The Portland Marathon was one of those races. My good friend Jim Lynch, who moved to Maui a few years ago (if you’re a runner, you should definitely check out his blog and forthcoming book), told a few of us that if we signed up for the Portland Marathon, then he would fly in to join us. So, while watching the NCAA title game in March, a handful of us signed up. Over time, more and more people decided to join us until we ended up with a decent size group (15-20) heading to Oregon this October.
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| Jim, Jay (not pictured) and I decided that we needed to carboload at Voodoo Donuts. |
I knew things were going to work out fine right after my arrival. I got in an airport shuttle with only one other passenger. We started talking, and she said she was from Lawrence, Kansas. Never one to hide my allegiance to my alma mater, I told her I was a KU grad. As it turned out, she was a team psychologist for KU basketball, so we spent the entire drive to downtown discussing hoops. I’ve got to admit, while I know there are Jayhawks everywhere, I didn’t expect to run into them during this trip.
I checked into the hotel on Friday afternoon before the race on Sunday morning, so Jim and Jay Coon were the only ones around.
The three of us headed to Deschutes Brewery for dinner, and while we looked over the menu the waitress stopped by to impart us with the following local wisdom.
Jay: We aren’t from here. What’s good?
Waitress: Strip clubs. There’s this one called Mary’s, and it’s right next to a Mexican restaurant, which is great in case you get hungry.
Me: I think he was asking about the menu.
Waitress: Oh that. I don’t now how many times I can get fired tonight.
Immediately, we knew we were going to like Portland (and for the record, no, it had nothing to do with strip clubs next to Mexican restaurants).
The next time she stopped by the table, we had this conversation:
Waitress: There are a lot of life lessons when you live with seven chickens.
Me, Jay and Jim: (Blank stares).
Ah, good times.
Earlier in the day, Jim had a crown come out. We were rooming together, so it was officially the first time I shared a hotel room with someone I knew was actively wearing Poligrip. At least someone I didn’t refer to with some sort of variation on grandma or grandpa.
The problem really came that night, when the Poligrip lost its poligrip, and Jim swallowed his crown.
None of us are at all immature, so it definitely did not lead to us to suggest he use a strainer to find it later and then pop it back in his mouth.
That never came up. Not once.
Concerned, however, we sent a note to our friend Dr. Dave Longcope, a fellow runner who also happens to have been on the cover of 5280’s Top Doc magazine a few months ago. Dave is a colon and rectal surgeon, so we knew he was an expert in, ahem, certain regions of the body. We texted him to ask if Jim was at any risk during the marathon after swallowing his crown.
Dr. Longcope: He should be fine. As long as it’s not the kind of crown you wear on your head.
The hotel seemed to be looking out for us, too. If there was an emergency in which Jim needed to retrieve the crown, the Marriott had left a plunger in the bathroom with a note reading, “Sanitized for your convenience.” Some might think that needing a plunger would completely eliminate the chances of “convenience,” but that’s for another blog.
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| Who doesn't take their toys hiking? |
I met up with my old high school friend Steve Meyer and his two sons for a trip out to Multnomah Falls, in the Columbia River Gorge just 30 miles outside of Portland. I hadn’t seen Steve in several years, and he just happened to move to Portland two weeks earlier, so the timing was just about perfect.
As if trying to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Portland is weird, two guys passed us on the short hike up to the falls. Both were guiding remote controlled cars as they walked up the path. Steve looked at me and asked, “Did I really just see that?” I suggested we just ignore it and keep walking.
That night, a group of about 11 of us headed to a small Italian joint to carb up. One of the great parts of these races is spending time with good friends while also getting to know some other people a little bit better.
I belong to a running group with about 300 people at any given time with some new one joining and others leaving. The bottom line is it’s tough to know everyone, but dinners like this and breakfasts after long training runs allow us to talk to some people we don’t actually run with.
I’ve said this before and can’t emphasize it enough. I don’t care how fast or slow someone runs. There’s just some sort of bond between people who are willing to show up at the starting line of a race.
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| The secret to running 96 marathons is obviously making sure your running clothes are ironed. |
On Sunday morning, Jim looked at me and said, “I only have to do this early morning crap four more times.” This was Jim’s 96th marathon, and he is convinced that No. 100 will be his last. That could be, but I know he won’t give up running entirely, and I know that half marathons and 10Ks start at the crack of dawn (or before), too.
We walked from the hotel to the starting line in the dark. It’s a little strange every time. At these moments, you’re walking through streets that are normally bustling. But before a marathon, there are rarely cars. It’s just streams of people walking in the same direction. And that direction usually ends at long lines in front of port-a-potties.
It seems to have become my M.O., but I entered this race after struggling with calf problems. Actually, I finally went to have my calf looked at. Another benefit of a large running group is that I have befriended some amazing doctors.
My friend Dr. John Hill worked his magic with an ultrasound and declared that I had absolutely nothing wrong with my calf, even though the upper outside of it seemed to be tied in countless knots. Then he scanned down and around the Achilles until he saw something. “Have you ever had ankle problems?” he asked. I told him I broke it on a trampoline when I was 10 years old, and it did not heal correctly. Apparently, the inside of my ankle was causing all of the pain in my calf. I’m so glad I know great doctors, who can explain things like that to me. I’m even more thankful that Dr. Hill gave me some physical therapy and suggested I get some active release technique chiropractic work from Dr. Michelle Clark, who also runs with us.
I don’t really understand how my inner ankle could cause fairly severe pain in my upper outer calf. And I don’t really understand how ART treatments work, but they got me back on my feet. Of course, I wasn’t really trained for the Portland Marathon, but at least I had a clean bill of health.
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| Posing while standing in line for the port-a-potties is what runners call multi-tasking. |
I hadn’t really focused on a time goal, which became a problem as I past the sign for Mile 24. I realized that I was in striking distance of four hours. There’s nothing terribly significant about that particular time – it’s nowhere close to a Boston qualifier, or even my PR – but for some reason at that particular moment, I knew I had to go for it.That's what runners do. We sometimes make up arbitrary goals at the spur of the moment and decide we have to achieve those goals immediately.
The problem was I had been averaging a little over nine-minute miles for 24 miles, and I had to run the final two about a minute per mile faster than that. That may not sound like much, but when you’re that far into a race and every part of your body just wants to be finished, the pain is amplified and doubt starts screaming in your head. In other words, it’s really hard to speed up that late in a marathon.
I did it anyway, willing the contents of my stomach (mostly Gatorade and energy gels) to stay where they were. My body suffered right after the race, and I could not bear to eat or drink much as volunteers attempted to hand me the post-race food. I downed some chocolate milk (the best recovery drink out there) and staggered to find my friends in the meeting area.
With just a few hours before our flights home, we couldn’t hang out very long. But the weekend was pretty ideal, thanks to great company.
And a charmingly weird city.
Portland is a great city. It's about the same size as KC, but the similarities end about there. Multnomah Falls is beautiful, but I haven't been back in 20+ years since my dog fell over the falls and died.
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