Category Archives: Running

 

April 21st, 2009

Boston Marathon (Drinking Beer, Kissing Wellesley Women and Abstract Journeys)

(Amtrak – northbound, April 18) Every adventure starts with a journey. As I leave my wife and kids behind I experience that rarest of moments — leaving town by myself when it isn’t for business. As the steel wheels rumble underneath me heading north toward Boston, I slip on the iPod and tune in Arlo:

Riding on the City of New Orleans,
Illinois Central Monday morning rail
Fifteen cars and fifteen restless riders,
Three conductors and twenty-five sacks of mail.

(Hynes Convention Center, Boston, MA, April 19) – I pick up my race bib and can’t believe I have it in my hands. I ran my first marathon in 1994, but it wasn’t until 2007 that I ran fast enough to qualify for this race. Boston is the only marathon that requires a qualifying time, other than the Olympics and the Trials. I’d only dreamed of it. I thank the woman for volunteering and tell her it took me a decade to get that little package she just handed me.

(Athletes Village, Hopkington, MA, April 20) I’ve gone through my pre-race checklist: Vaseline on the feet, taped nipples, peanut butter, chocolate and banana sandwiches. Empty the bladder. Then do it again. I go through the course map in my head.

But what am I doing here? When I was a kid, I suffered repeated injuries in 7th, 8th and 9th grades. While everyone else moved forward athletically, I went backwards. I strove for mediocrity.

And now I’m with 25,000 people getting ready to run the Boston Marathon, representing at this moment the largest and most concentrated collection of physically fit people on the planet. As well as the largest single concentration of nervous energy. From every state and from 85 different nations. I’m not worthy. I try to rest under a huge tent in the morning chill, but end out walking around. Pacing.

(Start Line, Hopkington, MA) Each corral has 1,000 runners. I’m in the 11th, corresponding to my bib, #11228. The crowd surges and stops, surges and stops as we make our way to the start, which we reach six minutes after the gun. But we will be timed by the electronic chips tied to our shoes, so it doesn’t matter. I shed the disposable warm-ups I brought with me, bought for a few bucks at Salvation Army for just this purpose, to be recylced to a charity (along with thousands of others) after the race. The finish line on Boylston Street is 26.2 miles away.

(Natick, MA) I’m supposed to grab a beer from a former blogger I know at mile 8.2 after entering Natick, but we miss each other. The early miles, after a quad-trashing downhill start, run through Ashland and Framingham and are an easy cruise, with the smells of grilling meat and popping corn wafting by as music blares from this place and that. The residents are having a blast as we pass marathon party after marathon party, as they sit in comfy lounge chairs screaming for total strangers. With my name on my shirt, I’m personally cheered thousands of times during the race.

I’m not looking to break any personal records or kill myself on this rolling course. The hard part is qualifying. The race is dessert. I merrily slap many of the outstretched hands of children lining the course, who treat us middle-of-the-packers like professional athletes. It took too long to get here and I just want to enjoy it all. But I did want that promised beer from the former blogger and I’m bummed that I missed it. But then, salvation! A frat-like group is handing out beer cups on the way out of Natick at around mile 11. And I grab a few ounces.


(Wellesley, MA) – The Wellesley College “scream tunnel” near the 13 mile mark can be heard 1/4 mile away. The women are standing on the barricades, cheek to jowl, leaning into the race, screaming for kisses and holding up imploring signs. Who am I to disappoint them? Was it six that I kissed? Eight? Ten? Another runner and I contemplate circling back for more. As one other blogger noted:

They were 2 and three deep and every third or fourth one held a sign of some sort. For about 300 yards it was the largest gathering of nothing but college women I’d ever seen. But that was not what was most striking. It was the signs. Most of them read things like “Kiss me I’m a first year”, “Kiss me I’m a senior”, “Kiss me I’m from New Hampshire”, and even “Only Kiss me if you’re a girl”. Was it a joke? No. The guys who were sprinting by me were kissing multiple women as they ran. They’d stop, kiss, run, kiss another. It was classic.

(Heartbreak Hill, Newton) — Still running with ease as I am joined by my nephew near mile 17. He stays to the center away from the water and Gatorade so as not to get in the way or consume runner resources. As we get closer to Boston, the towns get bigger, the crowds thicker. Heartbreak Hill is at miles 20-21, the last in a long series of hills in Newton.
Thankfully, I find more beer being passed out at the base of the last, and largest, hill. Beer never tasted so good. Thus fortified, we ascend Heartbreak toward Boston College. And my nephew drops out at a pre-arranged spot to jump on local transit and meet me later in the family reunion area.

