Land of Enchantment (New Mexico Marathon 2007)

It’s pitch black out when we start running north along Tramway Boulevard on the east side of Albuquerque. The only light in the sky is a very faint hint of sunrise, silhouetting the Sandia Mountains to our east. The only sound is the rhythmic footfall of nearly 300 people out for a run with me early on this Sunday morning. Nobody is talking; it’s as if there is magic in the dark morning air, and nobody wants to disturb it. After all, we’re in the land of enchantment. And at the start of the New Mexico Marathon at 5:30 a.m. on Sunday morning, September 2nd, it all feels very magical to me.

It feels magical partly because the morning has been surreal: a wakeup call at 3 a.m., then a short walk to the Hotel Albuquerque in Old Town, followed by a bus ride to the staging area for the race. At the staging area, we have been treated to musical serenade by a solo guitarist, whose music has been thoughtful and beautiful and respectful of the residential area where we awaited the start of the race. He was seated on a small patch of grass, surrounded by a circle of luminaria. This feels magical partly because I’m running on a route that is familiar to me: when I’ve visited my uncle and cousins in the past, Tramway has been my destination and my running route. It’s rare that I run a marathon where I feel that I know the route already. And it’s magical because I’m running – pure and simple. No politics, no work, no worries about anything other than putting one foot in front of another and listening to my own breath. No worries at all.

The morning is perfect. It’s cool with a slight breeze that swirls around and brings us little bursts of cooler air. Tramway is punctuated at regular intervals by the major east-west cross streets, whose names I recognize from trips to see Uncle Dwight and my cousins: Indian School Road, Menaul Boulevard, Candelaria Road. It’s so dark that the only time you can see anything at all is when you pass under the streetlights at these intersections. I’ve done a lot of my running over the last few months in the dark at night, so I feel right at home in the darkness this morning.

If there is a mile marker at mile one, I miss it, so the first split I take is at mile 2: 17:31. I’m surprised, and pleased, since the elevation map has shown the first 8 miles to all be uphill, which fits my recollection of the terrain along Tramway. If I’m running 8:45s going slightly uphill, there’s a good chance that I can finish this race in 4 hours. Normally, I don’t set out on a marathon with a particular goal in mind, but prefer to just see what the day brings. But after a couple of grueling – and slow – uphill races this summer, a fast (by my standards) race today would do wonders for my ego.

The real work of going uphill on Tramway starts in earnest after the two-mile mark, and the splits I take for the next several miles start to look a lot more like I expected for this part of the day, with an average of well over 10 minutes per mile. But the truth is, I’ve expected this and it doesn’t really concern me at all. I know that the race is a net downhill course, with a drop of nearly 600 feet from the start to the end. Six and a half miles of nicely steep downhill await me after these uphill miles, and I’m looking forward to them.

It feels good, running this morning, and I have that “it’s going to be a really good day” feeling. I caution myself about getting too optimistic too early, but it just feels good. We’re running on the roadway, with nice smooth asphalt, although when I’ve run here before it’s been on the bike path that parallels the road and that goes for miles and miles. The darkness remains for at least the first hour of the race, and then after that, we have high clouds and early morning daylight, while the sun works to crest the Sandia Mountains. The temperature remains perfect.

Just after the eight mile mark, the course turns downward, and I go to town. While running on the uphill part of Tramway, I’ve been passed by scores of people as I managed my pace by my heart rate. Truth be told, I’m getting more in tune with my body and I could probably run within my range without the heart rate monitor (HRM), but it serves to confirm what I feel in my breathing and general effort. On the uphill sections of this race, I’ve kept my pace in check – quite slow – in order to keep my heart rate within my target range. But now that the course has turned downhill, it’s a different story. I pour it on, and gravity does all the work. I’m flying, and passing back all those folks who went around me in the last six miles.

The other thing that happens shortly after the eight mile mark is that the course makes a broad sweeping left-hand turn, so that we end up running directly west. The view is stupendous. Here on the east side of Albuquerque, on the flanks of the Sandia Mountains, we are higher than my hometown of Denver. We pass the high point of the race course here – over 6,100’ of elevation – and our attention is now turned westward. The downtown Albuquerque skyline looks like so many Legos off in the distance, and I’m a bit awed that we will finish this run today even further to the west, in Old Town, where there are not many high structures. There are hot air balloons off in the distance, little dots in the sky. It’s a breathtaking view.

These miles are magical; no wonder they call this the land of enchantment. I keep a close eye on my heart rate while I push the pace. The weather is still perfect – cool, with the soft light of daybreak. I start to pass the people who surged past me when the course turned uphill many miles back. First one, then another, and then another. I pass the couple I talked to in the port-a-potty line; he is wearing a Georgia Marathon t-shirt today, and we had a good yuk about the heat that crippled all of us (and me in particular) back on that grueling day in March. Thank God it’s cool here, we said. And it’s still deliciously cool now. It’s perfect.

