Today was the inaugural Minneapolis Team Ortho Marathon in beautiful Minneapolis, MN (for those keeping track at home, that’s now 12 road marathons in 7 states) It was truly a spectacular event for a multitude of reasons some of which were downright odd. As a back story, this wasn’t a race for me – it was a pacing gig for Under Armour and true to form, I was assigned the 4:15 group. A pace I know very well (9:44/mile)

It started out easy enough – I arrived yesterday at 10ish and had plenty of time to kill since I didn’t have to be at the expo to sucker, I mean, bribe, I mean CONVINCE people that a pace team is a great idea. So I decided to do a little touring around. After all, I wasn’t really supposed to run and the weather was fabulous so I thought I should come back with *some* knowledge about this city other than it has a nice marathon course. I hopped on the light rail and decided to ride it to the Mall of America. Until I realized that it was a mall. Granted it’s a large mall, but it’s a mall. And really, no offense to Minneapolis but who cares? I hate malls.

I then decided to stay in the city and turned back around on the rail. On the way back, I found the metrodome (hard to miss), Minnehaha park (which I just like because it’s funny to say), a sex shop named “Lickety Split” (which still makes me giggle like a 5 year old boy) and this gem:

That’s right – a snot green car with the license plates “BOOGR”. I also met a bum who smelled awful, was covered in face lesions and jumped right in front of me almost touching nose-to-nose and said “CAN I ASK YOU SOMETHING?!?!!??!” which startled the shit out of me and caused me to say “No, you may not and that was rude!” His response? “Go f— yourself” and stormed off. Note to bum: If you’re trying to get money out of people, this is NOT the right tactic. The downside to this encounter was that this creature wedged himself in my psyche and re-appeared in my semi-restless sleep (jerk). Thankfully, the rest of the city goers were very welcoming, giving me tidbits of info here and there on history, building architecture and what bars to visit, which sadly, was wasted knowledge on the eve of the race.

The expo was fairly interesting as I met several women who were doing one of the following:

• Running their first marathon with a longest long run of 10 miles
• Running their first marathon with the goal of qualifying for Boston but having never even tried the pace out (“I’ve saving it for race day!”)
• Running the pace that the “cute guy next to you, Emily” is running (Eric, 3:30, and I highly doubt that, ladies..)

Ahh, over-confident new marathoners. Gotta love the enthusiasm. After, the group got together for the pre-race dinner and group meeting and I happened to have a camera to commemorate such a glorious occasion (really, we all look better in person… mainly because people see us from behind):

​Dinner was good and included Jim’s “Gloom and Doom, Don’t Screw This Up” speech. Once over, we hiked back to our hotel (a mile and a half away) noting that we had to make this hike at least twice tomorrow, though thankfully, Sam brought a car and agreed to drive us to the start line.

My group of about 20 or so found me at the start, shivering, wearing dark bottoms and the UA pace hot pink tops (essentially making me look like a dark chocolate dipped strawberry) and the gun and start went off as uneventfully as one could hope for for a first time race. I was slow out of the gate which isn’t unusual for a group of 4k runners and by mile 3 we were right on pace. A few decided that they could surge ahead and a few strayed behind early but most stuck by me and asked a lot of questions, as they had read my bio on the site and instantly became intrigued with the notion that, as an ultra-runner, a marathon is really a taper run. This is especially true as I have a 40 miler in 3 weeks. I talked, they listened and I had a sweet rotating audience – they would shift in and out and as soon as one stopped talking, another would start. It was like having 4 boot camp days in a row – I could give advice, be charming, laugh, enjoy the day and continually shift that annoying sign from hand-to-hand. Normally it wouldn’t have been that bothersome but there was a good wind blowing and if you’ve ever tried running holding a sign for 4 hours in a head wind (because, really, who hasn’t, right?!?!) you know it’s a rather difficult task. I even tried pawning it off – “Dan! Hey, I think there’s a camera ahead – wanna take the sign and get a running shot with it?” “Uh, no, not really.” “Hey, Gary, this would make a great holiday card photo for this winter!” “Nah, I’m good – don’t need any race photos anyway…” Pawning off sign carrying duty FAIL.

Since I was so chatty and had to stay on pace, nothing overly exciting happened. And for once, that was a very good thing. I had nightmares of people falling, me cramping, HEED sports drink which I’ve never had wreaking havoc on my intestines (that one DID come true, dammit…) so to not have anything major go wrong was great. Except that last mile. I had done a little calculating and knew the very last mile was uphill – the entire thing. I banked a little time at 24 in order to pad that uphill – you just never know until you run it, how hard it will be. And true to form, my eyes were bigger than my legs and I came up too fast. Suddenly they’re announcing names and I see that I’m right at the mat and I am 39 seconds under. DAMN. Jim will NOT be happy. But I can’t walk over the line and I’ve got no room to slow for the last few feet so I hit it. 4:14:21 for a 4:15 pace. And for once, that end just came up too fast. Then I realized I had an hour to get back to the hotel and showered and checked out. Solution? Running a mile and a half is faster than walking one. So I officially turned my marathon into an “ultra” by running another 1.5 miles, WITH THE SIGN IN HAND since no one would take it to get ready to leave. I’m sure I looked as ridiculous as the BOOGR-mobile.

At any rate, the race was outstanding, the medal and finisher jacket was pretty sweet and the big surprise was that they picked up all the throw away clothes and the ratty long sleeve shirt that I agreed to toss but really didn’t want to, laid on the top of the Lost and Found pile, ready to make a repeat appearance at the next cold race. Let’s just hope it’s not next to an angry bum.

