The twenty-sixth mile was the crucible...

My friend, work mate and running buddy Leah was in her twenty-first mile in her attempt to break four hours in the marathon at last month's MCM as we slogged our way over the Potomac on the Fourteenth Street Bridge towards Virginia.  I was running with her the last seven miles to give her support and at the top of the span, the last uphill until the nasty quarter-mile hill leading up to the Iwo Jima Statue at the race's end, I had settled into my own groove after two miles of matching her stride for stride, and it was time to get down to work and throw down five more nine-minute miles to help her try to attain her goal of 3:59, which requires a 9:09 pace.

I moved slightly ahead of her and ran nines by feel, and we steadily moved past other runners.  My head swiveled around on a stick as I looked back to see where Leah was, and she was always five yards back, doggedly following.  We turned left off the bridge and burned through the Crystal City out and back, with Leah ingesting an orange slice and drinking some water but eschewing taking any more of the energy-inducing jellied sports beans that she clutched in a bag in her right hand throughout the race; she had complained of stomach unrest but fortunately not shown its effects in her steady smooth stride.

We passed by runners that I had noticed passing by me many minutes before Leah arrived at MP 19, where I jumped in with her, but there was no sight of the four-hour pace group which I had seen pass by eight minutes ahead of her.  Perhaps she couldn't break four hours today, I thought, but she was going to be close and establish a huge PR of forty or fifty minutes.  Still, I didn't know what her actual (chip) time for the race was, as I surmised that she had started many minutes late.

Leah faltered noticeably as we ran the last mile, dropping back twenty or thirty yards a few times due to obvious mind-numbing fatigue, and I had to circle back once or twice to get closer to her in support, but she revived the last half-mile due to her pure grit, and at the bottom of the final hill, with a quarter-mile to go, I dropped away.  She was greatly encouraged and uplifted at that point by running past a circle of cheering friends and, with this last bit of a little help from her friends, Leah toughed out the last steep incline and finished at . . . 3:59:05.

On to the infamous bridge

I jumped into the MCM at MP 19 when I spotted my running buddy Leah, she of the 4:51 PR, to pace her during her last 7 miles in her quixotic quest to break 4 hours with very minimal training. That would necessitate a 9:09 pace.

As I settled into running alongside Leah, I told her I was going to sprint ahead 50 yards so that I could get in front of her far enough to stop and turn and get an action shot of her running towards me that would "take" on a digital camera, and since she'd just run 19 miles, she shouldn't speed up to follow me.  She nodded in agreement and I ran ahead and turned, but as I brought my camera up she was still practically right behind me.  I got the shot but I thought to myself that she appeared fresh enough after 19 miles to be able to do a short burst of speed work, and I wondered just what her possibilities were for a 3:59 marathon.

In any case, I now started running alongside her and we conversed for two miles, and she discoursed readily enough and didn't seem either excessively fatigued or particularly out of breath.  We ran at what I thought were 9-minute miles and she kept up with me well enough, with me continuously going literally from side to side of the course to find a space to dart through clumps of runners, what I call sideways running on crowded courses, which seemed odd to be necessary at such a far distance from the start line.

The MCM is a huge race, with many scores of thousands of runners, but to still be sideways running twenty miles into a race suggested that for whatever reason, Leah was among the slowpokes of the race, because with the oddball exception of solitary runners blazing by us occasionally at a fast pace, we were steadily moving up amongst the racers and we steadily started passing runners I recognized as having passed by me while I waited for Leah before she came by.  We turned left at 14th Street and started over the long bridge over the Potomac, which represented a major uphill for the weary runners in their twentieth mile as the Pentagon on the Virginia shore comes into sight off to the right.  I now assumed a path breaking spot five yards in front of Leah and she doggedly followed wherever I went as we worked our way through runners at about a nine-minute pace, with me wondering how close she actually was to the magic four hour mark, knowing as I did that the four-hour pace group was still several minutes ahead of us.

Seven More Miles.

