Avenue of the Giants Marathon

OK. It’s over. That had to be the worst marathon I have ever completed. As much as I would like to fault the marathon itself, I can’t. I simply wasn’t in the best of shape. Oh, there were plenty of things wrong with the course, starting with the first half, which is a 13.1 mile loop Out and In on Bull Creek Road. To call it a road is a mistake. It was very much like a trail run, rough and uneven. Plus a constant up and down in elevation. The official course remarks make no mention of the surface, which really slowed the racewalkers.

And as long as I’m complaining, we weren’t too happy with the “Early Bird” (8:00) start for walkers and 9:00 for runners, which meant that an hour and a half later the runners began running through our ranks. We had almost made the turnaround point when the runners showed up and passed through. Then it was a struggle to keep out of the way for the next 45 minutes while runners took up most of the “road”.

To tell the truth, as we came back to the starting area and made a right turn onto the Avenue of the Giants road, I had two distinct thoughts – One; I should stop now and call it a fair half marathon. Two; at least we were past the crowds and the road looked much improved. And the road was better but my feet weren’t. I had to stop two more times to put on bandages and re-lace the shoes.

Now the miles came slow and hard. It seemed like we were on an incline for the next 7 miles. Not a steep one, but one that sucked our energy away. By the time we reached the turnaround at 19.5 miles, we were both dragging. (And very glad the other was there to encourage!) And on the way back down the mountain, I got my second wind and hoped that it would last till the finish line. It didn’t. Every time we came to a sunlit stretch, the heat would slow us down. And by mile 22, we were walking and had given up on racewalking. (Racewalking requires some fine motor skills that disappear in extreme fatigue) But we persevered and pretty soon we could see the bridge that we had to cross to make it to the finish. Our energy picked up as we came off of the bridge and with a couple hundred feet left to go, I asked Jill if she wanted to go for it? She did and we actually ran the remaining distance, crossing the finish line a second apart…and with a finish time of 6:19:57. Almost half an hour slower than our time last October in Portland. And all of the promised food was gone.

Were there any positives? Well, the race to the finish was my highlight. I never saw the redwoods after the first 3 miles. You had to concentrate on road if you didn’t want to get hurt. We walked through some of the most beautiful scenery in the world and never saw it. Oh, we did get a cool t-shirt and a medal and I guess that’s positive.

I doubt that we will ever do the Avenue of the Giants marathon again. It’s certainly not suited for racewalkers. And the mixing of runners and walkers is foolish and dangerous for both groups on a narrow one-lane road.

And we both need to be in better shape for the next competition. For weeks ahead of time, we had told ourselves that this was simply a practice event for us. Not to worry! But once you start, the competitive juices begin to flow and then it became much more serious than just a practice walk. Shame on us.