him at the finish line where I also meet his lovely wife, Trish. They both seem like good folks. They started a foundation together to help cancer victims and their families. http://snowdropfoundation.org/ I invite them to come to the Disney Marathon and stay at our house in January. (If all the people I’ve invited during this trip actually show up I’m going to have a big crowd on hand.)

I’m feeling a bit hungry at the half way point. So far I’m making decent but not great time. My watch shows around 2:10 for the first half and that includes one delay while visiting a port-o-potty en route. I carried a gel pack with me after needing nutrition in Anchorage at my last event. At half way I suck down the gu along 200mg of ibuprofen and 200mg of potassium chloride.

Around miles 17-18 the sun comes out for about 2 miles. It’s hot and could make the last miles pretty unpleasant. Mercifully the overcast returns providing a cooler comfortable finish.

This event has no on-course nutrition support and I’m wishing I’d carried more gel. One pack gets me through but I’d have done better with more. I have a bit of a bonk in the late miles. Some folks at an impromptu aid station near the 25-mile post give me a handful of gummy bears which are a welcome but arrive too late for maximum effectiveness.

I walk quite a bit during miles 23-25 but was running for the finish line photographer. When I hear the nearby electronic bleep of finish line mats sensing champion chips I know the end is quite close although it’s still out of view around the corner. I try unsuccessfully to catch a tall man in his 30s during the last 0.2 miles but he’s kicking well and deserves to stay in front of me. I learn later this is his first marathon. Debbie and Jim Hill are cheering at the finish line.

The finisher’s medal is a 3-inch diameter, clear-colorless pexiglass disk about a quarter inch thick. It’s sandblasted or laser carved from the back with event name, location, and logo which appear submerged in plastic when viewed from the front. It hangs from a red, white, and blue ribbon appropriate for this Independence Day event.

I slowly stagger-limp over to the hot dog table and have two with mustard over the next couple minutes while exchanging accounts of the morning’s run with Debbie and some folks I met on the course.

Nearby I pick up a serving of the free strawberry shortcake being offered to finishers. It’s startlingly good. The women working the table are also the berry growers who are proud of the product. I return a few minutes later for a second serving.

“Hello ladies. For complete disclosure I should admit I was here earlier.”

“We know. It’s okay. We normally worry about running out but this year was a bumper crop. There’s plenty.”

“This is amazingly good and is the best I’ve ever had.”

“Thanks. It’s those Sauvie Island berries.”

‘What is it about this place … the soil…the sunlight…?”

“It’s everything … including the intelligence of the growers.” (grins with pride)

The on-line results show there are 135 marathon finishers and 1260 half marathon finishers. My chip time is recorded as 4:27:32. That’s about 9 minutes faster than what I had in Anchorage on June 21 just 13 days ago. All marathon results can be obtained at http://www.racecenter.com/results/2008/ftm08.htm

Debbie Hill completed the half marathon in 2:59:13 which I believe is also about 9 minutes faster than her time in Anchorage at The Mayor’s (Half) Marathon. We agree that it may be reckless and unwise to conclude from these data that our week of over-eating and lazing around on a cruise ship is a good taper strategy to use in the future.

Late this afternoon on the way out of town Debbie telephones me at the motel from the road to recommend Elmer’s restaurant a couple blocks away where she and Jim had lunch after leaving. They’re driving back to Seattle to fly home tomorrow but I’m staying through tonight. The dinner is great and I was grateful for something close enough so I didn’t have to drive.

Tonight outside my 3rd floor Motel 6 window I can see several July 4^th fireworks displays all within 1 or 2 miles of here. I hear the constant rapid fire crackling of rockets and firecrackers. I stay inside content to watch through the window while doing some laundry by hand in preparation for heading back east tomorrow.