And it is good.
I swapped stories with a few in the running community who opted to tackle the ASICS-sanctioned Boston 2 Big Sur Challenge, and these chats always stoked my curiosities. Why would you opt to run back-to-back marathons? More importantly, How the hell do you do it? This year represented the 5th year of the event, which invites 250 participants who qualify for the Boston Marathon to add the Big Sur Marathon their calendars. In all years except 2014 and 2009, the challenge has allowed for 13 days rest between events. In the first and fifth year, however, the break spanned just 6 days.
Enter: me. Ambitious, relatively healthy, and naively in love with distance and mileage. I signed up for the challenge knowing a return to Boston after PR-ing during the 2013 terrorist attack was a given, and wrapping the Big Sur element of the challenge in as somewhat of a pilgrimage to my proverbial "home," the central coast being the place I (then a nonrunner) completed my undergraduate education and, quote-unquote, "found myself."
Enter, again, me. Ambitious? Naive? These are terms that lead to... injury. Following a solid showing at the 2013 Marine Corps Marathon (2:50), I let off the gas long enough to relax the muscles, then put the pedal down hard enough to strain them. I engage in a serious battle with Achilles tendonitis, and found myself digesting a steady diet of "cool it, man," "non-impact cardio workouts," and magical remedy known as "7-second eccentric heel drops." This recovery plan led to rapid fat loss, often obsessive-compulsive gym excursions, and maniacal cardio endurance. (It likewise had a transformative effect on my brittle personality.)
But this brand of health did bring about healing, and I found myself quickly logging healthy miles at normal speeds. Then, after a solid 16-miler with too many fast folks in February, I felt serious pain in my right heal. On a Tuesday, during the last week of the month, I was diagnosed with an early-onset stress fracture and confined to a walking boot.
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I set out to maximize my gym access, exploiting all perks of the free wifi, complimentary coffee, 5 AM openings, two varieties of Spin class, and even did some sad aqua jogging reps in a beanie at daybreak. I refused to relinquish my B2B goal; it became a test of survival.
Once the escape from the boot became reality, my wife took over the coaching duties. She wisely prescribed (a mere) three days of running per week, which included the walk/run protocol from the fine folks at Kaiser's Sports Medicine department. I was allowed zero training on a track, zero speed work, and only one "long" run which started at 6 miles. With no mid-week increases, I was allowed to increase the long-run distance to 8 the following weekend. Under the same instructions, I netted 12 the next.
The plan to return to Boston remained in tact. I proceeded gingerly, nervous that even the slightest wrong move would jeopardize the final outcome. The weekend before Boston, I was allowed to run 16, and permitted to extend the distance a tad if the body cooperated. I netted a slow 17 mile training run, which wrapped a mere 8 days from the 118th Boston Marathon.
That's right. When the rest of the diligent marathons enter weeks of tapering, I was desperately grabbing whatever I could find to pad my trek to Boston.
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Our trip to Hopkinton came wrapped in a modest vacation, and with my coach by my side, I managed to follow the schedule through our days in Portland, Maine, and Portsmouth, New Hampshire. I fudged a few miles on a morning run in Maine, but mostly adhered to the "off" day instructions with intense elliptical intervals at odd hours in hotel fitness centers. I tried not to fret or overanalyze Boston amid all the hoopla my friends and the event provided; I seriously wanted to survive the journey. I wanted to emerge from the experience on both feet, smiling.
And I knew Hopkinton was a long way from Carmel.
Boston
Boston becomes more and more special to me with each experience. There was a time, before I knew that having children was a possibility, that I thought the word Boston held enough import for me to give it to a kid. Boy or girl. It is a wonderful place.
Then I ran an unplanned PR there in 2013. Then two brothers destroyed the purity and sanctity of the running event by ending the lives of four innocent bystanders and one vigilant MIT campus police officer. The idea to return to marathon was more of a compulsion; it would happen, and it would either be a triumphant, competitive push to nab another PR, or gallant parade.
With the injury casting so much doubt over the race, I know my plan should been based on simple perseverance, but it wasn't. You fall in with the company you keep, and Boston, like other seeded races, corrals its runners into thousand-person herds comprised of, more or less, the yous with the means and desire (and health) to travel to Hopkinton.
