The Eugene Marathon: A Recap

I came to Eugene to race a marathon. The trip was born from conversations with Melissa, who first experienced the natural grandeur of the Pacific Northwest last summer while racing the Hood to Coast Relay. I had never been to Oregon, but I believed that I knew the place, that I would be at home there, beneath its evergreens on dark trails coated with pine needles, at the cultural epicenter of our sport. Choosing to race was an easy decision, though not without apprehension: training for a summer marathon in the Chesapeake Furnace would pose challenges.

Foremost among my goals was to test myself over 26.2 miles and experience the distance. While I've raced competitively for 20 years, Eugene is only the fourth marathon that I've trained for, the third that I've started, and the second that I've finished. I sought to accustom myself to the physical and mental suffering inherent in racing for two-and-a-half hours so that someday I might only have to race for two hours and twenty-five minutes. A marathon with a small field and a relatively flat course after a short build up were the perfect circumstances to gain this experience. 

The race begins in the heart of the University of Oregon and leads away from town, climbing gradually along a green stretch of road lined with cottage-style houses mingled within towering pines. In these early miles, it seemed that my taper had failed; my legs didn't feel fresh, and sore spots in muscles and bones niggled me with each step. Over two hours of running ahead, I settled into a pace that was perfectly slow and calmly covered several miles, passing droves of immoderate runners who were in for a long day of suffering. 

I ran miles 8 through 12 blindly, relying on feel, because there were no mile markers along this stretch - the event's principal shortcoming. Climbing the course's only true hill at mile 8 bolstered my confidence. It didn't matter that my legs weren't snappy because they were strong and doing what I had trained them to do. Inadvertently, my pace quickened through these quiet, solitary miles. When I emerged from a park into a neighborhood near mile 12, I found that I was within striking distance of the next runner. Still, I remained tentative, tempered by memories of the disastrous final miles of my last marathon. 

At mile 14, I caught the first of several runners who faltered from their self-inflicted wounds from a fast start. Upon seeing my Falls Road singlet, the runner asked if I knew Nate Brigham. I love the interconnectedness our community - a web that stretches from one coast to the other. We casually chatted despite running a pace near 5:30 per mile before I continued on to overtake the next runner. The sun was bright and hot along the roads, but I soon found that I preferred the exposure to the last section of the course that brought me back onto a concrete path for several miles. Initially, its many turns were nuisances. However, as I began to increase my exertion in the last third of the race, the snaking, undulating path extracted a mental and physical toll. The sharp and abrupt turns caused my muscles to spasm and disrupted my rhythm at a time when I need to remain composed, fluid. Worse yet, over the last 10K the path gave the impression of a continuous climb - an optical illusion that brought real anguish. 

After sloppy calculations, I estimated that I could run under 2:30 and perhaps in the 2:28s if I maintained a sub-6:00 pace for the last few miles. Initially, I believed it was attainable as long as I didn't cramp; my legs felt strong. But then my split for mile 24 was 6:11. The pavement had inflicted damage despite my conservative tactics, and I had slowed dramatically. Negative thoughts were encroaching, as I feared every step would be the last before a cramp halted my fading momentum. But the crowds grew. Then I heard music from the finish line, and multiple spectators told me that a runner, not yet in view, could be caught. So I pushed onward, fighting to maintain the integrity of my form and regain lost seconds. 

At mile 26, I passed the runner in fifth place. Though he was unable to respond, I ran scared, remembering my frustration of being nipped at the line and denied a top-ten finish at the Columbus Half Marathon. When I entered Hayward Field for the final stretch, I was, in that moment, oblivious to the track's significance and its history that had made the event so alluring. The race had drained me of emotion except the lingering fear of being passed and the increasing desire to stop. I crossed the line with an open stride, delighted to see that the clock had not ticked to 2:31 (2:30:32). Finally, I am a 2:30 marathoner. 

As a retrospective, a marathon neatly fits the narrative arc: exposition, rising action, crisis, climax, falling action. But we are not credible first-person narrators because the haze of fatigue and delirium distorts our memories, dulls our senses. Products of Western literary traditions, we nonetheless piece together our experience into a storyline and cast ourselves as compelling protagonists - the everyman whose internal struggles are made manifest in the external struggle of the race. 

The arc of my narrative for Eugene is not steep in ascent or descent. I purposefully avoided the drama inherent in high mileage, a heavy racing schedule, and a large-scale marathon. I trained moderately and raced modestly, perhaps sacrificing an opportunity to dip under 2:30 but positioning myself for a positive outcome. The crisis is resolved and the action is falling: with a new PR in hand, I'm confident in my abilities as a marathoner and eager to begin drafting the sequel.  For now, it's time to relax and recuperate, celebrate and contemplate.