Marathon part 1

I felt most like an Olympian in my start village. A large video screen and booming voice gave directions in four or five different languages, which means that most of the time I didn't understand them. I picked up my second bagel of the day, coffee and water, and hung around for a couple hours on curbs, the grass, or up against a tree. Pretty sure everyone but me was shivering; it was a town of goosebumps and arm rubbing. I wore two pairs of pants, long sleeve shirt, singlet, windbreaker, hooded sweatshirt and a ski jacket. I did not look the part of a svelt distance runner, but that ski jacket was my best move of the day.

Our village was right along the start of the bridge, so I got to see the elite men start in the first wave (or at least their upper bodies). They seemed to be gliding and were moving fast enough that it looked as though they were all on motorcycles. There was enough to look at people to talk to that time to my start kind of flew by. Eventually we all crowded into pens at the base of the bridge, the cannon went off and New York, New York began to play. I looked behind me for the one and only time in 26.2 miles. There were very few people; I was starting from the back.

Ascending the bridge, I looked down to Fort Wadsworth. Above the empty villages full of paper cups and discarded sweats were security teams along the perimeter of each roof. I looked back in front of me to the slow moving traffic and continued a very leisurely uphill jog. I took the extra time to thoroughly warm up rather than risk pulling something so early in the day.

Brooklyn was the best and worst of the race. Parts were incredibly lively, fully of bands and cheering residents with funny, colorful signs. I got a marriage proposal from a very enthusiastic stranger and three more asked for my number. So it was in Brooklyn that I decided I must look pretty cute in my orange and bright blue ensemble and started trying to hit the right spots for the event camera men.

I spelled my name out in giant block letters on the front and back of my singlet, but it still took quite a while to get used to strangers cheering me on by name.  I loved the support and the energy, the back and forth with the crowds and high fives, but it certainly confirmed that I would never want to be super famous.


The miles went pretty quickly between the bridge and mile ten, where my first friends were waiting.

[MORE LATER-- would like to get the whole day down, but I've got to start catching up on work too!]