It's Over

It’s over. 26.2 miles are behind me now. There’s nothing official about my time; I tried doing some mental gymnastics as I I tried to remember exactly what time it might have been when I crossed the starting line. I think it was 7:05 and the clock said 6:02 when I crossed the finish line. So, that makes it a 5:57 time? I will know later on after the official times go on-line at portlandmarathon.org.

Wow! I just checked the website and they have live results; no waiting.

OK, 5:58:11…I’ll take it! That gives me a 13:37 average. If you want to see the results for yourself, my bib number was 2350.

Now back to the beginning. The start was almost normal; too many people and a slow shuffle towards the starting line. What was missing from the start were the signs that indicated where you should be lined up according to your pace times. Those were absent and so people were lining up anyplace they felt like it. This created a real problem for the first two miles as I had to duck and dodge between slow walkers that were taking up a lot of road space. I finally ended up running along the left side of the road and sometimes up on the sidewalk in an effort to find some breathing room.

Once we started up the first hill, it became easier to get past the strollers and it became a regular marathon at that point. Pick em and put em down! And do it at the same speed and same stride for the next…say, 23 miles.

Without my trusty partner to inspire me, I had to find someone to focus on and I found one; an older gentleman (like me) and he had a great racewalking gait. We stayed quite close from about mile 4 until mile 9. That was when I decided to make a bathroom break. When I emerged, I ran for awhile, hoping to catch up, but without success, so I just kept plugging away.

About mile 12, I saw him ahead of me but I just couldn’t make any gains on him. I figured that once we reached the Saint john’s Bridge hill, I could make a move on him. But, to my dismay, he pulled over to the side at mile 16 to change his socks. Darn! No matter, I found my way to the top of the hill and across the bridge. It was all downhill (almost) from here.

Then, at mile 21, he caught up to me and passed me. Whoa! I really didn’t have it in me to change that situation…yet. So I just kept him in view and hoped for a chance to catch him. And at mile 24 I did catch up to him; in fact we chatted for awhile. He lives in Vancouver and moved there from Citrus Heights. We kept on together for awhile and then he slowed or I got faster. Either way, I pulled ahead with just a mile to go. And at the half mile marker, there he was again, on my right shoulder. As we raced towards the finish line I was able to pull ahead of him and finished about 5 or 6 seconds faster, But since the race is decided on chip times, he might have beat me. That’s OK; it was fun to race to the finish.

After my chip was removed and I had my medal, it was time to browse the eats! Orange juice seemed to be my favorite this time; that and biscotti ice cream sandwiches. A little more water and some string cheese and I was good to go.

Now I’m relaxing. I have had a cold bath to help the injured tissues of the legs and a warm shower to remove the road grime. I’m nibbling on anything within reach and not worrying about any calories. And in about 2 hours we will walk (yes, walk) down to the Oyster Bar for dinner. A well deserved dinner.