Forget the shivers and cold legs; runners love it anytime a race starts at dawn with a temperature barely above freezing. Once packed into the staging area, it warmed considerably. With a barely audible start gun, I bid good luck to Jason Main, who I knew would disappear from sight before we ran a quarter-mile, and finally got to work on a promise I made to myself not long after I started running three years ago.
Finally, the October Sunday arrived, and I was charging down Broad Street with 12,000 other runners, shedding clothing and tossing my Team Zissou ski hat when it became impossibly hot after the first mile.
Of the six I've run, this was the friendliest half-marathon I ran. Getting out of the Main's van at the starting line, a woman ran up and asked if I was from Tennessee because I wore my Murfreesboro Half Marathon shirt. It turned out she was the race director. On the course, somewhere deep in Bexley, I got into a brief conversation with a couple from Knoxville, and that was just one of many. People were chatty that morning, enhancing the neighborhood feel of the race, which zigzagged through Bexley, Olde Town East, German Village, the Brewery District and most of Downtown's highlights.
My body betrayed me around Schiller Park - folks, regularity is overrated on race morning.
And note to the guy playing TLC's Waterfalls on acoustic guitar -Never disrespect a runner at Mile 11. We might lack the full marathon inclination, but you like a pie-eating contest champion. Don't call someone "the day's first androgynous runner when bundling up for the cold race start made their gender a question to you. And don't expect respect in return when you ask a chafed man with throbbing calf muscles.
Pain shepherded me through the final paces, when stopping felt so right. It got so bad I missed that Columbus finally tore down the awful pedestrian bridge from the derelict City Center Mall. Even on a Sunday after devastating Ohio State loss (you can't rationalize that Purdue victory in any way), give Columbus its due; its residents poured out onto the streets and made the race the welcoming event the city needs, not the black marks it receives for drunken fans harassing those from visiting teams.
Aside from the Marine Corps band playing in front of the Capitol building's William McKinley statue, I hardly noticed anything at all. That only lasted until the final turn came into view; full marathoners must try hard to ignore that - the turn happens at Mile 13, when 1/2-Marathoners have just a few hundred yards to finish. Thanks to the bathroom stop, I had no chance to set a personal best, but 2:26:45 beat my 2009 Country Music mark by a cool nine seconds.
I couldn't find Jason and his family at the crowded finish, so rather than stand still and cramp up, I walked all the way back to my buddy Mike's house in Victorian Village. So I tacked on another 1.5 miles to the half-marathon, which was surprisingly fun; the full marathoners pass Mile 25 on that stretch of Neil Avenue, so I got to see some especially fast runners cruising to the finish.
I limped and tossed my way into Cap City Diner for brunch and celebration of a new law - the Ohio Legislature finally broke down the last of the blue laws, allowing restaurants to serve at 11 a.m. That made the bloody Mary taste that much better. Although my legs tried not to cooperate, I made numerous visits around the city, catching up with my core people in Columbus, grabbing a beer at Bodega (God, I need a bar in Nashville like it) and enjoying a slow pace in the big city for one.
That Sunday was one of the last pretty falls days to hit Central Ohio. Between clumps of pinkish red leaves fanned on the pavement, I saw one large ant sluggishly navigating the cracks. At dusk, he had little time to reform before the elements claimed. Why focus on something so insignificant, a single insect racing against the fading season? On a different scale, I just saw another anonymous runner pursuing a finish line, concentrating only on his journey, not the rest of the field.
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