These are some of the best miles of my marathoning career. I turn in a couple of sub-8 minute miles, and although I don’t really trust the mile markers, it’s a blast to hit my split button when the clock reads 7:57 and 7:42. I don’t think I’ve ever run a sub-8 mile in a marathon before, and the odd thing is how easy it feels. This part of the race goes by way, way too quickly.

The only real problem with this part of the race is that I just can’t seem to drop a number of other runners with whom I keep trading places. The most annoying is the tall guy wearing purple Race Ready shorts who shuffles every step along the way. I try to run with my internal rhythm – counting out the steps from mile to mile – but this guy’s shwuh shwuh shwuh with each footstep makes it difficult. Another bothersome runner is the younger guy wearing the golden t-shirt. He’s a much faster runner than me, but he takes walk breaks every 4 minutes, so I’m constantly passing him, only to have him go around me a minute or two later. There’s also the shirtless short guy with the gray shorts. The world might be a better place if he kept his shirt on; he’s definitely not a candidate for a cover shot on Runners World. I’m not really sure how it is that we keep trading places, but that’s exactly what happens. Over and over, I go around these guys only to have them all pass me further down the road.

One of the few complaints I have about this race has to do with the mile markings. Early on, I missed a couple of mile markers, and chalked it up to the darkness. In these middling miles, I’m not so sure; I watch for the markers, but they don’t always appear. Sometimes I catch a glimpse of a painted notation on the roadway, but the mile markers are not always coincident with these. So it is that we approach the halfway point, but there is no clear marking for the 13.1 mile point on the marathon course. This seems like an especially gross oversight, since there is a companion half marathon that started here – 13.1 miles from the finish. Would it be so difficult to put up a “half-way point” sign? As it is, I see a painted marking on the roadway and mark a split, accepting that it’s most likely not 100% accurate. My watch reads 2:02:45. I figure that if I can run my patented negative split, just averaging 9 minute miles, that I’ll easily finish the day in under 4 hours.

What I haven’t counted on is the heat. It comes on, sudden and brutal, without warning. Just past the halfway point in the race – where the course turns flat and shadeless – the sun makes its debut for the day from behind the mountain range to the east. The clouds have burned off, and there is no shade. Here at altitude – just like at home – the untempered sun is relentless. After averaging 8:30 per mile for the last six miles, I find myself running progressively slower and slower miles while my heart rate – well in control for the first 13 miles of the day – is now dangerously in the red zone, even though I feel like I’m crawling. The painful process of adjusting my goal begins, going through revision after revision. My day – my beautiful, “maybe this is going to be one of those really great days” day – is done. And I have miles and miles left to run.

The saving grace is the fact that the heat seems to treat all of us equally. I continue to run with the same group of people I’ve been with for miles and miles, continuing to trade places over and over again. The race literature advertises aid stations with water and Gatorade approximately every two miles, and the aid stations materialize on schedule. They use little Dixie cups, so early on I’ve started to yell ahead “water please! Two cups!”, and the volunteers are eager to make me happy. I spill as much water as I drink, and it feels good, cooling.

There are several miles through non-descript neighborhoods as we continue westward. At mile 18, we turn onto the Bosque bike path, a beautiful urban asphalt trail that runs parallel to the Rio Grande River. This part of the course reminds me of the bike path where I run at home – a remote and wilderness experience in the heart of a major city – but I can’t much appreciate the beauty. It’s just too hot. I’m suffering. And the finish is still a long ways away. It doesn’t help at all that there is not a single mile marker along this 4-mile stretch of the race course. It feels like it will go on forever.

I’ve been hoping to see Mick at some point today. We’ve come to Albuquerque together, and he – God bless him – got up with me at 3 a.m., keeping me company while I forced down my early breakfast, applying Bodyglide for me to those pesky areas on my back that I can’t seem to get on my own, and helping me to get my bib number pinned on straight. When I left him at the hotel at 4:15, he was studying the course map, trying to figure out how to ride out to meet me on his bike. I’ve been expecting to meet up with him at any point for several miles, perversely enjoying the fact that as I click off each mile, I have something left to look forward to.