(Brookline, MA) After passing Boston College at mile 21, the crowds thicken more as the terrain turns definitively urban. It heads downhill and my quads scream at me for relief. I’m distracted by Wonder Woman running near me. Folks have stopped yelling my name, because they have a much more interesting runner. But I can’t catch her, just as I can’t catch the Hooters girl or Richard Whitehead running on prosthetic legs.

I hit Beacon Street and am heading into downtown Boston. Ahead of me is Kenmore Square and the giant Citgo sign, one mile from the finish. I will finish this race. Even if I have to crawl it in. But I need not crawl. The crowds carry me along, and I in turn, whoop and holler back at the crowds, as we feed on each other. It is energy well spent. For without the spectators, it wouldn’t be the same. They are an integral part of this spectacular show.


(Boylston Street, Boston MA) — Last winter I stayed at the Charlesmark Hotel on Boylston Street. My room overlooked the snow-covered finish line, and I took the picture you see here.

The scene now looks altogether different as I turn from Commonwealth Avenue onto Hereford Street and then onto Boylston, thick with Bostonians several people deep on both sides of the road.

I see the finish line ahead, with a temporary bridge over the street to hold the cameras and press. Through the exhaustion I ham it up once more for the crowds, again waving in an up swept motion to get them louder and louder. I raise my arms up in advance of the finish line.

I want a good finisher’s photo for my wall.


(Finishers Chute, Boston, MA) — My pace slows to a crawl, along with everyone else. Each step a painful effort. It will take 20-30 minutes for runners to meet up with family as we move from station to station through the recovery area. Water. Gatorade. Food. Heat shields. Chip removal. Medals. Baggage. Change to warm, dry clothes that we had checked onto dozens of buses at the start. I find my brother and his family, with whom I have stayed, in the reunion area. I pick up an over-priced souvenir running jacket with the race logo on it. I’ll wear it in the old folks home decades from now so the attendants will know that I once did more than wheel myself around babbling incoherently.

(Amtrak, southbound, April 20) — My brother drives me to the train after I shower and eat at his place. We arrive at the station at the same time the train does. I jump in and grab a seat. Drop my bags and hit the bar car. Grab a Sam Adams and head back to my seat.

I think about the race and the extraordinary logistics. I think about the new half marathon trail race I’m organizing in the ‘burbs of NYC and wonder what I can do to make it better.

I feel the wheels rumbling ‘neath the seat as the car gently sways and dusk settles in. I pick up the iPod and, like I try to do at the start of all journeys, put on a little traveling music:

Nighttime on The City of New Orleans,
Changing cars in Memphis, Tennessee.
Half way home, we’ll be there by morning
Through the Mississippi darkness
Rolling down to the sea.
And all the towns and people seem
To fade into a bad dream
And the steel rails still ain’t heard the news.
The conductor sings his song again,
The passengers will please refrain
This train’s got the disappearing railroad blues.

In one sense this was 26.2 mile journey. In another it was a three-day weekend. In yet another sense it started in 1994 when I finished my first marathon and I realized that I had never tested my physical limits. And in another sense the journey started in 7th grade when I ground to a halt athletically while my peers surged forward.

But after long efforts I finally qualified for one of the most prestigious races in the world. I toed the line at Hopkinton and arrived on Boylston Street. I ran Boston.

This post took me an hour or two to write, but it took me years to get here.
—————————————————–

And if you want more about what it’s like inside a marathon, read below. And feel free to send along links to others…

  • The iPhone app that ran the Boston Marathon (Geek.com):

    Common sights for marathon watchers include runners fainting, losing all control of their nervous system and the spontaneous evacuation of bowels. It’s a fun sport.

  • Agony and Ecstasy: Running the 113th Boston Marathon: (O’Malley On the Web)

    The first three miles are pretty much downhill, then the hills start towards the middle and the end. Down, up, down. The marathon route is like the Dow Jones Industrial Average. Hopkinton is like the recession of 1990. The four Newton Hills are like the end of the Clinton administration where everyone got rich. Boylston Street is like the current fiscal climate.

I live close to mile 24 of the Boston Marathon and when I’m in town I love to go watch it. Today I was there for more than an hour, from just before the elite runners arrived till the first part of the main group came through.

  • Boston Marathon:

    It wasn’t my fastest or my slowest, but it was one of the most enjoyable and satisfying marathons I’ve ever run.

  • The Race (Ben’s Boston Marathon Blog) – A view of the race from close to the front, instead of the middle of the pack
  • Boston Marathon — epilogue (A Bold Pace — Running for Our Lives):

    Mile 20.5: A flash of grace; an announcement, “You have just passed Heartbreak Hill, the hills are finished.” I pass the very festive and upbeat Boston College crowd. Time to celebrate with an Advil and Double Latte GU!