Early on the morning of the Marine Corps Marathon, I lay in bed figuring out what time my running buddy Leah might be passing by milepost 19 if everything went just right for her in her quest to break four hours.  That requires a 9:09 pace so I figured that nineteen 8:30 miles, if she passed the start line right when the race started at 8 a.m., would have her running by Seventh Street on Jefferson Avenue in the District on the Mall at the earliest at about 10:42 a.m.

At 10:35 that morning I was in running clothes at the agreed upon spot on the Mall at the nineteenth mile marker of the race, anxiously scanning the faces of an endless stream of runners going by.  It's hard to pick out an individual runner in such conditions because you can't stand in the roadway and let them stream around you, you have to pick one curb or the other and watch the entire street from the side.

The four hour pace group went by, a little clump of about thirty runners following two runners holding up signs saying 4:00.  No Leah, and as the minutes passed, I began to worry that I'd missed her.

It had been raining earlier but it was now dry and the day was heating up, with the temperature climbing through the fifties and the humidity starting to rise.  I discarded a cotton t-shirt I'd been wearing to keep warm while I waited but I was still overdressed with a long sleeve running shirt and a light vest.

About eight minutes after the four hour pace group went by I spotted Leah, running steadily at a good pace, by herself amongst a horde of runners.  She looked good for someone who had just run nineteen miles, but then she still had seven miles to go.

I jumped into the race and fell in beside her.  For me it was showtime, because for weeks at noon I'd been practicing running six-milers at what I perceived to be a nine-minute per mile pace.

I had practiced running fifty-four minute six-milers diligently because I sure didn't want to let Leah down and falter as the miles rolled by at a nine-minute pace and perhaps have to drop out earlier than at the last quarter-mile-to-go spot at the base of the last hill rising to the MCM finish line at the Iwo Jima statue in Arlington.  I lied a little to Leah right off the bat by telling her that the four-hour pace group was only about four minutes ahead of her, but she seemed completely uninterested in that and we didn't discuss it further.

I didn't want to discourage her by making it seem like the four-hour group was too far ahead to catch but she knew something that I didn't, that because of the crush of people at the start, she didn't even pass the start line until twenty minutes into the race.  And Leah knows that the steady pace wins the race.

Leading up to the MCM.

The build up:  My running buddy Leah, she of the 4:51 marathon PR, wanted to break four hours at this year's MCM.  With eight weeks of training.

But do not believe that Leah cannot do what she sets out to do.  For long runs during those weeks I think she ran a 14, a 16, an 18, a 20 and a 14, and then she pretty much took the last three weeks off.

Resting her legs, she said, which indeed does have value when near a marathon.  She did run a six-miler with me early in the week leading up to it and I ran it hard, because I had been practicing my six-milers for weeks leading up to me jumping in with her during the last six miles of the marathon to help her out.

She had no problem keeping up, I was the one who had a problem keeping up with her.  We ran a slow three miler later in the week, and I told her to do a couple of fast miles on Friday and that I'd see her at MP 19 on Sunday.

She wanted to break 4 hours, how?

A year ago my running buddy Leah had commanded me to run the last 6 miles of her 2015 Marine Corps Marathon ("MCM") with her, which I forgot about till she reminded me of her demand sometime earlier this fall.  I had forgotten about it because she really hadn't been training for a marathon, she only started to train seriously for it about eight weeks out.

She seemed to think she could go from a 4:51 marathon PR to a 3:59 marathon merely by wishing it.  But let me tell you something about Leah, she's incredible.

She's also fast, faster than me now, and steady too.  I taught her to crave hills on runs, and now she regularly smokes me on any uphill we find and take.

Of course I hate being showed up by a person I have been mentoring in running, but she is a determined, no-nonsense runner and she once told me, in the middle of last year's HM when she coldly went on ahead of me mid-race to finish four minutes ahead after we had supported each other for the entire first half, "I'm in it to win it."  I knew last month that she was thinking she could do a 3:59 marathon with inadequate training, and if she asked me to jump in and run with her to shepherd her home those last 6 miles at this year's MCM, well, I wasn't going to be the person who let her down and caused her to do a 4:01!