Albuquerque strikes me today as a very fit city. Everywhere we go – even back in those early, dark miles out on Tramway – there are people out exercising. What this race lacks in standing-on-the-side-of-the-road-clapping fan support, it more than makes up for in kindred-spirits-going-the-opposite-direction support. Nowhere is that more pronounced than on the Bosque bike trail. I would suffer much more on this hot stretch in the marathon if it weren’t for the multitude of people showing support. Here on the bike path, there are runners and walkers and cyclists, and many of them – heck, most of them – yell out encouragement or offer high fives or thumbs-up when I go by. I keep my eyes peeled for Mick, reminding myself that he pulled out his Triple Bypass jersey from this year before I left the room. It’s bright red, and he wanted to make sure that I could spot him easily. Finally, somewhere between miles 20 and 21 (although I haven’t seen a mile marker since mile 18), there he is.

The timing couldn’t be more perfect. Just seeing him lifts my spirits. I yell out at him, and he quickly turns and comes back to ride beside me, offering me water from the bottle on his bike. It’s nice and cold – oh so nice after the lukewarm offerings of the latest aid stations – but I’m worried about drinking too much and getting the sloshing-stomach effect, so I just take a couple of sips before handing the bottle back.

Mick asks how I’m doing, and I try to answer, but I find that I can’t talk. My heart rate is in the red zone now, and I just don’t have anything left for non-essential functions. I’m really doing okay, but the realization that I don’t even have the spare cycles to utter more than a couple of words is a bit disturbing. There is a scary feeling of not being able to draw a deep breath. Mick gets this, and he tells me not to talk.

Except, he asks, is there anything you need?

And the request I’ve been praying about for the last hour or more now crosses my lips: “ice!”

Mick says that there’s not much near this bike path, but that he’ll try. And then he’s gone.

The section on the bike path continues until mile 22, and then there are a few twists and turns before we eventually get onto Rio Grande Avenue, heading south again. Our hotel is on Rio Grande. I know that the finish is near the hotel – just past it, and somewhere in Old Town near the grand old Hotel Albuquerque, where we boarded the buses back in the sweet coolness earlier this morning. Just nearing Rio Grande gets me jazzed; I know that once we get on this road, we’re headed back to the barn.

Mick shows up again, and miracle-of-miracles, he has ice. And lots of it! Later he will tell me that he found a Safeway, and filled a large plastic bag with ice from a soda fountain, and grabbed the largest cup he could find. For now, all I care about is that he’s holding out a cup to me, and it’s filled to the brim with sweet, delicious, cold ice.

I chew on the ice. I put ice cubes down my sports bra. I hold ice cubes in my hands. I bathe my arms in ice. And I pour the melting, icy water from the cup wherever it will go – my face, my mouth, my legs. It’s all good. It’s a new lease on life. Nothing has been this grand this late in a race ever in my life.

And it keeps coming. Incredibly, I empty the cup and then ask Mick for more. And then some more. Finally, after, three large cups, I’m finally starting to feel that my core temperature is under control. This coincides with the 26 mile marker, so I toss my empty cup to Mick, who yells encouragement. I look at my watch. Holy crap. If I’ve got a snowball’s chance of meeting my latest goal, I’ve got to kick it in.

That latest goal has been the result of making many adjustments over the last several miles. These are the games we play while running this crazy distance. Four hours is no longer viable? How about 4:05? That would – at the very least – be a Boston qualifier. But it’s quickly no more realistic than four hours was. So what about 4:10? That sounds good. But as the splits come in at nearly 11 minutes per mile, that becomes a fleeting thought. How about 4:15? Well, when you hit mile 26 in 4:17:37, the only thing left is to aim for sub 4:20.

So I kick it in. And, truth be told, it doesn’t really matter that much: 3:59 or 4:05 or 4:20. The reality is this: crossing the finish line – and doing it in style, giving it everything you have – is the only thing that matters. I’m well off my goal today. The finish line announcer blunders while trying to read my bib number. The crowd at the finish line is miniscule. Still, it doesn’t matter. I finish in 4:19:29, and I feel like a champion when a kind volunteer puts a medal around my neck. Is it so important to wish for anything more? This is grand.

But, okay, yeah, I want it all. The fast time, the Boston qualifier, meeting a goal. So I experience a tinge of disappointment after all, even though on another level, I’m happy just to have state #26 behind me. I just wish I could have done it in grander style.

But the land of enchantment does not disappoint, at least not entirely. The medal for this race is the prettiest that I’ve ever received. Mick is by my side, and I use him as a crutch, since I’m pretty light-headed at the finish, and I’m not so steady on my feet. I have the pleasure of knowing that I gave this everything that I had. We hang out in the small post-race area, enjoying a brief rest on the cool grass before walking back to the hotel. The awards ceremony starts, and we stick around for a few more minutes. Even with my slow time, I’ve still taken third in my age group, and I receive the coolest piece of southwestern pottery. Mick offers to put the award in his backpack as we walk back to the hotel, but I decline the offer. There’s something magical about carrying this little piece of pottery. I want to hold on to this feeling as long as I can.