So today was my 11th marathon in 18 months which, coincidentally, is my 11th marathon ever (it just sounds more impressive to add the timeframe) and there was much rejoicing. Mainly because it was number 11 and I like that number and the line “it goes to 11” is from one of my favorite movies but I digress. As marathons go, it was a very good one. 

The race was the BC/BS GEICO Fredrick Marathon, in, well, Frederick, Maryland. It’s the first of the “Maryland Double” which means that if you run this one and Baltimore in the fall, you have “done the double” and you get yet another useless medal. I signed up for it because I wanted the discount and because I was hoping I’d run into the pace group that is in charge of both races and beg them to let me join the “cool team” and be a future pacer. Lucky for me, I accomplished both.  

The day began as perfectly as a marathon day could begin for most people. I prefer it to be a little warmer. 60 and overcast is too cool for this lizard and I forgot my gloves. Oh well. I would have to make do. I arrived just in time having not taken into consideration the sheer volume of traffic attempting to stream into a small fairground area at 6 am on a Sunday. My guess is that any other Sunday would have crickets chirping and roosters crowing. With 5000+ runners, I’m pretty sure we either couldn’t hear them over the din of the crowd or we backed over them attempting to park on the grassy area that doubles as horse exercise fields. I know this because I almost stepped in horseshit making my way to the start. Twice.  

So just as I get there, the gun goes off. At the expo yesterday I had toyed with the idea of running with the 3:40 pace group and signed up just for fun but then decided that my idea of fun yesterday was not the same as my idea of fun today. It was going to be a 4:00 day. I need to work on perfecting my pacing without using my GPS. I like my GPS and it’s wonderful to train with but lately I’ve been wanting to kick it old-school style after Boston so I did not bring it today, opting only for my cruddy little Casio that I bought in Germany at World Cup when I needed to know what time the beer gardens opened (answer: ANYTIME) so I still haven’t quite figured out how to use it. The instructions only came in German. I do know how to start the timer, though, and as I crossed the mat, we began our journey, me and my little digital watch. I knew I needed to be around 9 minutes per mile so I figured this would be a good test to see how accurate I could be.  

The race on the whole was pretty uneventful. Frederick is quite hilly, “challenging” as they call it in the brochure. I’ve never been a good hill runner but I can appreciate the feeling you get once you’ve crested one and are on the downside. I made sure though to continue to maintain the pace. Even keel, even keel… left foot, right foot, left foot, right foot.   

I have been asked before what I think about when I’m out there for hours. Usually the answer is whatever pops into my head. I don’t try to solve the problems of the world, nor figure out what’s wrong with the one half of my family. I don’t reflect on why I don’t date much, nor what could I do to make my current work project better. I just sort of space out. If I’m lucky, something catches my eye and holds my attention for as long as possible. And today was my lucky day. It was none other than a timeless lawn ornament in the form of 3 meerkats staring off into the distance: 

​I call this “The Three Meer-ka-teers”. Oh what a treat! Its sheer hideousness is one thing – so oddly amusing yet so incredibly insane. Of all the creatures to immortalize into a concrete statue for your front lawn, why would anyone choose the meerkat? And pair it with two companions?? On a whole different level, though, this statue reminded me of the trip my coworker/friend Layla and I took 2 weeks ago to Indianapolis. I’m not going to go into details here but the trip had some very amusing parts including a reference to the Capitol One “What’s in Your Wallet” campaign that requires many beers, chex mix and a goofy Canadian named Jim to explain the hilarity. This of course had me laughing inside as I played out the events of that trip in my mind. These situations are perfect for marathons – you can relive entire days for as long as you like since you’ve got nothing else to do but run and think. Then I snapped back to reality – “What’s in your wallet”? Capitol One. Cheesy Ad campaign. Money with eyes (WTF?) GEICO. GEICO!! Official pace team of this race. What is my pace?!? It was dead on. We were at probably mile 13 by this point which means I should be at 2 hours. Lo and behold, 1:59. “Oh you goddess of running, you… you are SO good” I told myself. I was proud. (see note above as to why I don’t date much) 

I decided that since I didn’t *have* to run a 4 hour marathon I’d try for a faster time. So I managed to find a nice looking man around mile 18 who was attempting to chat with some people around him to no avail (marathoner runners are so serious sometimes!) I saddled up next to him and for the next 70 or so minutes, we had a grand time. We talked about all the races we’d done, our experiences at Boston (which, I’m convinced is the “great uniter” of all marathoners… “Oh you’ve done Boston? Me too – what year??”) and what we think about the swine flu (it’s so over-rated!!) And then we rounded the last corner with a mile to go and I knew I was close. I could smell it. That nice scent of horseshit, wafting across the road meant the parking lot was nearby and sure enough, there it was…ULTRGRL. (ed note: my little Miata)

We sprinted the last quarter mile across the line and I knew that it was exactly what I had been wanting. 3:55. It was fun, or at least, my idea of fun, today. I was soaked as it had been raining steadily since a bit before mile 11 and I was beyond waterlogged. I turned the key in my car and saw it was exactly 11 am.  
I wonder if there’s a puppet show anywhere in town…

UPDATE: Note to self - never leave until the awards are over. This keeps happening and I missed getting my 2nd place award, once again for my division. Grrrr! I hope it wasn’t a meerkat plaque because then I’ll be REALLY bummed.