Sunday, October 7th, 2007

Never Surrender, by Corey Hart, is on my iPod shuffle five times. That way, when the machine mixes up the songs, there is a good chance that with fair regularity I will be listening to my 80’s anthem of perseverance. After all, it fits brilliantly. It is what the entire insane endeavour is about when you lace up your shoes, pin that number on your tech-gear, and tell yourself that you are about to run 26.2 miles. One foot in front of the next, find the strength somewhere within, and never surrender.

There is, however, a big difference between never surrender and never stop. To me, surrender is admitting defeat whereas stopping is sometimes about being smart.

As an experiential learner, I now know the difference.

When I awoke at 5AM the morning of the Chicago marathon, it was already 71 degrees (22C). The air was hazy with humidity and it took a little extra effort to breathe deep. By late morning the thermometer would read 93 (33C), the sun would be baking the streets of Chicago, and the humidity would not have relented at all. Where this was headed should have been painfully clear.

There are those who, in the convenience of retrospect and in the safety of their newspaper editorials, insist that none of us runners should have been out there in the first place given the conditions of Sunday the 7th of October. Yeah, they are probably right. They don’t know marathoners very well.

I was standing at the start line (well, I was standing at what would amount to about 22 minutes from the start line after the gun went off) already sweating having not yet run a single step. I was with some fellow JeansMarines and we were all feeling excited, nervous, and confident that we were going to be stepping across that final timing mat before the day was done. There were a couple of first timers and I think I was as excited for them as they were for themselves. Who doesn’t recall the first marathon? It was, for me, one of the sweetest experiences of life so far. So I think I was talking their ears off with all kinds of last minute advice - it may or may not have been worth anything in the end. I finished my litre of gatorade and dropped the empty bottle in the nearest recycling bin.

Before the race even began, I had made a critical error. I had decided to leave my water-belt at home and just run with the water stations. There are many different ways of training for and running a race and stopping to drink at and walk through the water stations is a pretty common one. Thankfully this did not turn out to be a fatal error, just a dangerous one.

The gun went off at 8AM and at about 8:22AM I was across the start line and on my way. By mile 1 I was soaking wet. My shirt and shorts were clinging to me like polyester cellophane. Streams of water were trickling down my neck and back, all exposed skin was slick and shiny with the humidity of the air around me. I recall feeling so self-conscious that I was this sweaty so soon in the race.

I hit the first water station at about 1.5 miles and grabbed a cup of gatorade and a cup of water. I took the two half full cups and mixed them together - the water station gatorade is always too strong and sweet for me. Instead of the usual two or three sips I would take before running on, I walked for a while and finished most of the liquid in the paper cup. I promise you that I had already lost more than three times that much. I also polished off a package of ‘sports beans’ - pumped up jelly beans with added salt and potassium.

Slow but sure was the strategy for this race. I had a talk with myself before I had even crossed the start line and my brain and feet were both briefed on the fact that there was no attention to be paid to the clock today. I always say that my goal for every race is simply to finish. I always have a secret time in mind. This time my goal was no secret. It was a goal I think I shared with a lot of people out on that course and it was honestly just to cross that final line and manage to flash a smile for the cameras.

I hit the next water station at about 3 miles and there was, all at once, the most eerie silence all around me. All of us runners had just realized that where the water station was supposed to be was nothing more than a street carpeted with crushed paper cups and sidewalks lined with water station tables that had been collapsed and hauled to the side. There was no water for us.

My head swam and my heart beat a bit faster when I thought of what this meant for the remainder of the race. I had to assume there was no water at the rest of the water stations. There was no way to make it through the race without water. I told myself to calm down, that the race organizers would scramble to fix the problem as soon as they saw what was happening. I stopped to walk for a minute or two because I started to feel a bit woozy and my vision was blurring a bit around the edges. I was fine a moment or two later - I had got myself so worked up over the lack of water that I think my blood pressure spiked just a little.

