Boston Pilgrimage

My Fellow Travelers

We have all probably learned (well, people my age, that is, probably not younger people since they don't even teach grammar OR SCRIPT in schools anymore) about New England's Pilgrims, Puritans, and even Paul Revere. Luckily, I am one of about 20,000 people who know the other side of Boston: Marathon Monday. Last year, after our first visit to the Boston Marathon, Rob and I vowed to return each year, no matter how hectic life became.  Unfortunately, the way Rob's spring break fell this year, Marathon Monday was his first day back to school after a week off; taking off is "frowned upon," and although I am sad he broke his vow, at least it wasn't the more important July 16 vow.  Instead, I gathered up Caitlin and Angela, two Post XC gals, who were just as excited as I was to watch 15,000 runners brave 26.2 miles in 88 degree weather (oh yeah, and take a day off from work/school).


As a track geek and regular nerd, I can't help but throw in one of the most interesting things I learned in school when studying American literature.  As we were headed up to Boston, we passed signs for Salem. Did you know that Salem was named by the Mayflower kin who sailed here to escape religious persecution?  They were in search of their religious motherland, Jerusalem, and cleverly named their settling ground "Salem," yup, minus the "jeru."

Marathon Monday Street Signs

And Caitlin, Angela, and I were in our motherland.  Boston is so incredible because the whole town turns into a running community.  All the stores adopt running themes.  The restaurants and shops give discounts to people who show their bib numbers.  The street signs change meaning, and acceptable attire in fancy restaurants becomes a whole lot more spandex-y. 


Before we set out on our trip, I sent the girls a tentative itinerary (I am the master of to-do lists).  Our (my) goals: meet Alberto Salazar at the Boston Library, find Tom (fellow CWPXC runner) at the Expo, introduce the girls to Pete Hawkins (the elite wheelchair racer I mentioned a while back), run along the Charles River, and grab a nice dinner in probably sweaty clothes.  We did all but one. Sorry, Alberto!


The weekend seemed to fall together perfectly.  We took the ferry over to New London, got into Boston smoothly, and were welcomed by the sight of the Charles River, which was exciting since I wasn't sure how to find the river.  Instead, it seemed to find me.  After driving around for parking near the "Boston Library" (the GPS was actually not taking us to the right spot, which we later discovered was at the easy-to-find finish line of the marathon), we gave up and found an all-day parking garage and planned to walk everywhere.

Tom at the Expo

Two miles of walking later, we met up with Pete and Tom at the Expo! Perfect.  Tom was glowing with excitement; Pete was radiating experience.  One of my favorite moments was when Tom's family disappeared for a minute, after we were having a Gu/Energy Gel discussion, and returned with a handful of Energy Gel treasures.  They were going to do anything to make Tom's race the best it could be.  Another favorite moment was when one of the "slow" wheelchair women kept trying to get Pete's attention, and he wanted to avoid her completely.  He turned to Angela and begged her to pretend they were in deep conversation.  Angela failed miserably and laughed, while Pete humorously hid from the women.


Later we went to lunch with Pete. We had about a 45-minute wait, so we sat outside by the water and chatted about racing and pre-race rituals.  Once our table was ready, we headed inside to a pretty happenin' sports bar.  Pete slid in first and reached under the table to push out the chairs.  We were all impressed with his gentlemanly actions (he ended up refusing to allow us to pay too).  During dinner, Pete answered a lot of our wheelchair racing questions.  He explained that because he has a T6 injury, he only has feeling from chest up, no core, while other racers in the competition do (not an excuse, he will say).  Although I already understood this difference, I learned more.  The lack of core affects the race more than just muscular brute strength. Pete doesn't eat breakfast the morning before a race (a 26.2 MILE race) because he doesn't have the stomach muscles to guard his stomach as he presses on it in his chair.  Likewise, his lung capacity is affected too, since he puts his weight on his lungs and doesn't have the reaction to engage those muscles to not smush them either.  Crazy.


Since Pete knew we walked to the water and were about two miles away from our car, he offered us a ride back to the heart of Boston.  We accepted and got to watch him get into the van.  He uses a strap to belt himself into his chair, and then he reaches into the opening of the van's side doors and pulls himself (and his chair) up into the van.  I like to compare it to what the Olympic gymnasts look like on the rings.  I couldn't help but gasp, "That's impressive."  After lunch and our van ride, the girls were in awe.  As we waved goodbye to our friend, we headed out for more things to do, but commented that we felt bad for leaving our elite friend alone.


Pete dropped us off around Boylston (the last stretch of the marathon) after showing us some of the tactical spots of the course, and we wandered the street and shops, purchasing a cool black jacket for Tom (most people were wearing an ugly orange one) at the marathon shop. Later, we walked to Newberry Street to find the Nike Store.  After a bit of walking and digesting, we headed back to the garage (hard to get in and out of for walkers) and got ready for our run along the Charles.  I packed my credit card and phone, in case we got lost or wanted to go straight to dinner, which we ended up doing.