With hopes to hold 7-8 minute miles, I launched out at the starting gun and watched all my ability brothers fly by, steadfast and diligent in pursuit of their own unique goals. I tried to remain cautious, given what Stephanie had trained me for and what doctors had insisted all through the winter I might realistically endure.
By mile 3, I began compiling a mental list of the things I'd underestimated. First on the list: my ability. I was clipping off 6:30s with nary hitch or glitch. And while I knew it might certainly make for a painful (read: sore, not injured) recovery, I'd likely be no worse for the wear.
Another 2014 underestimation was the heat. I'm typically a cooler runner, and don't sweat profusely or feel like I might eventually overheat. In Boston, by mile 9, I began dumping aid-station water on my head and neck to cool down. It wasn't, by any means, close to what runners endured in the awful humidity a few years back, but my need to cool certainly surprised me. Race starts at 10:00 in mid-April can do that, I suppose, whether or not your run 5 days prior includes tights and gloves and sub-30 degree breezes.
And like anyone familiar with the pomp, circumstance, and fragility of the Boston Marathon, I underestimated the course. The water dumping at mile 9 coincided with alarm bells sent off from receptors in my quads. The continuous downhill out of Hopkinton--the simultaneous braking and propulsion required on the descent--shocked my system. Unlike many storied Boston athletes who dread the sight of Heartbreak Hill, I was ecstatic to reach Newton and relieved to enjoy an ascent that seemed to stabilize my body and mind.
The pace didn't slow until Brookline, a stretch I've come to loathe as a distance runner. A good friend calls it the longest four miles in the history of road racing, and his words bounced off the echo chamber in my brain for the half hour I spent there. At that point, with my quadriceps again screaming, an actual finish line goal began to form. I wanted to hold the finish time, if at all possible, to sub-three. My rationale for such an ambitious goal in this situation, I figured, emanated from the fact that no one--not even me, really--thought I'd get as far as I did in the first place.
Given my mental list of underestimations, it didn't seem too far fetched.
That left turn onto Boylston Street, unlike 2013's blurry cloud of speed and grit, was crisp and incredible. I creaked down the center line, smiling, waving, and urging myself toward that 2:58 mark flashing overhead. I passed the same flags I distinctly recall from 2013--those from the grainy post-blast video footage. The people surged, yelled, clapped, and cheered. They seemed so fearless and resilient and proud.
It's odd to describe now, in retrospect. Boston 2014 wasn't my fastest marathon--not by a long shot. In fact, it was the slowest since my first attempt at CIM in 2011. But felt like the most significant run I've ever completed, especially in its final moments. It was a confluence of emotion--communal, social, spiritual, and personal. I wept uncontrollably, removing my glasses and blubbering through the thank-yous and hellos at the finish line. I did my best to hurry along, wanting nothing more than my wife (and my compression socks).
The first leg of the challenge had ended. I was upright, on Boylston, and looking for some kind of recovery product that might whisk me off to Big Sur, ready for more.
I ran both races with an ultrasound photo of the boy.
Big Sur
The B2B Challenge is certainly a test of strength and training and will, but my decision to tackle the races had nothing to do with physical or mental training, endurance, or mettle. I made it so personal.
I saw the challenge as a work of literature, a cathartic return of spiritual and emotional validation. With the impending arrival of our son, the experience also became a punctuation mark for the end of one journey and the bridge into another.
Marathon training, in the traditional sense, doesn't really apply to my plight or the back-to-back challenge. My goal heading in to the next race was simply to stay loose. So, the morning after Boston I "enjoyed"a sickening shake-out jog with my pregnant wife. Barely holding her pace, she led me three miles through the picturesque suburban streets of Hopkinton.
I hated it. But it helped. Immensely. And it led into a nice stretching session before heading to the airport.
I took Wednesday off completely, but started jogging again on Thursday. I grabbed an easy four miles, and followed it with five on Friday and the same on Saturday. The goal of staying loose worked, and it allowed me to approach the race with a new and unfamiliar tactic. In the lead up, I abandoned the typical runner fare. I stripped the Garmin, changed the routes, and ran on feel.
