MAR-B-18
THE INAUGURAL
RUNNING OF THE NEW DC MARATHON
March 24, 2002
I have done another one! Another marathon (this marking off what I believe is the 73rd in my only 16 year running career.) I have done another “First-Timer” (assign this one to San Diego’s Rock ‘n Rollin 1998, Marathon in the Parks in 2000, and Baltimore in 2001). And, as I was aware in the last half, this marks the first marathon I have run as I have entered into a new decade!
I had planned as long ago as when it was first announced, that I would run this one with Joe, and I had registered us both with the same number. I had picked Joe up from work at the Navy Yard. I parked in Southeast Washington, not a maneuver to be undertaken with a newer car or one with many valuables inside it, and walked to the gate in a frigid blast of cold wind. When I presented to the guards behind the sign “Threat Conditions Bravo” told them I was a runner here to pick up my friend Joe, and get him and me to the DC Armory. When I talked further with them, they had invited me to bring the Bronco around to park it inside the gate near their guardhouse, so they were nice enough to decrease Joe’s longer walk in the breeze. Joe came along with his white cane and I carried him to a place I have never been before. It is called the Starplex, because of the initials of Stadium (the RFK Stadium where the Redskins formerly played) and the Armory, the large Quonset like structure where circuses and other major spectator events are held. We went in to see the very large Expo and met several friends and others as we picked up our tags and were loaded with goodies, such as freebie energy bars etc. We worked out what Joe was most concerned about, which is that as much as he has enjoyed the marathons with me, he would like to run no more than ten miles since he is concentrating on the shorter sprints to make it into the Para Olympics. He already has one newspaper headline “Blind Runner wins Open Race.” That is, he won the race—not the first blind man, or the first in his age, or handicap, he just won. That it is why he had worried about the longer distances slowing his sprint efforts, so I agreed that he could run any distance he wanted, but then I would have to get him back somehow. We figured out that at Maryland and Seventh Avenue there was a Metro stop on the course at eleven miles and I could duck out and put him on the Metro to return home. We would run with my fanny pack so that he would have a fare card and a dry shirt and warm-up pants, and we would hand carry his collapsible white cane in one hand and sue the string between us for the other hand.
That is what we did.
I picked him up early, and we drove to GW at 5:30 AM. We parked in my building and got upstairs to a student lounge where he could lie down and rest with his eyes closed for fifteen minutes, then walked with warm-up suits on to the starting line on Memorial Bridge. We took off all our warmer stuff and I even shed the gloves, and checked them all in a bag we are given as registered runners with the tag we will need to claim it at the end. We saw my friend Dave Treber who was originally going to come on down to my house as he had for the inaugural MITP but this time had taken the Amtrak to stay downtown where he could take in the pasta party the night before. The day before I would hardly have been the perfect host, since I could not offer him a hot shower and a warm bed.
It had been a very mild winter, but once Spring officially arrived in the vernal equinox this week, it dropped into the coldest days we have had all year. At that point I noticed something at night while I was trying to sleep. It got colder and in the morning I had to take a “bucket bath”—as in India or in Africa. Despite putting in for an automatic fill, I had run out of heating oil. This means that on Saturday I was scrambling to get oil delivered and then the priming of furnace and water heater after bleeding out the lines of air and crud. I got all that done in time to get a full load of laundry done and a bit of grocery shopping and then an early turn in after several baked potatoes. So, I had a restful at home day to precede the early start for the marathon.
Mayor Tony Hopkins sent off the runners from the Memorial Bridge and 8,000 of us, with one paired runner connected by a string moved out briskly in the cold morning each dressed in a short sleeve Inaugural DC Marathon Tee Shirt and shorts. Joe and I ran well. We were in the seven-minute plus range for the first several miles, then dropped into the eights. The race start was moved to seven AM because of concerns voiced by those who said it would interfere with the attempts to come to church for palm Sunday. We did pass lots of churches and at every one I saw, the congregation and the ministers both were out there in front cheering us on.
We went out Constitution Avenue on our “Run Through History” and swung around the RFK Stadium to cross the Anacostia River. We entered Anacostia, where neither Joe nor I had been, so I kept up a stream of description by his request of what kind of area and street landmarks we were passing. I saw a lot of parts of the city where we had not thought it safe to go except in the middle of a marathon—as one of our fellow runners pointed out. We ran around Capital Hill, and then back down the Hill into the DC area of the Mall. Joe and I had a good time as well as made good time, when we got through the crowds around the Air and Space Museum, coming up on ten miles. The crowds of all colors and languages are wildly appreciative of Joe’s effort, and quite a number do a double take on the string between us before they burst into cheers. Joe was not wearing his “blind runner” singlet, but my dark glasses I had given him as well as a white cane would not take too many people a long time to figure out what we are up to. Runners would come over to tell how much they were encouraged to see us running.
All too soon I saw Maryland Avenue and its Metro stop coming up. We unfurled the cane and I walked Joe into the Metro escalator, asking a passing couple to do me the favor of getting Joe onto the train of the transfer home—which they did. I then ran on back on the course, and felt lonely all of a sudden. True, people were cheering for me, but it was not the same, since I had less that I was giving in the race. I plodded along in silence, looking down at my feet at the broken pavement, and then realizing I almost ran over the official course photographers.
I fell lower in pace, and kept on running. I noticed we were going by GWU at Washington Circle, the only place I recognized anyone I knew. I made my way through the long climb up to Children’s Hospital, then through the Washington equivalent of “Haight Asbury” the Adams Morgan neighborhood. I had “Bro’s in the Hood” giving me high fives as I climbed to the highest point on Georgia Avenue, before a long tapering downhill toward Freedom Plaza Finish Line. IU had one inspiration as I ran. I came by a church just letting out, and the parishioner were getting palm branches to wave as it is Palm Sunday. I ducked off the course and went into the church, where I was immediately showered with palm fronds, one of which I carried proudly and waving it as I came through the Chinatown arch—a million dollar combined project of China and US Chinese.
I had run every step of the way, but I had so slowed down in the second half that I was running in the 24-mile point when it was four hours. I came around onto Pennsylvania Avenue and saw the Finish ahead, People had been passing me along the way as I had cruised along, but now I reeled them all back in. I raised my head up and kicked it home to cross the mats just as it began getting warm for the first time in the race.
And a good thing, too, since the only thing about this race that was not well organized was that bag claim pick up. The line was several hours long. So, I wrapped in my Mylar blanket and lay down in the grass at Freedom Plaza and took a nap in the sun awaiting a chance to collect my bag. I finally sneaked in under the flap and retrieved my own.
One of the reasons that nearly all details of this race were so well attended to had to do with the fact that this is an Inaugural Run of an annual event, and that the city is trying to showcase this run and this course as the Olympic trial marathon running course. The city of Washington is bidding for the 2012 Olympics. This may put them on that map.
It was a good Inaugural Run, and now I have a fifth Inaugural medal to add to the rather heavy collection of six dozen marathons.