Caitlin celebrating her 53-min run

We started our run around dusk, so the lights along the river were starting to pop up, about 30 minutes into our run, we had a romantic night run together haha.  We saw the lights of Fenway and ended up running back to Boylston.  I'm pretty proud of Smitty; she completed her longest run (53 minutes) in weeks, still dealing with pains from her new orthodics.


From our run, we walked right into Max Brenner's in our sweaty outfits and feasted on (small) chocolate dinners.  A little while later, we realize that Pete was not alone; he was on a date! at the same place we were.  Of all the places in Boston, we ended up all at the same place again, too funny.


Around 10 p.m., we headed back to the car, walking past graveyards of famous people: Ben Franklin's parents, John Hancock, Paul Revere.  And even though I was there to honor the Mebs, Karas, and Desis of the world, I couldn't help but feel the history nerd come out and think it was the coolest thing in the world that we were passing the resting spots of all of these people who have formed our country. Next trip might have to be a history one.

Elite Wheelchair Racers - Incredible!

By 12, we were at the hotel, showered, and passed out.  The next day, we woke up, got on our bright Big Tom shirts (homemade by Smitty), and headed for our free breakfast, only to realize that the wheelchair race went off earlier than we thought.  We booked it out of breakfast and rushed to mile 4 in Ashland, MA.  We were fully prepared with our Big Toms on a stick and big voices in little bodies.  We arrived at "our spot" exactly as some of the first racers came by; at first we thought we missed Pete and were so disappointed.  They come by so fast, it's hard to spot specific people.  But then, Pete in his blue Under Armor came on by and even took a split second break from pushing to give us a wave.


Later, as we waited for the runners, a few Boston official vehicles drove by.  As I quietly clapped for each of them, I looked up and saw a familiar-looking Kenyan in my sights.  Slowly, it dawned on me that I was looking at Meb, the USA Olympic Marathon Trials winner.  Out of my mouth, I slowly started to cheer, "Meb? Meb! MEB! MEB, MEB! I LOVE YOUUU!!"  I think I was the only person in the area who had any idea who he was, so I looked like a crazy Justin Beiber fan screaming for a hero.  He looked down from the car and laughed and directly waved at me! OH BOY - I don't think I am going to be able to survive Eugene this year!

ABS

Still at mile 4, we watched the elite women runners come by (holy crap, I need to do abs).  And the men, and then Tom.  As the people began to come in hoards, it was hard to search the crowd for our beloved Big Tom, but Smitty spotted him and pulled a Meb cheer.  "Big Tom? Big Tom! BIGTOMBIGTOMBIGTOM!"  Then, we all joined her, screaming for our Beiber-Brouillard.  Because he was in the middle of the road, he made an almost-fatal attempt to cross the crowd to our side.  He settled for a wave and continued, missing the ice cold water that Angela had just gotten him at the gas station.  Later we learned that Tom was with his friend who said that we were screaming so loud that it was a little frightening and informed Tom, "They have your face on their shirts."  The girls and I all admitted that we felt light headed from screaming HA, as we dashed back to the car to head to the finish line.

Angela, Smitty, Me + Big Toms on a Stick

After some traffic, we found a parking spot at a shady parking place.  I threw them my car, paid them, and didn't think twice about what a potential bad idea it was to park there (it ended up being fine, but could have been disastrous).  We hurried along the closed down streets, looking at buses of runners' bags and signs for family waiting areas.  Finally, we shoved ourselves into a hole by the fence to wait for our friends.  Big Tom came a little later than he wanted to, but with 88-90 degree temperature, even the elite men were about 10 minutes off their regular times.  Once Tom ran by, we did our crazy-person cheer. Angela almost jumped over a woman.  And then, we headed toward the family meeting area.


Seeing Tom at the end area would probably make most people rethink doing a marathon.  He threw up a few times and acted almost drunk.  It was a little scary, but there were about ten people who were watching his every move.  Once we got him to lunch and he had some food (including ice cream) in his system, he looked and acted awesome.  We are so proud.  The experience made me realize all of those times I was so down on myself, so many people are still beaming.  I know Tom wasn't too happy with his time, but there was really nothing he could do.  He did awesome, and we all know it!

PROUD!!!!!!!!

So after a weekend in Boston hanging out with awesome runners, I just don't even know how I can handle the excitement of going to Eugene, Oregon for the Olympic Trials in June.  Nine days of all my favorite runners.  Another trip where I will refuse to pack anything but running clothes AND another reason to buy more!  WOOOOOOOOOOO!