  • Post Mortem (MattFitzgerald.org)

    My goal going into Monday’s Boston Marathon was to run 2:35. I ran 3:18. That’s a spectacular failure. Either my goal was absurdly unrealistic or something really major must have gone wrong, right? Wrong.

  • Boston Marathon Re-Cap (Obesity Panacea):

    Waiting for the start-gun, you could see thousands of people in every direction, fighter planes zooming overhead, and of course smell the strange mix of excitement, fear, and Gatorade that you find among people minutes before starting a marathon.

  • Boston Marathon: Running against the wind (The Ultra) Marathon Life:

    I headed under the tunnel, urging myself forward, feeling nothing but good, but still feeling like I didn’t have another gear. Emerging from the tunnel, I just let the crowd carry me. I have never felt such a feeling of having a crowd cheer you on. And for me, it really was just for me as there was no one with me. I turned right on Hereford Street, then left on Boylston, the massive crowds swelling against the railings. They cheered and cheered, but went wild when I raised my hands like a cheerleader flapping indicating raising the volume. I was encouraging them and so they went crazy. That felt pretty cool. I drained every ounce and sprinted to the finish line, crossing the mat in 2:53:20. Not a bad days work.

  • The Boston Marathon…(Lil Runner):

    Lots of college students out, many drinking and offering beer, and overly excited , due to the beer consumption, to get high fives. Wellesley looked really pretty and was filled with lots of girls holding up free kisses signs of all kinds. I watched an older fellow walk up to a girl and get a kiss. Probably made his day!

  • What is it like to run the Boston Marathon for the 1st Time? (Run to Win: Marathoning Made Simple):

    I was ready for this and I knew it. I believed in my training, and in how far I had come… there was no way I could wait any longer. This was the day I had to put it all out there. It was time to shine.

  • What is it Like to Run the Boston Marathon From the 1st Corral? (Run to Win: Marathoning Made Simple):

    A big, burly old timer volunteer in a BAA jacket was walking around introducing himself to every runner, “What’s your name? Where you from? Have you run Boston before? Well good luck, sonny.” The answers were more interesting than the questions…Ireland, Minnesota, Manitoba, Japan…The first corral is like the coolest fucking club on earth….until the elites come out. When they walked along the side of our corral to take their place in front of us, the cheers started coming out: “Go HALL!, Go HALL!, HALL, Go Ryan, bring it home! HALL!!” It was pretty cool. A little pomp, national anthem, Air Force flyover and, shit, the gun.

Links to this post:

blawg review #210
half-wracked prejudice leaped forth “rip down all hate,” i screamed. lies that life is black and white. spoke from my skull. i dreamed. romantic facts of musketeers. foundationed deep, somehow. ah, but i was so much older then, …

posted by @ May 04, 2009 1:26 PM
 
the carnival of running #27
if you’ve never seen the episode of nova where coaches at tufts take 12 people off the coach and train them for the boston marathon, it’s available on hulu and well worth your time just for the stuff about how your physiology adapts to …

posted by Mike @ April 29, 2009 11:16 AM
 
a non-race report; ny?; more photos!
until last night, i planned on running the rye derby today. the temperature for today was expected to reach 88, although it actually got to 91. i was still ok with it, until i read of someone dying at the nashville half-marathon. …
posted by joegarland @ April 26, 2009 8:52 PM

 

April 6th, 2009

Paine to Pain 1/2 Marathon Trail Race: The Longest Trail Race Within 50M of NYC

I’m off-topic today to let those who run (or who have friends who do) know about a race that I organize called the Paine to Pain 1/2 Marathon Trail Race. It’s the longest trail race within 50 miles of NYC, so if you (or a friend) likes running, and rocks and roots and other gnarly stuff, this is as good as it gets in the New York metropolitan area. It starts at the Thomas Paine Cottage in New Rochelle.

Registration for the race, which will be run October 4th, just opened. This is our second year.

I organized the race after six years of working with local officials to get the Colonial Greenway in Westchester County built. This is an extensive trail system that includes New Rochelle, Mamaroneck, Scarsdale and Eastchester.

This is the race description:

The Paine to Pain is a giant single loop that winds its way through the woods and trails of several lower Westchester parks. You never run the same trail twice and will spend 90% of your time on dirt (and rocks and roots) in the shade of the woods. Many of the trails are completely hidden from public view and host a wide variety of wildlife including deer, fox, coyote, hawks, owls, heron, wild turkey, rabbit and other critters.

If you want to run it you can sign up at the Paine To Pain website. And if you want to volunteer, you can contact me.

 

August 28th, 2008

Paine to Pain 1/2 Marathon Trail Race on the Colonial Greenway (Westchester)

This isn’t about personal injury law, but about a 1/2 marathon trail race I am organizing. Unless someone gets hurt and sues me, of course. Then it will be about personal injury law.

