Race Report

New York City Marathon

Sunday, November 4, 2001

This was the most exciting marathon I've ever run (except perhaps for my first!). So many things were different, there was so much electricity in the air, everyone was so emotional, there was so much support from everybody, so much camaraderie among the runners, the volunteers, the spectators and the thousands of police officers making sure everybody was safe. Yet many things were the same as in other marathons. There were as many amazing stories as there were runners. Some had run many marathons, some were running their first.

Almost one-third of the runners came from abroad. Although some of the foreign entrants decided not to come, many arrived. Some of the French runners I talked to said they were coming to New York to show their affection and support for the city. I thought that was very moving.

As in previous years, I worked on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday as a volunteer at the international registration desk, to give the foreign entrants their packets for Saturday morning's International Friendship Run (bib, t-shirt, a beautiful pin, etc), and answer their questions.

Friday night, we had our first Penguin encounter (not counting the Tuesday night W&B outing). We met at the expo (Harriet, her brother and sister-in law, Julia, Ron, Doug, Ryan and me) and we walked on 34th Street until we discovered a nice little Italian restaurant.

Saturday we had the Big Combined Penguins and Dead Runners Pre-Marathon Encounter and Pasta Dinner at Padrone's Italian Restaurant. 39 people showed up, evenly divided between Penguins and Dead runners (OK, I know, that makes 19.5 of each. I am actually both a Penguin and a Dead). That was a lot of fun. The funniest thing was that Ron and Julia were sitting at adjoining tables and spent the whole time sending e-mails to each other with their little pocket gizmoes. The food was good and I hope everybody had enough to eat.

Sunday morning I got up at 5:00, ate a breakfast of orange juice, bread and cheese, and headed for Staten Island. I took a taxi to the NY Public Library where hundreds of huge buses were lined up to take the runners to the start. The line of runners went halfway around the block, but it was moving fast. Everybody had to show their bibs and their bags were scrutinized, but it all went very smoothly. In the bus, I sat next to a nice young lady from NJ, and we spent the time talking about...running. I got her interested in joining the Penguin Brigade.

The first thing I did on arriving in Staten Island was to eat a second breakfast. After all, we were not going to start running for another 5 hours! I had a bagel and a bottle of delicious strawberry-flavored liquid yogurt. Then, I started looking for the "Penguin Condo", aka Ron Horton's B&B. It was not difficult to find. It was in a big tent with a pink flag saying "Penguin Brigade". There were lots of Penguins in pink hats getting ready for the marathon. After chatting for a while, I lay down on the mat Ron had placed on the grass, covered myself with a little blanket I had brought, and went back to sleep. I don't know how long I slept, but when I woke up I decided it was time to bring my bag to the UPS truck. I was early, so there was no line. I was dressed in the fancy black and yellow fila outfit (singlet and shorts) that I received at last year's Country Music Marathon. It's very light and very comfortable. And I also wore my pink Penguin cap. I didn't keep anything else with me except an old throw-away wool sweater that I was planning to wear only on the bridge while waiting for the start. I also had a tube of glucose tablets in the one small pocket of my shorts and I was carrying a little American flag in my hand. One big mistake I made was to forget my salt. It's a necessity for me, especially on a warm day such as it was.

Cher, Carol, Ron, Ryan, Doug and I decided to start together. After getting lost and separated in the mass of runners, Ron managed to get everybody back together and united we marched onto the bridge. Helicopters were flying overhead, everybody was taking pictures and the atmosphere was very festive. Mayor Giuliani, who had just flown back from Arizona to start the marathon (and was to fly back to Arizona that evening for the final world series game) made a nice little speech dedicating the marathon to the victims of the September 11 attack. Someone sang the Star Spangled Banner and God Bless America, and about 100 white doves were released and started flying in circles above the heads of the runners.

The gun went off. We couldn't start running for a while but we could see the elite runners whizzing by next to us. It took us 5 minutes to get to the starting line. We had a clear view of the altered Manhattan skyline. Fireboats below us spewed red, white, and blue jets of water, to which the rays of the sun added all the colors of the rainbow. The runners spontaneously started singing "New York, New York."

The Verrazano bridge is 2 miles long. I didn't believe it was possible, but it's true: one can feel the bridge vibrating under the pounding of 60,000 feet. We all stayed together around Ron whose pink hat was towering above the crowd and could be seen a mile away. We entered Brooklyn. The crowds were roaring, the children were putting out their hands to touch us, and the bands were playing rock and roll. This is the borough where half the marathon is run. A little black boy asked me: "Can I have your flag?". I gave it to him and he proudly showed it to his friends. Doug had a slightly bigger flag, but he was tired of carrying it so he gave it to me.

Soon, the girls went ahead and we, the four young men, continued at our leisurely pace, high-fiving the kids and yelling "Thank you, NYPD!" Every time we saw a pretty girl, Ron would grab her around the waist and make her do a pirouette to the wild applause of the crowd. Then, we would all gather around her and have another runner take our picture with Ron's camera. I can't wait to see those pictures!

Ron was just amazing. While running, he was continuously typing e-mails to Julia, telling her what was happening and where we were located. Julia was sending e-mails to Ron, informing us where she was waiting for us with the rest of the Penguin scream team. She kept popping up here, there, and everywhere, together with Milt Link, Glenn Gabriel (who had come all the way from Toronto just to cheer for us), Ken Fargnoli, and, at times, El from Brooklyn, Peggy Harper, and Ken and Ellen Weissman. Of course, we stopped every time for hugs and pictures. What a race!

To make a long story short, we crossed the Pulaski bridge into Queens (the halfway point) and soon thereafter got onto the Queensboro bridge. This is definitely the hardest part of the race. My legs were starting to cramp and I knew this was due to a lack of sodium. Fortunately, the nice lady at the medical station on the bridge had salt and gave me 2 little packets. Immediately after swallowing it, I began to feel better. I had some more salt at a medical station on First Avenue and this allowed me to finish without further problems. For energy, I had my glucose tablets and also chocolate chip cookies given to be by Vaira at 70th Street and Ellen at 97th Street. What a race!

If you've read this far, you are probably tired of all the details and you just want to know how it ended. OK, we're almost there...

First Avenue, screaming medical students, a big hug for Vaira who was about to give up waiting for me as I was 45 minutes later than I told her, the Willis Avenue Bridge, mile 20, the Wall, the Bronx, saying Bon Courage! to French runners who looked rather discouraged (this always brought a smile to their face), the Madison Avenue Bridge, back to Manhattan, Fifth Avenue, 90th Street and Central Park, mile 25, Central Park South, Columbus Circle, back in Central Park, the finish line is in sight, the four of us are still together, Ron, Doug, Ryan and me, and Harriet who was with me in spirit, we all cross the finish line together, holding hands. Our time was 6:08:15 chip time, 6:13:05 gun time. Somehow, I managed to beat the others by one second :-) We missed making the New York Times by about 6 minutes. This was my 19th NYCM, my 23rd marathon overall, and my first marathon over 6 hours. What a race!

Email comments to Daniel at dwelln@med.cornell.edu