Or better yet, put it in a bottle for me.

My running buddy Leah had set her goal at a sub-4-hour marathon, which would be besting her PR by, oh, about 52 minutes.  All right then!

Twelve weeks before the event, the MCM, she wanted to do an 8-mile run at noontime on the Mall as she started to ramp up for it.  We couldn't finish the run and had to walk much of the seventh mile.  (Leah training for the MCM.)

This didn't bode to well for running a marathon in eleven weeks with plans to smash your PR by increasing your previous-best marathon pace by over 2 minutes per mile, but she did have some medical issues which were cleared up through the power of Western medical magic although she lost another couple of weeks of training while her RX took effect.  I want a bottle of those pills.

We still ran at work, our normal six miles, and she reported her weekend long runs to me, sometimes doing them with her husband who is faster than her.  Still, I was concerned about her ability to even finish the race without crashing and burning as her weekend long runs as the race approached went something like this towards the end--14 miles; 16 miles; 18 miles; 20 miles; 14 miles; 10 miles; race weekend.  (Leah at her pre-race dinner party at her house, an event for runners only and which doubled as her law school reunion.)

 

   

Please chart that training course for me.

When my running buddy at work Leah killed her half marathon a year ago with a 1:50, a PR of over 25 minutes, she immediately started thinking 3:59 for the 2015 Marine Corps Marathon.  After all, there was plenty of time to train, over a year.

Never mind that her marathon PR was 4:51, she now had a substantial base and a plan.  She asked me to coach her, which was very flattering since she had just beaten me by almost four minutes in the half.

I thought she could do it, with the proper training.  Ah, there's the rub!

We ran the year round, but there were certainly no 15-milers, or even any 10-milers in there, and her base reverted to the 6-mile base we both normally have which is the maximum distance we can run at noontime and get back to work without being too delayed.  She hyper-flexed her knee in a hockey collision over the winter, an injury that bothers her to this day, and she couldn't run for many weeks, but she didn't ask me for any running advice and I saw no training plan emerge as spring turned to summer, and suddenly her 26.2 mile race was a mere 12 weeks away.

My Running Buddy Is Back

In 2011 two lapsed runners in the same office started a weight-loss regime of workday noontime running on the National Mall two or three times a week.  My reason for the extra weight (lots of it) was a chronic, seemingly permanent injury to an ankle, and hers was the more reasonable excuse of a recent childbirth.

Our first attempts were pretty pitiful.  Practically every other run I broke down, or she broke down, and we walked it back, from a mere 1 1/2 miles out.

Four years and a century loss later (practically all of it from my frame) I'm fit enough and run five times a week, and she's fit, runs with me at noon often and does cross training on the hockey rink where she's famously known by the other players, because she'll take anyone on who crosses the blue line (she seems to be the only one who can skate backwards), as "The Goon."  A year ago we ran a half marathon and she killed it with a 1:50 and I exceeded all of my hopes with a sub-1:55.

Now she's gearing up to run the MCM next month with her husband, and I think she wants to beat him.    She's asked me to jump in at the end and run the last six miles with her, so I have been practicing six milers for a few weeks solo (she's been away or busy) while she's been doing 14, 16 and 18-mile long runs on those weekends.  Today she ran a six miler with me at noon and I was going to show her my stuff, having been practicing at the distance, but, well… .

I'm Running

I have bumped up my game since I abandoned running for a couple of years in 2009 due to a chronic injury and then tried to come back in in 2011 with my running buddy when I was close to 250 pounds.  Back then we could barely run two miles before one or the other of us would break down.  Since then we've lost about 100 pounds together, of which I accounted for probably 98 of those.

Coming back, I tried to run four times a week, about 15 miles a week doing 10-minute miles.  Now I run five times a week, about 25 miles a week and do 9:20-minute miles.

