Marathon part 2 (long post for a long run)

Alright, now that I have had a chance to digest the run and once again attempt walking down a staircase face pointing forward, I can tell you a bit more about the day that made me the man I am today.

I crossed the start line about 16 minutes after the gun went off (I think) and the day began in earnest. First thing, the route took us through Shinjuku - by now you have seen about 1000 pictures of Shinjuku posted by the geek.

The throng of 30,000 runners starting en masse took a good 10K to thin out to any sort of comfortable spacing. No problem though, I kept a steady pace behind a very attractive behind and waited for an opportunity to surge ahead.

The rain had let up just a bit before the starting gun but at the 8K-ish mark decided that no more miss nice hello-kitty and pelted us anew. The roads, manholes, sewer grates, paper cups, plastic bags became hazzards far greater than running out of glycogen or losing too much salt. I couldn't feel my fingers and couldn't use them to tie the shoelaces that the water repeatedly worked apart.

My calf and quad muscles were ice cold and started to spasm at around 16K. I stopped to stretch and massage a bit of heat back into them and a 5 foot tall Japanese woman came running up to me, said something I couldn't quite get, and started rubbing down my legs with the strongest most glorious smelling mentholated cream I have ever known. Under different circumstances this might have been strange. There and then it was a kindness I could not have expected. I picked up the race from there with tears in my eyes. So strange the emotional effect that the kindness of strangers has.

From 16K to 27K, the race was mine! I felt like I had wings on my feet. Running down the streets of Ginza the crowds were cheering and chanting. Criest of 'Ganbare' (Do your best/You can do it/Good luck for you) and 'Faito' (Fight!) were bouncing off the great big buildings of Tokyo's most posh shopping district. It struck me then that the entire core of Tokyo (Tokyo for goodness sake!) had been shut down and brought to a halt for us. 30,000 of us got to run 42.195K down the middle of streets that never ever ever stopped or emptied out for anyone. It was bizzare and wonderful.

The rain stopped, started, spit, and streamed at all kind of points all along the 42K, 5 hour trek. Really, at about half-way, it was time to stop focusing on and cursing the weather and start pointing my thoughts to the amazing experience that was unfolding with each foot-fall.

Running past 'music stations' that were filled with Taiko drummers, brass-bands, Shamisen and Koto music, Bagpipes (all of these in separate places mind you) was so much fun! Running past the few foreigners that lined the route who gave their fellow Gai-Jin an extra hearty cheer was a great boost. Running past 90 year old men and women standing out in the pouring rain clapping and cheering and grinning from ear to ear as we all went past was just plain beautiful. Tokyo had not only stopped for us but had stopped what they were doing and come out for us.

From 35K on things got really really really truly terribly tough. I did, I must admit, have a few thoughts of surrender. Not one of those thoughts were as stubborn as the genetic code my father gave me for my 0th birthday (one of the few situations where this quality has served me well).

Between 38K and 40K I experienced the strangest thing. Euphoria. Complete euphoria although my legs could barely move and my feet were begging me to stop. Is this the storied 'runner's high' I have heard about. I was running along for two full kilometres with a grin on my face. I think at one point I actually imagined taking all my clothes off and running through a field of sunflowers. Thankfully, there were no sunflowers to be found.

Of course, crossing the line at 42.195K was glorious. To herald the glory of the moment, nearly as soon as my size 12 shoes crossed the finish, Mother Nature parted the clouds, stopped the rain, and spread bright sunshine across a blue blue sky. Bitch.

-mikael