Hot Time in the City by Duncan Stewart

Well, the 2003 New York City Marathon is in the books. The weather was great for watching a marathon, but not so great for running one. But hey – if it were easy, everyone would be doing it.

My wife and I flew up on Friday, Oct. 31st, and a buddy of mine met us at the airport and took us to our hotel. That sure was nice! After checking in, we strolled over to Times Square and got a couple half-price theatre tickets for Cabaret (not a show for kids!), then walked over to the expo. I was disappointed – here I was, ready to load up on NYC merchandise, and most of the stuff they had was of mediocre quality. Oh, and they were very proud of their stuff. The jacket, which was only a windbreaker, was $160!! The long-sleeves and tights were shoddy, the singlet was hideous, and the socks/etc were boring. I ended up only buying a pair of shorts. They didn’t even have NYC Marathon t-shirts. So we blew outta there fairly quickly. When we were out and about Times Square that Halloween night, I figured it would be a WILD scene, but it wasn’t. That is, not much wilder than usual.

The next day we bought a few souvenirs, got some more half-price tickets for a matinee (Chicago), and generally took it easy. For the big pasta dinner, we went to a very interesting diner – complete with singing wait staff. I hit the hay early and tossed and turned most of the night.

Marathon morning came early, as the last bus leaves at 7am. This leaves plenty of time to mill around at the start, because the race doesn’t start until 10:10. The race organizers did a good job of clearing the first corral (seeding is based on your recent marathon time), making all of us show our number, then checking anyone else who wanted to get in. As the start time drew near, we began a slow march to the start line. Unfortunately, there was a large group of slower runners between us and the starting line – some logistical mix-up, I guess. The sun was blazing high in the sky and I was perspiring slightly before the race even began. Not a good omen! The announcer, obviously a non-runner, said “Don’t drink unless you’re thirsty” (?!?!) Finally the gun booms and we’re off, sort of. As you can imagine, there was a bit of chaos for the first mile or so, with the faster runners trying to get by the slower ones. Mile 1 went by with me “only” behind schedule by a minute. Not that it was to matter in the end.

Despite this being my 21st marathon, I made a few mistakes. The first of which was trying to squeeze more miles out of my flats, which were a year old. The second was in trying to make up ground on a lousy day. The third was in allowing myself to get dehydrated, which led to cramping and some slight dizziness and nausea later. Lastly, I underestimated the toughness of the course. It didn’t look so hard on the elevation map! By the halfway point I knew I was in for a bad day, and by 18 I was struggling. If it weren’t for the crowd support, I would have finished 5-10 minutes slower. Even so, I lost 12 minutes on the back half and finished with a 3:05. I could barely walk afterwards, but managed to hobble the 30 blocks back to the hotel.

On Monday we took the subway to Ground Zero, which is a big construction pit now. I didn’t get a feeling of solemnity like I did at the USS Arizona Memorial (Pearl Harbor), probably because there isn’t a special area set aside for remembrance yet. Then we took the subway to Central Park, because we wanted to check out the “day after” expo to see if there was a better selection or at least better prices. However, there was a HUGE line, so we passed on that. Instead, we went to the top of the Empire State Building, which was pretty interesting. We also wanted to check out the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Guggenheim, but ran out of time.