Race Day, Part 1

There was no other word for it than hot. The official high for the day was 87 degrees, which was a record high for the tenth edition of the race. The winner, Kenya’s Amos Matui that finished in 2:13:41, could have lapped me twice. I was happy to survive the hilly course under those conditions in 4:19:39. Tragically, one young man did not survive the event (more on that in a future post).

I arrived as close as I could get to the start of the race on West End Ave. at 5:30 a.m. and kissed my wife good bye as I headed towards Centennial Park. As I walked down West End Ave., the corral numbers kept falling in descending order, 29, 28, 27, 26….so on and so on. I was in corral number 4, obviously a little optimistic after coming off a good showing at my first marathon. I finally made it down to the park to drop my clothes off, stretch, warm-up, and make one final trip to the portable toilet before the race start. The bag drop off was well organize and manage by UPS. I had zero problems with drop off or pick up. By 6:15 a.m., the crowds really began to pick up. They could have put an additional 500 portable toilets in and around the park, and there still would not have been enough. After stretching and going for a warm up run, I ended up waiting in line for 20 minutes to use the bathroom. The wheelchair athletes were taking off while I was still in line.

The enforcement of the corral assignments was laughable. There were people from every corral down the line in a group with me. I could not even actually get into the corral until groups 1 and 2 left. Then, we were able to move our way into place and make the march up to the starting line. With the horn, we headed down West End Ave. as it passed by Vanderbilt University and turned into Broadway. Along the way we passed many famed Nashville landmarks, including the impressive Union Station Building, the Sommet Center, making the turn at the Gaylord Entertainment Center and coming back around in front of the Country Music Hall of Fame.

We then headed towards and out & back route down Music Square and Belmont Ave to a small loop past Interstate 440. This was the most scenic and shaded part of the entire course. Being a builder, I enjoyed the Tudor cottages and classic bungalows that lined the streets. Large oaks, maples, and poplars shrouded the sun as best they could. This helped mask the full effect of the hills in this section of the route. There were also large numbers of fans that turned out for this part of the courses, mixed in with the variety of bands that were stationed every couple of miles. As you can tell, I was pretty upbeat during the first 10 miles.

We made our way back into downtown, along the railroad tracks adjacent to the old Union Station Building again. You could still see people on the overpasses waving us on. The aid station people were top notch. The Cyto-max was in clearly marked cups, the water in water cups, and the Vaseline-on-a-stick was ready for places that were rubbing. As we made our way up onto Rosa Parks Blvd., the ½ marathoners were still with us until they made their turn off at Harrison St. on their way to glory at mile 11.5. For the rest of us, there was another 14.7 miles to go.

Also, check out the service by Garmin/MotionBased to give you elevation charts, 3D maps, and Google Earth view.

Photo from www.cmmarathon.com