We enjoyed a nice drive to the coast on Saturday, and arrived in time to check in and stop by the expo. As anyone who's done a few of these distances knows, these events can be awkward spectacles and sales pitch zoos. But I rather enjoyed this one. It was smaller than the massive multi-level mecca in Boston, for one. It was in the hotel, funky and local in nature, and yet also very celebratory of what the race offered: history, legend, views, solitude, and the experience of running on "the jagged edge of the western world." There was also the sideshow of B2B challenge, which provided a feeling of pre-race accomplishment. Pointing out the challenge seemed to provide a relief I was unaware I needed. And yet, by the time the evening rolled around the task ahead seemed more real then than it ever had.
Describing the race itself is a challenge unto itself. It was at times silent and lonely, at times gregarious and talkative; sometimes it was enjoyable and easy, and at others it was a grueling slog fraught with questions. The best summation I can provide comes in borrowed form. It's a detailing I heard that evening at a special event, held with Bart Yasso and all who completed the B2B challenge, that I've paraphrased here.
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B2B is more than just two consecutive marathons. It is more than two long runs. It is more than 52.4 miles. It represents two stark contrasts. In Boston you run a storied race on a state holiday. The event kicks off at the odd hour of 10:00 AM. You toe the line with elite athletes from around the country--literally corralled with your global running equals--and you run a net downhill through wall-to-wall spectators. You are never alone. If you want a beer, you can hang with the frat crowd. If you want a kiss, go to Wellesley. Never a dull moment.
Big Sur, on the other hand, happens on a traditional race day. It's just a Sunday. You catch a 4:00 AM bus for a dark, windy drive to the Big Sur Station--a National Forest staging area--where you sit in a parking lot for around 90 minutes. Things need to move, since you're running on a highway. When the race begins, you're not surrounded by a massive throng. Diligent runners move in and out in coordination with their goals, but the only surroundings are redwoods and mossy pockets of the coastal forest. The speed isn't intense, and the difficulty of the course means PR-minded hardliners aren't necessarily flocking to run. The first chunk of the race can be laced in fog, and it's shady and cool. You roll, not unlike the sea you'll eventually parallel, and then climb, sometimes for over a mile, and often alone.
These differences can be vexing, so to cope, I made some adaptations to one of my hard and fast rules. I'm a dedicated podcast listener during my training runs, but I abide by an unplug rule during races, no matter the size, distance, or location. For this event, afraid of the dangerous isolation in Big Sur--especially in the wake of Boston--I made a playlist of various meaningful songs to help mollify my brain. And for roughly forty or so ugly minutes, I broke my rule. And though I won't do it again in an event, it was crucial here.
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Having the music taught me three important things:
- Turns out, some of that Kanye West bravado serves a purpose. (See: "Stronger.")
- Nostalgia-inspired tracks will be hit and miss. (Wade: good; Guster: bad)
- I am a Lorde fan.
And then, in a nice jog through the inflatable tunnel, my version of the B2B story ended. A kiss from the lovely wife/coach/partner (who ran the 5k!), a stop by the special "B2B Challenge" tent (where I could not for the life of me drink more than one sip of the promised celebratory beer and had to give my post-race pasta to my hungry, pregnant wife), and a complimentary ice bath at the Treadmill running store (an unforeseen blessing that kept me out of the ocean), and we rolled back into real life.
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I earned two handmade medals, one for the completion of the Big Sur International Marathon, and one for the completion of the Boston 2 Big Sur Challenge. ASICS also provided a finishers jacket, emblazoned with the challenge title, the year, and the slogan. Those with B2B in their Rolodex love to point out that my jackets says "6 days" when most of theirs say 13.
I also earned a healthy amount of humility during the process. Much was instilled by my injury and recovery, but more came from the sanity provided by my wife-as-coach, and the reminder that I managed to succeed alongside so many other extraordinary runners on a very un-typical build up. I am moving ahead with increasing durability. While racing (or running fit) through the challenge would be ideal, I used the races to build an extraordinary mileage base. This marathon-as-long-run mentality has set me up, nicely I believe, for the next major event on my calendar, a trail 50k looming at the end of July.
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There are so many ways to find value in the B2B. If I were to encourage someone to accept the challenge, I would push them to see it as an intensely personal, multifaceted experience. Along the way, you have to be willing to remain loose. You'll break some rules, overstep some logic, and always adapt. In the end, you might have to couch some of the happenings as inexplicable--perhaps even sheer luck. But that's OK. That's how challenges work.
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