I'm in a happy place.  My running buddy trusts me enough to have asked me to jump in and run the last 10K of her upcoming marathon with her.  You probably have heard the old saw that a marathon is a 20 mile warm-up run with an ensuing 10K race.

She's faster than me now.  I will do my best to drive her on in the last portion of her race next month.

"Isn't worth the effort."

As a former president of D C Road Runners Club, I will speak to the hurtful and arrogant comments made by the club's current president in a Washington Post article published Friday, which article extolled runners in DC. Current DCRRC president Brian Danza explained that his club "firmly promote[s] the sport of running in a competitive manner."  

The article cited Mr. Danza as saying, "Running a marathon just for the sake of completing one isn't worth the effort."  Recreational runners, such as presumably the vast majority of participants in today's People's Marathon, "do it to check a box," according to Mr. Danza.

The club under the care of the president one before me and then myself believed in inclusion and participation, not elitism and disdain for the common runner.  We provided training programs for persons wishing to engage in or initiate a more fit lifestyle, for people who aspired to run a 5K or a 10K or a marathon, and actively encouraged achieving such a lofty goal.  

The club president mid-last decade and myself did not denigrate the efforts expended by such ordinary athletes for the uncommon accomplishment of running a marathon, even in perhaps 4 or 5 hours or more, rather, we tried to encourage and facilitate such activities by creating and running training programs tailored to certain races such as the Capital Hill Classic 10K, the ATM, and the National Marathon and HM.  (Recognition goes to Kristin Blanchet for being the genesis of such programs becoming a regular part of the club.)  

I consider it asinine that "competitive" runners such as Mr. Danza might say "recreational" runners are merely wasting their time by their participation.  (Mr. Danza related to the reporter that anything less than "competitive" running is merely "the way to one-up each other-I'm thinner than you, I'm better than you, I checked this box.")

I hail all those runners who did their best this morning at the MCM, all 30,000 athletes, and whatever time they achieved, I urge them all to exult in having accomplished a hard feat that 99% of all people have never performed.   I salute them all for undertaking the task and sticking with it and finishing it, competitive and recreational runners alike!

Still runnin'

This morning I went on a 5-mile run, a large loop around my greater neighborhood, that was a microcosm of why running is so great.  I have been running socially since I returned to running in 2011 from my 2-year layoff due to my now-chronic ankle injury (tibial tendinitis), which I merely try to manage through reduced mileage, more rest days and a slower pace.  This morning was one of my infrequent solo longer runs.

Doing the loop clockwise, like this morning, puts all the hills into the first two miles, including the half-mile long hill a half-mile from my house.  Going out, I spent the entire first mile fending off frantic messages from my brain to turn at familiar points and make it a mile run instead, or a 2K run, a 3K run, a 2-miler out-and-back or my old standard 2 1/2 mile run to the schoolyard and back.  Fortunately my breathing soon regulated, my legs lost their leaden feeling and acquired a little spring in them and I doggedly stuck to my original plan.

On the long hill I seemed to be pacing the garbage truck collecting trash and the garbage collectors took great pleasure in giving me a friendly ribbing at each curbside canister they emptied, commanding me to "Get up that hill!" and inquiring of my present speed, "Is that all you got?"  I got to the top ahead of their truck and turned to point this out as we gave each other friendly waves.

Past familiar haunts I ran (I used to do this run frequently, and drive the pace on it), past the tiny colonial cemetery, Timberlake Elementary school, the large modern cemetery undergoing expansion, the tiny used car lots on Lee Highway, the miniature golf course and tennis courts up by the Fairfax County 9-hole golf course, around the backside of the large loop running parallel to the infamous Beltway and onward towards Haycock Elementary school.  Large stretches of the run were shaded and there was a breeze so the sweat didn't start dripping off the bill of my running ballcap and splashing across my cheeks until the third mile.  The last mile I fell in with Beth, a hitherto unknown runner but a friendly one, and we discussed our experiences at the Marine Corps Marathon, local hills and our three sons before I turned off near my house with a friendly wave.

