Photo by: Megan Kimble
In spite of rain, wind, and temperatures hovering in the high 30s, about 7,500 runners braved some very un-fall like weather to participate in Denver’s second annual marathon.
Jonathan Ndambuki, 31, finished Colorado’s longest race in 2 hours, 21 minutes, 34 seconds, cited as the fastest marathon in Colorado since the mid-1980s. Martha Tenorio, an Ecuadorian who lives in Boulder, took the women’s title in 2:46:41.
I, however, am not in their class. I’m not even a runner. Training for a half-marathon was an idea, shared with a friend, a non runner as well, to ‘get in shape.’
It turned out running was the least of it. The anticipation was by far the most difficult part of the race. I had checked the weather incessantly the night before. It was going to rain Sunday, and there was nothing I could do about it.
I got up at 5:30 a.m., peered out my window, saw rain falling in front of a streetlight, and almost went back to bed. But, last night’s pasta dinner, and the $75 entry fee, got me up out the door.
I half thought the race would be cancelled. Who in his or her right mind would run 13.1 miles, or the full 26.2, in sleet and rain? Apparently a lot of people, including me and a dozen other DU students.
My dread only increased in the ride down, in the freezing walk from the parking garage to the start and finish line at the State Capitol. My fear culminated as I attempted to attach my bib number to the front of my thin coat, with cold, almost numb fingers.
Regardless of my doubts, my disbelief at the weather, the coldness, my fear, I joined the runners at the starting line. Far away, I heard a gunshot, cheers, and we were off.
I began to jog. With each step, my fear subsided. I fell into the flow of the crowd, and then fell into the movement of my own legs and arms. Despite the cold, my body felt familiar again, as it had on all of our long training runs. I finally realized that I was going to finish this thing, like it or not.
Each mile had a different feel. I spent the first two finding a pace and getting comfortable running in a crowd of people. I warmed up, oscillating between exhilaration and anticipation at the long run to come.
At the first drink station, I thought I could drink out of a Gatorade cup without breaking my pace and ended up, to my embarrassment, with a cup of Gatorade down my front. And still, I ran on. I ran past the Pepsi Center, through LoDo, up and over Broadway, and the rain continued
Running downtown, sheltered from the wind and rain by looming office buildings, the time flew by. We ran by a bank with our race time and the temperature. 58:59 and 38 degrees.
At five miles, we turned off of 17th Avenue, and the shelter of city buildings, to face the wind in Denver City Park. I retreated into my music and tried not to think. The six-to-10 mile stretch was cold and long. I visualized the amount of energy left in my body, knew that I had better push myself so that it was zero when I crossed the finish line.
The 10-mile marker: all downhill from here, or so said my training plan. As I crossed the sign designating 3.1 more miles, I entered new territory. The farthest I had ever run uninterrupted in my life was 10 miles, training for this very half-marathon. I smiled, thrilled at my body’s capacity, and found that my face didn’t move: it had gone numb.
After 11 miles, I began to wonder if I was actually still running. I looked over at my running buddy and was confused to see that she was still running, rather than walking, as I must surely be. By 11 miles, I forgot what it feels like not to be running, for my body not to be in movement, forgot what it felt like not to be simultaneously sweating, cold and soggy.
At mile 12, I was so focused on the tunnel of buildings before me, the long city blocks that I had to run before the finish line, that I stepped in puddle after puddle, barely aware that my feet were wet and that my face didn’t seem to exist.
That last mile was the longest and shortest mile. Passing 12th, 13th, 14th Avenues on Lincoln, and cornering around on Broadway, my vision tunneled onto the finish sign, the sign I left two hours and 18 minutes earlier. These two hours and 18 minutes were agony, were the most exhilarating, focused and precise minutes I had experienced. I sprinted, crossed the finish line, and finally stopped running. I was cold, tired, and very alive.
The best part of all the rain and cold, the part I could have never anticipated, was that, after thousands of cups of coffee in my life, after thousands of showers, the hot coffee and the hot shower were perhaps the two best of my life.
