Every Minute Matters

“Lucky number seven!” I said to myself in the cool, predawn air.  The usually crowded Third Street Promenade in downtown Santa Monica was silent and still as I walked down the street towards Santa Monica City Hall.  I was wearing running gear, carrying a sixteen-ounce bottle of Aquafina water, and had an LA Marathon big pinned to my shorts.  Today, I would be running the Los Angeles Marathon for the seventh straight year.  Approaching city hall, I saw more runners making their way over to the shuttles.  I caught up with the pack and fed off the energy of a group of ready-to-go marathoners.  When I arrived at the shuttle pick up location, there was a long line waiting to get on a bus.  I was about to start walking to the end of it when I noticed that the group I had been walking with crossed the street and walked right onto an empty bus ahead of the end of the line.  I ran over joining the pack, and miraculously, I was able to bypass forty-five minutes of waiting in line.  I headed towards the back and took a seat as the bus quickly filled up and began heading for the start line at Dodger Stadium.

 

The Los Angeles Marathon has become somewhat of a running tradition for me.  Established in 1986, the creation of the marathon was inspired by the success of the 1984 Olympics along with the growing popularity of other major marathons such as New York, Boston, and Chicago.  While the LA Marathon’s popularity has not surpassed that of the above-mentioned races, the race maintains a strong presence in the marathon community, with over twenty-five thousand registrants each year from all over the globe.  Although the course has changed a few times since its inauguration, the current course is a point to point race, beginning at Dodger Stadium and finishing on Ocean Boulevard in Santa Monica.  In between, runners are treated to a full tour of the Los Angeles area.  The route leaves Dodger Stadium, travels through downtown LA, China town, and Little Tokyo, before veering onto Sunset Boulevard and heading west through Echo Park, Silverlake, Hollywood, West Hollywood, down to Santa Monica Boulevard through Beverly Hills, Century City, onto San Vicente Boulevard through Brentwood, and finally ending in Santa Monica when runners make a final left onto Ocean Boulevard from San Vicente.  I moved to Los Angeles in 2012 about two weeks before the marathon.  Despite not having logged as many miles and I normally would as preparation, I knew I had to run this race.  When race morning came, I was excited and filled with energy.  I finished what is still my fastest marathon to date, and since then I’ve been hooked, signing up every year like clockwork. 

During the bus ride, my phone vibrated repeatedly.  A large group of friends and I had a Facebook Messenger thread going so we could keep in communication and meet up before and after the race.  As I exited the bus at Dodger Stadium, the morning air was refreshing and crisp.  Runners lingered in the parking lot, music cranked from the speakers, and lights illuminated the start line.  As I walked towards the stadium, I took my phone out to message the group letting everyone know that I had arrived.  Just then, I heard a familiar voice behind me.  “What’s up, Mr. Liam?!”  I turned around to see my good friend, Tony walking up behind me.  We embraced in a hug and continued walking towards the stadium.  We had gotten word that a group of our friends were huddled inside the stadium trying to stay warm in the chilly air.  We met up with some familiar people and had the pleasure of meeting some new people as well.  Tuyet and her husband, Ian, were running their first marathon, Angelica was running in place of her friend who recently had surgery and was unable to run, Monica was running her second LA Marathon, and Michael had tagged along for moral support.  The fact that Michael wasn’t even running and was here at 5:30 in the morning just to support us runners was beyond cool to me and speaks volumes of his character.  As the start time approached, Tony and I hung around near the start line and watched the elite women take off.  When the gun went off, they left the start line almost sprinting.  “Wow” I said to Tony.  “And, they’re only going to run faster from here”.  As Tony and I made our way into our corral, we found our friend Edith, who was also an accomplished runner who had finished several marathons and a few ultras.  She had recently returned from a family trip in El Salvador, where she was from, and was ready to get back into her active lifestyle.  The three of us shuffled through the crowd and before long, the gun had gone off and we were making our way to the start line.  Tony and I ran together through downtown for the first three miles until I began to pick up the pace and soon found myself on my own.  Before the race, some people asked me if I had a time goal in mind.  I told them I was hoping to finish around the four-hour mark but wasn’t looking to PR in this race.  I had been training for a 100K trail race that I had coming up in April, this marathon being part of the training.  The trick to finishing an ultra is to pace yourself and take it easy.  That’s the method I’ve been following during my training, and I would be doing the same for this marathon.  Over the years, I’ve developed a strategy for finishing strong in a long-distance race; stay focused on the task at hand, but don’t overthink things.  I Don’t worry about how far I’ve gone or how much further I have left to go.  I Just run and try to enjoy the experience.  I Focus on are taking deep, full breaths, making sure my stride is light, almost like I’m running on hot coals, and I run at a comfortable pace, speeding up when I feel strong and slowing down when I feel like I’m pushing myself too hard.