I just love this stuff.  Five miles in about fifty minutes.  It's fun while it lasts and it makes you feel so good when it stops.

Goodbye my loves

It's so hard to say goodbye.  The ravages of time and hard living took their toll and now the lifeless bodies rested on the ground, worn and tattered.

Brooks A. was one used up life.  A. Foundation was another dearly departed sole.

I played with Brooks all of 2011.  In 2012 I played with another Brooks but that particular Brooks still had life so Foundation, who had expired years earlier, took that Brooks' place at the burial.

My 2011 playmate, Brooks Addiction 4 running shoes, were coming apart at the seams, with the tread all gone and the front lip of the sole separating from the shoe and hanging down, threatening to trip me with every stride.  I threw those shoes away in January even though we'd been through so much together upon my return to running after a year-long layoff that it was hard to give the shoes up.  I buried them in the kitchen garbage bag which I set out on trash day and then immediately hurried off to work.  They were gone forever when I got back at the end of the day.

My 2012 playmate, Brooks Addiction 6 shoes, still had the front of the sole adhering to the shoe, although the tread was mostly gone and my little toes stuck out through the fabric on each side, exposed to the elements.  But I couldn't part with them yet, we'd had such good times together, so in February I threw out a better preserved, long retired pair of Asics Foundation 3 shoes instead.  Those shoes had taken me through the Marine Corps Marathon in 2002 but were size 12s and I could no longer wear them even casually as after a decade of running I am now a size 13.

The Brooks Addiction 6 pair still lives on, although its heel area is starting to separate from the shoe so perhaps that pair will be March's casualty.  We runners love our shoes so.

The bug bites deep

I have a hard and fast rule in life. I never disagree with a pregnant woman or a first time marathoner. The answer is always, Uh-huh. Peanut butter at 3 a.m? Sure. Can't do it? Uh, huh.

Sasha just ran her first marathon on Sunday, the MCM. Recently in training, she put me away in the twentieth mile of a 20-miler we did, a race. She scorched me the last mile, after I was so proud that I had HdTFU and caught back up with her from 20 meters back at MP 19.

But she still wasn't ready. Knee hurt. Lost a day. Ran slow. Was tired. Had to travel. You know.

She emailed folks saying she wanted to do 4:00 (she put it out there) but feared she only had a 4:15 inside her instead (we all should be so lucky!). She didn't know, but maybe marathons weren't her thing.

So she merely reeled off a 3:51. Whew.

And yesterday she emailed that the California International Marathon in December looked good. Maybe her BQ of 3:40 was there. This race is evidently the Left Coast equivalent of the Steamtown Marathon. Do you suppose she spent the morning after, when she should have been sore and shuffling around her house quaffing aspirins, surfing marathons on the Internet instead?

She's gone down hard. You go girl.

Sasha's first marathon.

Over the weekend I took a coaching certification course offered by the RRCA, along with six other coaches from my club’s recently-completed 10-Mile Training Program. It was an intensive session of two 9-hour days, on Friday and Saturday. What we learned was that almost everyone runs too fast for proper endurance training almost all the time.

It has to do with how the body fuels itself during long races, whether it uses fat or glycogen, and how the body deals with lactate. It has more to do with time on your feet rather than intensity of your run, a classic case of less is more. You can’t skimp on the hours (miles) you run, but less intensity over the same time or distance is most often more beneficial, as you train your body to push its lactate threshold further out (the point where the production of lactate exceeds the body’s ability to disperse it). Also you want your body to start using fat for a fuel earlier so you don’t deplete your glycogen store so quickly. Very technical and very thought-provoking stuff in terms of training.

Sasha was there taking the course. She also ran her first marathon yesterday, the Marine Corps Marathon. I have avoided her these last few weeks, as she had a classic case of first-marathonitis. She wasn’t ready. Her knee hurt. She got sick three weeks ago and missed a couple of training days. She only did one twenty miler. You recognize the symptoms.

