I’ve never been much of a runner. I don’t really have the physique for it: I’m a little too squat. Not fat (at least I don’t think so), but my body doesn’t do a very good job hiding my love for IPA.
Still I enjoy running, or at least jogging. I’ve never had any serious problems with my knees or other lower-limb joints. Other than a couple 5Ks, however, I’ve shied away from organized races. I like running alone, in nice places, like Rails to Trails. I leave the music at home. I like to hear the place where I run.
But I’ve always had this thing about running a marathon, though I’m not sure why. The idea has persisted and I’ve often thought, if I had time to really train, I’d go for it.
For years I’ve found excuses to just say no. Like most things in life, however, it was one of my offspring who was my undoing. My daughter convinced me running the Missoula Marathon would be a fine way to spend a Sunday morning. In a moment of poor judgment — a sign of advancing age no doubt — I agreed.
July 12 turned out to be a good day for a run. With the way spring and summer had gone, I was anticipating blistering heat and air heavy with the smoke of forest fires. Fortunately, a few days before the race, our long, early summer nightmare ended when the heatwave broke. There was even scattered rain about the region. The morning of the race was actually quite cool. Gray skies hinted at race-day rain but never delivered.
The race started at a way-too-early-for-me 6 a.m. Though I’m usually an afternoon runner, things started well and I ran along with the 4:10 pacers, faster than my training suggested I’d be able to finish. At about the 10-mile mark I took a brief water break and watched those pacers run out of sight. I tried, but couldn’t catch up.
Then came the hill. For those that don’t know, the Missoula course starts in Frenchtown and heads straight for Missoula, but as you near the city the course takes an evil turn south and clips the base of Blue Mountain. The hill climb begins at mile 14, and it was there I realized the half-marathon may have been a wiser choice.
I survived the hill, but the race was a battle from that point. Fortunately, Missoulians turn out in force to cheer on runners, even slow guys like me who are way off the pace. I’m not normally much of a rah-rah type so I was surprised by how much the high fives and words of encouragement from strangers actually helped me fight the urge to stop. There was even some dude in a tux playing the “Chariots of Fire” theme song on a grand piano in the yard of one south Missoula home along the Bitterroot River.
Toward the end my pace slowed considerably and I had to walk once or twice each of the final few miles. At one point some dude doing the odd race-walk thing passed me, and in the neighborhood near Hellgate High, I heard a bystander tell a friend that these were now the “mere mortals” as a group of my fellow marathoners struggled past.
Near the end, as I slowed for a final water break, I looked at another bedraggled runner who I’d shared the course with the last few miles and told her, “This is my first, and last.”
She barely managed a smile and said, “You and me both,” before she ran on to the finish line.
My conclusion: running a marathon is largely an unpleasant experience, except crossing the finish line and getting a big hug from my daughter. She’d been waiting more than an hour.
That was sweet.