Marathon #2: My Version of a Love Letter To Los Angeles

 

The second time I raced a marathon was about a marathon distance from my first, at least it felt like it.  I had been working consistently as a Production Assistant and sufficiently surviving on my own, AKA my hip studio pad in Venice Beach was indeed the bees knees, and I was loving being an independent woman.  The catalyst for signing up for my second marathon was because my TV show/stable job was  canceled, and after spending many numerous hours over the days and nights in downtown Los Angeles I wanted to run all over it during the LA marathon.  My show, “Haunted”, ended in early December 2002, the race was slated for early the following March in 2003, so I had about twelve weeks to whip myself back into marathon shape.  Fortunatley, I was not unemployed for long, I had another grueling 12 plus hour a  day job lined up by early January, which meant “yay I can eat, but yikes, when and I am going to train?”  I will tell you when, before work, 6-7AM, and after work, 8-10PM.  I tended to have plenty of time for my after work/late night runs because besides work and my family, running was my life, yeah, no male suitors were banging down my door at the time. Actually, that is not entirely true, there was one very nice fellow, but he did not give me the” warmies” like I had hoped, so to the curb he was soon kicked.

Night after night, from January to March, I ran loops around track home neighborhoods in Santa Clarita, CA.  I sometimes ran in the rain, and always ran on exhausted legs that I had been standing on all day, but none of that mattered because I had to train properly for the race,  and give it the respect it deserved, which I think was lacking on the first go-around. 

The morning of the race was LA sunny, but cold.  I was decked out in my white on white dry fit gear, Eminem blasting in my car stereo during the nervous nauseating drive on the 10 freeway from Venice  to downtown Los Angeles.  As I walked from my car toward the starting line I felt the ease of “my calling” calm my nerves; I was ready, and right where I was meant to be, on the starting line of another marathon.  This time around, I was fueled with my blood, sweat and tears that I had bared all over Los Angeles in my first year of a working in Production, this race would be my swan song to the great city I loved, and I was ready to trounce the streets.  As the final minutes ticked by I started to stretch a bit, and mill around the crowd of over 10,000 fellow runners, when suddenly my heart skipped a beat, I saw her, my hero of all heroes sitting among the dignitaries at the starting line, Jackie Joyner-Kersee.  I was a hurdler and both a long and high jumper in high school during the mid-nineties when she was at her peak, I even had a poster of her on my bedroom wall, so to see her in real-life just feet away from me was a genuine thrill, and provided a giant shot of adrenaline that I needed just as the gun went off. 

 

The marathon course present day is a magnificent tour of Los Angeles “ point to point” race course starting at Dodger stadium, and ending just above the ocean in Santa Monica.  I would love to run that course some day, but in 2003, the course was a meandering path through south central and the east side of Beverly Hills, in essence we ran through neighborhoods that I would never drive my car through day or night, however, the support from the crowds was electric.

 I discovered early on in this race that I am not a fan of very large races, because having to fight for position in the sea of runners is not very pleasant.  I felt comfortable during the first 7 miles, I did not pay attention to my pace because I just wanted to finish under my previous time of 4:24, and I did not want to bonk by going out too hard, too quickly.  Once I passed the 10 mile marker I started to settle in, and realize that, yes, I was indeed going long today… I still had 16 miles to go! 

There was a short hill just after mile 15, but then it was flat for the next 5 miles as we cruised through Miracle Mile on Mid Wilshire, a very historical area where museums and entertainment guild buildings line the streets, and volunteers are excited and abundant. For example, one volunteer was running backwards making me chase him for an energy gel, he may have thought this was motivating, but I just thought it was annoying.  Nevertheless, I was passing people and feeling good; then I saw a glimpse into my future.  There was a petite woman cruising by me with an Ironman California 70.3 hat on, I zeroed in that MDot, and chased her down for dinner.  I knew what a privilege and honor it was to wear the MDot gear, because that cemented one’s legitimacy as an Ironman, which in my mind was at the highest level of the endurance food chain.  I passed her around mile 22, and continued on the long, leg searing slight uphill of Olympic Blvd. which continued until mile 26, when we took a sharp left onto Flower St. and thundered up the home stretch to the finish line.  Yes, the last 6 miles were up hill.     

 

Once again my heart was beating in my throat over the final 100 feet of the race, I had crushed my previous time by 13 minutes, and again felt like I could spring to the top of the skyscrapers towering over all of us, it was magic.  When I was driving home on the freeway talking with my uber-runner best friend Hadara, downloading her the deets, (we could talk on cell phones back then while driving), I was serene and not exhausted, which felt like a sign that this would certainly not be my last marathon, but that I was already looking forward to training and racing for #3.