In the class late on Saturday, she went to fetch another chair upon which to prop up her balky knee. Carrying it across the floor over to her chair, she dropped it accidentally four times in a row. Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Then five restless minutes later, she abruptly got up and left. Man, she had a marathon to do the next morning!

I looked at another veteran marathoner and wagged my hand as if to say, She’s on the edge! We both chuckled, after first making sure that she didn’t see us laughing.

I went out to MP 11 on the course yesterday morning to run the last 15 miles of the marathon with her. At least, that was the plan. Remember, I used to coach her. Now she is a valuable coach of mine in the club programs I actively direct. I was going to help her out.

Today I am sore as heck. She was awesome. She smashed her objective of finishing under four hours. When she came by and I hopped in, we ran a steady stream of 9 minute miles from MP 11 to MP 22. Then suddenly I hit the wall, not her. Our pace was actually creeping up at that point.

So I dropped out at a water table to fill up her fuel belt bottles. I picked her back up at MP 24, having rested myself, and I noticed that we did an 8:04 on that next-to-last mile. I could barely keep up.

Then she kicked up the pace in the last mile into a scorching sub-8 range and dropped me off the back end. I called out "Good Luck, Sasha!" as I ground to a halt and she left me behind! She waved goodbye and kept on blazing up the road. She finished her first marathon in 3:51.

Obviously I created a monster.

H runs the 2007 MCM

MCM. Unlike three weeks ago when it was 90 degree and humid at Chicago, the weather today was almost perfect for the running of another of the nation's premier marathons, the People's Marathon, the 32d Marine Corps Marathon. It's either the third or fourth largest marathon in the country. They know what they're doing.

This marathon, a scenic trip through the nation's capital, has never been cancelled. The Marines provided plenty of water for everyone. The police didn't deploy on the course and order runners to walk under threat of arrest. (Below: Does the marathon in your town have a view like this one that greeted today's runners?)

It was in the fifties and breezy for the 20,667 finishers. I waited on the 14th Street Bridge at MP 20 for a friend of mine, H, who was running her first marathon. I had offered to accompany her the last six miles. She wanted to run around a 4:00 (9:09 pace) marathon so I had been practicing running nine minute miles all week.

It's a lot harder to spot people as masses of faces pour past you than you might think. Last year I completely missed Bex when she ran by me at the same spot with A, who is 6-3, running next to her. How could you miss those two women running by you? Bex ran a 3:56:53 MCM last year, having been greatly helped by the accompaniment of A around the wind-blown and desolate Haines Point.

This year they added some hills. It seems they're always tinkering with the course but the core course, a beauteous run down the mall and by the Capitol, remains the same. I ran it in 2002, not very well (5:04:38), and it seemed a lot more crowded this year than what I remembered. There were 14,086 finishers back then. (Above: Old Glory on the 14th Street Bridge.)

H came by, a little off her desired pace. She was running steadily though, looking relaxed and strong. We burned a 9:12 running to MP 21. Off the bridge now, we went though the crowded streets of Crystal City, running a 9:25 mile, then a 9:30 mile. (Right: Running by the Lincoln Memorial in the 2002 MCM, my fourth marathon.)

H had worked hard all summer and fall, running according to schedule every week and keeping on her desired pace in her training runs, including a couple of 8:58 minutes-per-mile twenty milers, but she was hitting the wall now in the twenty fourth mile. She powered through it though, with a 9:59 mile followed by a 10:15 mile. Nice and steady. I ran a little bit of the last mile with her, then stepped off the course before I got penned in by the crowded finish zone. H finished with a really nice time of 4:07 and change. Nice job! (Below: H is on the left. She looks pretty good for MP 20, don't you think?)

If you haven't done the MCM, it's a must-do. There's a great spirit to this race, a great sense of community and excitement. You can have Chicago, although the spectators were terrific.