As I made my way along the course, I took in the scenery and tried to live in the moment.  Every neighborhood of the LA area has its own unique personality and today I would get to experience it all, first hand, at six miles per hour.  The stretch that runs down Sunset Boulevard leaving Echo Park and entering Silverlake is a gradual descent, which treated me to a fantastic view.  As I ran downhill, I admired the scene of buildings, palm trees, green hills, and blue sky in front of me in the distance.  The halfway point is on the border of Hollywood and West Hollywood, and I soon found myself running down the Sunset strip, gliding past several clubs, restaurants, my office, and lastly, the Whisky A Go Go, before banking left and heading down into Beverly Hills.  My race strategy was carrying me along pleasantly, however, the LA Marathon is a large, sanctioned event, meaning there is a mile marker and race clock at every mile of the course.  I tried to ignore these mile markers for as long as I could, fearing it would derail me from my method of not worrying about how many miles I had left to cover.  At mile seventeen, I gave up trying to fight it, and just accepted the fact that I would be constantly reminded how much further I had to go for the rest of the race.  It wasn’t ideal, but I stayed focused on my breathing, stride, and pace.  Things were going well, and I gradually picked up the pace as I progressed further.   At mile twenty-one I was feeling good, but I was in the stage of the race where strange things could happen.  One minute I could be feeling great, the next, I could be in a world of hurt, or vice versa.  This is the part of the race where many runners hit the wall.  Their bodies are feeling the fatigue of running twenty miles and begin acting irrationally, delivering brutal cramps without warning, and screaming for you to stop.  Running a marathon requires both physical and mental strength.  This is the time where physical strength deteriorates, and mental strength takes over.  I made my way through Brentwood, feeling optimistic, but hoping my body wouldn’t shut down in the next few miles.  The crowd support along San Vicente boulevard was unbelievable, with several enthusiastic spectators lining the sides of the street.  There were folks from running clubs, running stores, local organizations, and people who were out there just because.  As I approached mile twenty-three, I came to a beautiful realization.  After passing by the mile marker, seeing the time on the race clock, and taking a quick inventory of how I was feeling, I realized I had a chance at finishing the race in less than four hours.  I had broken the four-hour mark in two previous marathons and was hit with a burst of energy when I realized this could be my third time.  I shifted into high gear and began running at an eight minute per mile pace.  I cruised downhill on San Vicente boulevard reeling in mile after mile and approached the left turn onto Ocean Boulevard.  I knew what that meant.  Three quarters of a mile until the finish line!  I ran as fast as I could while still trying to keep it all together.  The finish line was in view and was getting closer by the second.  The final quarter of a mile was lined with die hard spectators who either knew someone running or they feed off this kind of energy.  Normally, I run at a steady pace, wave, and high five them as I go by.  Not this time.  If there was any chance of breaking four hours, I was going to have to go hard.  I ran by the spectators as quickly as I could, eyes facing forward, towards the finish line.  I loved their enthusiasm and made sure that even though I was hauling ass, I had a smile on my face as I ran to the finish.  I burst through the finish line, throwing my arms in the air and letting out a victorious “Yeah!”.  Just as I had gotten my medal, my phone vibrated.  My dad was tracking me and sent me a congratulatory text.  “Four hours flat, that’s excellent!”.  I soon found out that my clock time was four hours and thirty-eight seconds.  Damn!  So close!  If only I could have gone a little faster.  Then I remembered something; I stopped to use the restroom at mile eight.  It was a necessary decision, as the mounting bladder pressure surely would have caused issues later in the race, but I lost a good two minutes in the process.  “Ugh!” I thought.  If only I didn’t have to stop.  Many of times, people running a marathon don’t think of losing a few minutes during the race as having much of an impact.  Sometimes runners need to use the restroom, stretch, take a break, etc.  It makes sense to take a few minutes during the race to remedy minor issues that could become more serious in the later stages.  Well, not always.  My 2018 LA Marathon is a testament to the fact that even in marathons and ultra-marathons, sometimes every minute really does count. 

Overall, the race was pleasant, fun, and rewarding.  I was happy with my performance and for all my friends who were running.  Tony, Monica, Angelica, Edith, and the others began trickling in as time went by and I was thrilled that everyone successfully crossed the finish line.  I drove home, showered, changed clothes, and a handful of us gathered at a local Mexican restaurant for lunch to celebrate our accomplishment and congratulate each other.  Later that day, I reflected on the race.  It was another great adventure and every year I learned something new.  The lesson from this year?  Use the restroom twice before starting the race to avoid having to stop!