I got up at 4:00AM and took the R train to Whitehall to get to the Staten Island Ferry. Last time I slept over at a friend’s who lives on Staten Island right next to the start village. I was able to roll out of bed at 7:00 to get to the start. This time I wanted to experience what all the other marathoners experience.
By the time I got to the terminal to wait for the 5:30AM ferry, my anxiety was already in effect. The vast majority of people in the terminal were runners mostly carrying the clear plastic bag that we got when we picked up our bibs. Their bags were filled with Gatorades and bananas and Gu packets and I immediately thought, “Did I do this wrong? Was I supposed to bring stuff in that bag? Are pre-race electrolytes and potassium essential to a good race?! I’m screwed!”
I had my Honey Stinger packets in an elastic runner’s belt. I was wearing a sweatshirt and sweatpants that I had bought from a dollar store the night before along with my previous marathon poncho. I was planning to ditch them all before the race.
I couldn’t calm my mind down. The presence of all these other runners heightened my anxiety. They’re better prepared. They’re better runners than I am. I did my best not to listen to any of them when they started talking about Chicago or Boston.
After the ferry, we got on charter buses to take us to the start at Fort Wadsworth right below the Verrazano. There was a man in front of me who was 84. He was running his 160th marathon. I figured if he could do it I could do it. But then I heard him tell his neighbor, “you cross that finish line and look at your time and you say, ‘I can beat that’,” which is not what I wanted to hear.
There was one thing in particular that I wanted at the start, that other marathoners had gotten in the past. I wanted the Dunkin’ hat. One of the benefits of the NYC marathon start areas are the free waters, Gatorades, Dunkin’ bagels, coffee, and the fleece Dunkin’ marathon hat.
The first time I saw them, I was a spectator in Brooklyn and noticed that all the runners were wearing them. It just seemed like such a quintessential part of running the marathon. Kind of like the medal, it was proof that you ran it. It should be noted that the 84 year old guy was wearing one from 2017 (they all have the years on them) and they were all gone by the time I got to the start in 2019. The woman handing them out laughed at how happy I was to get one. They’re one size fits all and I have a big ass head so it wasn’t the best fit but I don’t care.
Cinnamon raisin bagel, coffee, and hat procured, I could focus on my nerves and pace around thinking about my failed 20 mile training run where I had to stop at 18 miles. “Can I even run anymore? What if I can’t run? These people are all faster than I am. Why am I in wave 1? I’m not fast as fast as I was in 2019. Why did I do this? Why are we all doing this? Dammit, this is going to hurt. How much? And when?”
When we got the actual starting line, having waited in our corrals for half an hour or so, I may have even said a few prayers.
And then it started. We were off. I had a plan and that was to take it slow at first. As I started running and people were passing me, I thought, “Good, go ahead and pass me, I’m executing my plan!” People on the Verrazano often take the downhill into Brooklyn way too fast. I was sure not to do that. 9:10-9:20, that was my pace.
And that’s how I kept it for most of the race. Nice and easy. Finish. Have fun. Enjoy it. These were the mantras that I adopted after speaking to some friends who had done this before. Keep a slower pace. All you have to do is finish. Have fun. It was a gorgeous fall day and the view from the Verrazano was amazing. All of a sudden, I was able to actually feel happy and privileged that I was doing this.
Thank God something took over once I started. I didn’t feel fatigue. I felt okay. I was running my race and because I was going slower, I was confident that I could keep going. At one point I even thought, “Hey, maybe this pace is so great, I can actually keep going the whole way like this! Maybe I won’t hit the wall!” Even thinking it must have been a curse, but we’ll get to that later.
I’d only run in one previous marathon but the energy in this marathon was incredible. This time around there were 20,000 fewer participants and the waves of runners were spread farther apart but the crowd was as big it was last time. I had my name on my shirt in yellow electrical tape against my navy blue shirt* and the Rob chants started early and kept going throughout. I even had three or four instances of a pretty enthusiastic, “Rob! Rob! Rob!” chant from strangers.** It was a kind of thumping chant like I was doing an absurdly long keg stand in an 80’s frat comedy.
* Last time I used white tape with red tape behind it like a drop shadow and I made it huge on my shirt. I didn’t realize until I saw other runners that I had John Hancocked myself and it may have come across as a little self-important. Even self-correcting for that, it was still readable from very far way.
** It turns out that one of the chants was actually led by my friend Peter in Ft. Greene who I didn’t see. Other friends that I wasn’t expecting differentiated themselves by shouting “Rob! Rob! Rob Penty!” and that’s when I knew, “Oh, that’s someone who knows me.”