Honestly, the space between mile 3 and mile 13 is a bit of a watercolour painting. I’m sure it all comes together to make some sort of image, but the stream of sweat blurred all of the colours into a big mess. Monet would be proud. I do remember some things with overwhelming clarity.

I remember that gatorade bottle I put in the recycling bin at the start line. Every water fountain I ran past would have been a saviour had I only kept that bottle with me.

I remember every single Chicagoan that came out to the side of the road with their garden hoses and sprinklers. They came out with plastic pitchers of water and styrofoam cups. They stood on the sidewalks and soaked us as we ran past. As the miles added up and the news of the empty water stations spread throughout the course, the city rallied for us. The citizens, businesses, and organizations of Chicago came out in droves with cases upon cases of water and cooler after cooler of ice. They did everything they could to keep us cool as the people of Tokyo had done to try and keep us warm.

Why does everything I do have to involve such extremes?

I remember also the images of people falling down on the course. From about mile 7 onwards there were people down on the side of the road left and right and the aide stations were overflowing with people needing assistance. There were people lying on stretchers who where covered in as many bags of ice as could be mustered. There were people who stumbled and fell between aide stations and spectators who were running ahead to gather medical staff to help those who had fallen. At mile 10 I was suffering so badly from the heat that I decided to stop and walk the next mile. It was then that I really had a moment to stop and look around and see what was happening to my fellow runners out on the course. To put it plainly, it was really scary to watch. It was also the first moment I thought that there was a chance I would not be finishing this race.

That is where the crucial difference between surrendering and stopping comes into play.

I think it was just before mile 17 that police began to line the streets and it was announced that the marathon had been cancelled.

I didn’t understand. Race marshals were telling us that the marathon had been cancelled and that we were to stop running and start walking. I still didn’t understand. I looked around and it was clear by the faces of my fellow runners that they understood no more than I did.

Little by little the chatter started. Cell phones were pulled out all around me and calls were being made and received by people with weary and strained voices. It took no more than a few minutes before we all got the message. The marathon was, really truly, over. We were to stop running, start walking, and were to be diverted back to Grant park and the finish area.

I was so disappointed. I had come so far and it had been such a struggle. It had been the longest, most difficult 17 miles I had ever run and now I was being told to quit. Disappointment turned, in a matter of seconds, into defiance. No freaking way they were going to tell me to quit after all the effort I had just put in. Defiance turned to the sweetest sense of relief.

Sure I had come 17 miles, but that meant that there was still 9.2 miles left (almost 15K) left to run. Sure I was doing alright considering the circumstances, but the time for being smart was upon us and I am thankful that someone made the call. If ever there was a race that I should not have finished, it was this one. Thing is, I probably would have tried and who knows what tribulations were waiting between mile 17 and 26.2?

So, we were diverted up to and along Jackson St. and I was greeted there by one of the most fantastic pictures I have ever seen. The long skyscraper lined street stretched out in front of me as far as my eye would go and as far as my eye could see all the fire hydrants were open in full force sending giant arcs of water up into the sky and across the street.

Runners were jumping through the plumes of water like five year old children and great sighs of comfort soared through the air as cold water hit the hot skin of people all around me.

I was so exhausted, so thirsty, so drained that I walked along Jackson letting the fire hydrants spray the sweat and tears from my sunburned face.

The finish area was chaos. Runners down, on stretchers, in wheelchairs, again packed in ice. Family and friends looking for their athletes. Athletes looking for water. Maybe a banana or a bagel. Mostly just water.

I was in a group that was herded down toward the finish line. We were coming at it from the wrong way since we had been brought in from behind. I wasn’t sure what the point was. I realized then that someone had decided to let us cross the final timing mat so that it would be recorded that, even though we had not been allowed to run the entire 26.2 miles, we finished what we could. It also means that my timing chip shows that I had a finishing time of 4:20.

I won’t forget it. Not any time soon. Probably not ever.