The Encounter

A week ago Saturday I took a trip to New York City to visit my brother and go to Coney Island. Specifically I went to ride the Cyclone (it alone was worth the trip) and to see a minor league baseball game on Coney Island. I am attempting to see a baseball game at every current major league stadium and now that I have reduced my "wish list" to six (there are thirty major league parks), I have been branching out to watch games at minor league stadiums.

The baseball game was a joy. The new ballpark has a nice ocean vista along with nice views of two nearby protected historic structures of yesteryear, the abandoned, towering Parachute Jump and the Cyclone. Like all minor league parks, once we were inside we roamed around at will. Players were even signing autographs.

The home team Brooklyn Cyclones (a Mets affiliate) won 8-6, coming back from a 5-0 deficit. Several balls flew out of the park. My brother actually caught a foul ball. That was thrilling. Being a Class A game, a few innings went on for a long time. Sorta like watching T-Ball. Anyone with kids knows what I mean. Interestingly, KeySpan Park has distance to deep center that is two feet further than at Shea Stadium.

The next morning I left my brother's and walked over to see Shea Stadium. To get from his house in Flushing (Queens) to the park you have to traverse a highway bridge over a vast wasteland of Belt Parkways, a turgid creek and auto repair shops. He thought I was taking my life in my hands to do this even in broad daylight.

But once at Willets Point, I walked around the brand new stadium being built for the Mets in the parking lot next door to Shea. It's an emerging steel skeleton right now, right across the street from a long row of muffler shops, auto glass places and body shops. It's like a shantytown devoted to auto repair out there. There aren't going to be any spectacular views from the new stadium like in, say, the new Pittsburgh baseball park.

My brother tells me the plan is to move all the auto shops out and gentrify the place with condos and shops. But there are rumors that there's a lot of chop-blocking going on out there, Mafia controlled, and those shops ain't moving. Shea is like certain other baseball parks which are set down in the middle of nowhere and where half an hour after a game, everyone is gone. Atlanta comes to mind.

Then I got aboard Greyhound and returned home for $68 round trip. At the bus terminal in DC, instead of walking the three quarters of a mile to the Metro stop at Union Station, I went a half mile the other direction on this Sunday afternoon to the Gallaudet University station. A friend I was telling this to later thought I was taking my life in my hands to do this even in broad daylight. It was an interesting walk down an absolutely deserted street bordered by vacant warehouses on one side and the raised train tracks on the other. As I walked along I counted the number of square patches of broken auto glass in the street next to the curb every eighteen feet, where a recent smash and grab operator had been at work on parked cars during the weekday. There were an even dozen.

There was life at the Metro station in the form of the station attendant in his booth at the fare gates downstairs, myself and one other patron who was a transient. No matter where I went on the platform, he followed me. A train came by and we both got on the same car. He sat down opposite me, staring at me before he spoke.

"What year'd cha do it in?"

I thought about his remark, and alighted upon the fact that I was wearing a Marine Corps Marathon ball cap.

"2002."

"I did it in 2003. I'm trying to get automatic entry."

I looked him over. Ragged clothes, pretty much toothless, carrying around two plastic bags full of stuff, a typical homeless guy. (Disgracefully, Washington our nation's capital is full of them.) Maybe he was a runner although it seemed doubtful.

"How many you need to run to get that?"

"Five."

"How many more you got to do?"

"Four. How many you done?"

"Only one Marine Corps. I don't run the same marathon twice, there are so many out there."

"Huh. You run others?"

"Yeah, you know. Baltimore. Columbus."

"The thing I like about the Marine Corps one is that extra bit they add at the end. It's all uphill, to the statue. It's just like the Marines, they always got to be better or longer or somethin'."

"I think they're all the same distance."

"No no, the Marines add that extra, what is it, three hunnerd yards? Marines gotta do that. What makes 'em special."

"Yeah. Those Marines. You ever in them?"

He had been, in the eighties, He happily told me all about it. It was very interesting to hear.