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St. George Marathon - October 7, 2006 - www.stgeorgemarathon.com by Bruce Wearda
Don't want to brag, but do want
to share. Felt pretty good about it overall. I just
finished a marathon in St. George, UT. I did pretty good,
for me at least. If I would train a little more seriously I
just might even become impressive. At least I finished
under 4 hrs. I haven't been able to do that in long time.
I did it once in L. Tahoe, came close in Salt Lake, and now
here. Maybe I do better in alpine venues. A friend of mine
once said that I do well in hills. At any rate we are
to live life and do so abundantly. This might be what was
meant. It certainly was enjoyable.
I am not sure if it was the altitude (started
about 1 mile up, 5240 ft) or the lack of sleep, or both. Or, the cold. I
didn't find out until I got home that the start temp was just a little north
of freezing (34 or 35). Now the thing is, there was a pretty hefty breeze,
so factor in the wind chill and you have a pretty silly, if not stupid guy
out there running around. Hard to say if it was the lack of O2
no sleep or hypothermia. Might have been a perfect blend of each.
It really was beautiful. Maybe because I ran so
well I thought it was, but nonetheless it was very inspiring. The
attachment is very appropriate. The race course was winding and curving
(make the crooked straight) and hills, some gentle, others not so (the rough
places plain.) I really like the part about the not being weary or faint.
The start was in the middle of a road in the
middle of nowhere in the desert. They had some bonfires going, but really
they did little more than make your clothes smell smoky and melt the trash
bags people were wearing. Really magnificent landscape, God did excellent
creation here. The moon was full and bright. Gave a good glow, made the
glow sticks on top of the mile markers along the road useless. (if the moon
was not out, I am not sure we would have been able to see.)
Now this course has been touted as "net
downhill." That is code. What it means is that the course if full of
rolling hills--think RAGBRAI for you Hawkeyes, Galena you Illinini.
Typically there is always some wise acre who says something dumb like, "it
is all down hill from here." That wasn't mentioned once. Which tells me
that the natives know something--like it wasn't. In actuality there were
about 3 significant climbs and a whole mess of little rollers. Many of
which were right after a gentle down hill. The key was to keep in mind that
hills can take it out of your legs, so stay within yourself. The other
thing to do is completely ignore the profile map. Remember scale means
nothing because the x-axis consists of 26.2 miles whereas the y-axis is
less. In this case about 1/2 mi. I kept remembering my algebra. The slope
of a line, rise over run. Well, for being net downhill, there certainly was
plenty of rise over the course of this run. In fact, I almost felt we ran
uphill at the start. We had a little dip, then about a football field out,
the thing started to climb.
The key I heard was to get past the first major
uphill before the sun was beating down on you. Well, I am still trying to
recover from the frost. As the sun was rising, the landscape was really
spectacular. Rugged rocks, blue sky, big ol' moon. Ah, the swish-swish of
plastic garbage bags running over the hillside. About 6 miles out came to
the little villa of Veyo. I think it was 10 houses, a few ranches, and
maybe some general store. Anyway, just outside of town a horse was racing
us. It would run around and round in its pasture lot. Probably excited to
see the bipeds running for once instead of us staring at him running all the
time. As we scampered down the hill into Veyo, we ran by Mane Street.
(remember the horse-mane street, main street), I found that bit of Americana
amusing. All the while I kept looking at the impending doom looming ahead.
We started to run up a volcano at mi 7. The neat thing about this being a
small marathon (limited to 6600 runners) and the small towns in the country
we ran through, it felt very relaxed and middle America. It seemed that
every ranch on the way had all inhabitants out to cheer. Seemed like half a
dozen or so kids per family. Many of them had their hands out to be high-fived.
Of course I had to oblige. They squealed with glee. Oh, yeah, back to the
story of Mt. Veyo. Up, up, and away. This only brought us to Dameron
Valley. Again, all the people turned out. This was a 2 mi gradual uphill
trudge. The sun was just behind the craggy horizon. I was able to keep the
sun off for 13 miles now. Ok, maybe a little heat is good. I could still
see my breath at that point. Looking down at my arm I noticed goosebumps.
Those never did go away until that afternoon.
This peaked and leveled at Diamond Valley.
Another volcano. I thought this looked like a park ranger's hat. A wide
brim that rose sharply (similar to Devil's Tower) and where it had blown its
top years ago was the dimple in the hat. It was remarkable. The black lava
against the red sandstone surroundings. Truly divine. We circled around
the backside and circumnavigated about 3/4th of the volcano. The cool thing
(yes, sun-up side was the opposite, we were running in the shaded area) was
the back side was neither the red stone abundant there or the black lava,
but a buff color like the back side of white-tail deer. Moving down the
road (literally) we came upon Snow Canyon. There they had at the entrance
to the Canyon park barricade fencing like they have for presidential
motorcades. I kind of felt like a campaigner as I again high-fived the
kiddies. Lots of energy. This is about mi 16. After this lovely
downhill, there was another gentle uphill. Although they are beginning to
lose there gentleness. A little past mi 17 we hit another uphill. This is
where I get a jump of confidence. Folks are walking up the hills. I am
able to continue running. Yea!!! Some of those who passed me earlier, I am
gaining on and sending them back to the farm. Mile 20 or 21 sends us down
again steeply. One more slight uphill then it is down again at 23. We
enter St. G outskirts. Plethora of people are lining the course. At this
point I know I have the sub 4 hr achieved, although in the back of my mind
visions of the hare and the tortoise dance in my head (at first they were
waltzing then they pick up speed and jitter-bug). I start to slow and
really glad hand the kids. At 24 a high school cheerleading squad does
their "Goooooooooooo Ruuuunnnnners." So I have to "Gooooooo
Cheeeeeerleaders" them back. (Tango, salsa, rumba--there goes those dancing
rodents and reptiles) got to pick up the pace. As we run through the town
we pass the Tabernacle and town square. Although, I think it is a town
circle. They have one of those goofy roundabouts that are so popular in
Europe. Scoot around that where the high school band is playing (think
Music Man--gazebo.) Now the end is near. Do I have goosebumps from the
excitement--no, although the sun is bright in the blue sky, the ambient temp
is still rather cool. (When is the 80 degree weather showing up? It does
later.) A little past mi 25 a sign reminiscent of the Burma Shaves pops
up. Sponsored by the mortuary, it reads, almost done, dig deep.
Well, it really was a good run. I named it ST.
Gorgeous. Lazy, small town atmosphere. Oh yeah, the best part. Blue Bunny
(a dairy brand big in the Midwest.) was one of the sponsors. Sooooooo post
race treats? Popsicles, drumsticks, and ice cream sandwiches, oh my! Now
that is my kind of race.
It might have taken longer to read this than for
me to run it. Thanks for listening.
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