I saw friends I wasn’t expecting to see: a friend from college, improviser friends, neighbors. My friend Bryan shouted the Spurs score to me because I had to miss the game (it was disappointing and I don’t want to talk about it).
I played up the crowd around 4th Ave and Atlantic and they went nuts. I saw at least 3 Ted Lasso-style “Believe” signs. I slapped the “Hit this for a power boost” signs, high-fived many lines of kids, and even punched the hell out of a Trump doll.
Even going across the Pulaski Bridge where there are no spectators on either side, dudes far away on rooftops were able to see my name in yellow and shout, “You got this, Rob!”
But Pulaski is a steep incline up. It’s also the halfway point and I started to think, “Yeah, this is a fun marathon but it’s still a marathon. It’s challenging, just keep going.” My Garmin watch was saying I completed my miles about 0.2 miles before the course did, which threw me off of my mental game a bit. But I trusted that the pace it gave me was correct.
The dip into Queens is cool but then it leads to the 59th Street Bridge. Coaches say that this is good time to take stock of your race because it’s quiet – there are no spectators on either side and no rooftops near enough to see your name. And it’s a long bridge with a long incline. I noticed people walking. I passed some people that I had been running close to for the entire race up to that point.
And then I hit the sweet decline of the bridge, heading into 1st Avenue in Manhattan.
One friend told me to go slow and you can always pick it up at 1st avenue. I ran one faster mile but then remembered that I was on my way to the Bronx.
Bronx and Harlem are where the race switches from a beautiful challenging event on a lovely fall day to painful frustrating test of your will.
As I started up the last bridge out of the Bronx, that’s when things started getting difficult. At this stage of the race, inclines and declines are death and life, respectively. This is where my quads started to become a problem.
They didn’t cramp. I saw people who had to stop and massage their muscles. That wasn’t the case. They just felt like I had done 400 squats in a row and I couldn’t run through it. I had overused my legs and I could no longer stride like I could before.
I had to change it up. I shortened my stride almost as if I was running in place. It’s quicker and it was taking less of a toll on my quads and I was still going forward.
When I got to Harlem, I stopped to stretch. When I started again, I was half walking, half running. Cheers of, “you got this, Rob!” did actually help at this point. It was almost like I didn’t want to disappoint that stranger, so I’d run again. But then my quads would start burning and I’d walk again.
The Park was the worst. I’d walk, I’d run, I’d do an old man speed walk thing. All the while, people are shouting, “You go this, Rob! Almost there, Rob!” And just like last time, I resented it a bit. “People. Seriously, look at me. I’m walking right now. Does it look like I’ve got this?”
Then I got to the part where you exit Central Park, and I knew that the finish was close. I picked it back up. I actually ran again. I did walk briefly but as soon as I turned that corner at Columbus Circle, I knew that I was close. I looked forward. My Garmin said I was done and I wanted to shout, “Lies!” at it but I didn’t want to waste any energy.
In my memory from 2019, it was a short burst of energy from Columbus Circle to the finish but in 2021 it felt like a winding path designed to fuck with me.
Finally, there it was, the finish. I could see the wave 1 clock in the upper left was still under 4:15, which was my new goal. I crossed the finish line at 4:14:17, about 19 minutes slower than last time but I’ll take it.
And I got the 50th Anniversary medal, the big, fat, round Olympic sized medal. And I wore my Dunkin hat the whole damn time.
My quads are still messed up. They’re insanely sore, nothing else is, or perhaps my quads eclipsing the pain of other things. I have to brace myself against the railing and wall to get down stairs.
So, when’s the next one?!
Shut your goddamned mouth.
I’m not saying I’ll never run one again, I just need to chill out for a bit. I love running. I hope I’ll do it for many years to come. But sometimes there just ain’t nothin’ wrong with three miles, five miles. Hell, I feel like I could knock out a half marathon in a week or two (I’m not gonna but I bet I could).
The whole time I was training I kept thinking, “This hurts! It’s hard to keep going!” I was right but I was using that as proof that I wasn’t prepared for the marathon. If I do it again, that’s now how I’ll see it. Whenever it gets hard, I’ll think, “This is the training. This is where you will get to so learn about it. Feel it and run through it. This is what will get you to the finish from the Bronx next time.”
P.S. I also grew a mustache for this marathon. I called it my Prefonatine marathon mustache for luck. Not sure how long I’ll keep it but looking like a boxer from the 20’s or a porn star from the 70’s is kind of growing on me.