This is the virgin running of the Paine to Pain 1/2 Marathon Trail Race on the Colonial Greenway, in Westchester County just north of NYC on September 28th. It starts at Paine Cottage in New Rochelle and ends — after a spectacular loop of local trails in the areas of New Rochelle, Larchmont, Mamaroneck, Scarsdale and Eastchester — at New Rochelle High School across the street from the start. I wrote about this a bit in May when the local paper ran a story about one of the trails we will use, and used me for the story. (See: Me on the Front Page of the Sports Section (Again))

The point of the race, which will be an annual event after this, is to officially dedicate the creation of the trail system. It came together just this year, after about six years of work and numerous meetings with local officials.

Trail races are not something you generally see in the New York City area. In fact, there is nothing else like this in the whole metropolitan area. (And if you are interested, we are limiting it to 200 people this first year, so sign up quickly.)

But in putting the race together, I found myself confronted with the liability waiver issue. Every sporting event has one. And the vast majority are in unreadable gobbledygook that makes the eyes glaze over. Why use Ambien for a sleep aid if you can find legalese?

In deciding how to handle it, I first had to determine what the point of the waiver was. Is it to protect the organizers if someone gets hurt and sues, or to protect the event participants from getting hurt in the first place (or to write it in such horribly stilted language that insures no one will read it)?

Sadly, most seem designed to protect the organizers, despite the fact that such protection likely already exists under the doctrine of “assumption of risk.”

So mine was written with the participant in mind, not the organizers. And it starts like this:

I realize that these trails have many rocks, roots, stumps and other tripping hazards. The course can be narrow, crowded and wildly uneven. Wet weather may create mud holes and fell trees and limbs that race officials and trail maintainers don’t even know about.

That’s the informing part. And yes, I did feel a need to put a touch of legalese in it, so I dressed it up a bit to make it readable, cribbing here and there from other releases that I found online that were made, thankfully, without letting a lawyer muck it up:

I therefore release and discharge all race officials, volunteers, sponsors and municipalities, as well as the rocks, roots and other stuff, dead or alive, gnarly or not, that might cause me to get seriously hurt.

But let’s just hope that nobody suffers anything more than a few scrapes and bruises.

If you’re in the NYC area and looking for an excuse for a long run in the woods, come run with me on September 28th.

 

May 7th, 2008

Me on the Front Page of the Sports Section (Again)

OK, this has nothing to do with personal injury law. So if you came here just for that, you can leave now. This has to do with running.

For the second time in seven months I find myself gracing the front page of the local sports section, with the photo you see at right looming large in the center of the print version. (The first time was October 14th, with a substantially geekier picture, not that I look so sharp here.) It’s a feature story about trails in Westchester County, just north of NYC.

But here’s the important part about the piece: This past winter local officials linked together numerous parks in to create the 12+ mile Colonial Greenway, which loops its way through numerous Westchester communities that line Long Island Sound. The fact that such a thing can even be created in one of the most developed suburban areas of the nation is incredible. And the fact that the trails pass through different jurisdictions made creation of the system a difficult task, with different people responsible for different sections.

Just to give some perspective on what has been created, it is possible to hike or run 15 miles or more (depending on which trails you choose) without ever doubling back or even crossing your own trail, with 90% of that loop on dirt through the woods (a few street sections are unavoidable.) There is really nothing quite like it in the New York metropolitan area.

I started running these trails back in 2000, and spoke to local officials about linking them together in 2002. Now, six years and many meetings later, signs are up, trails are blazed, and money has been allocated for improvements throughout the system.

I’d like to find some analogy to the law, but the best I can find is that working with public officials in numerous jurisdictions is somewhat like litigation. It can take a long time, but if you prevail, it is worth the effort.

When the trail gets officially dedicated, I’ll return to the subject.

The map is here:

 

October 14th, 2007

Turkewitz On Front Page of Sports Section

It’s not every day I land on the front page of the local sports section, above the fold no less. But I think the story fits in with personal injury law given the countless ways people get hurt, so I want to discuss it. (Runners’ safety a high priority as days grow shorter.)

It’s about safety, personal responsibility and assumption of risk. It is, in essence, about risk management. In this case, the risks are tripping over the unseen or being hit by a car when running in the dark. And the management part revolves around lights and reflective clothes. And fashion be damned.

The theme of personal responsibility is one I often use at trial. Defense lawyers like it too. So in picking the cases to take, it’s a crucial parts of the analysis, regardless of whether it is a simple trip and fall on a broken sidewalk or a complex medical malpractice case. A jury wants to know what each of the parties did to prevent the incident that led to the injuries.

Oftentimes there is no clear cut answer, but a long sliding scale of grays. For example, a fall over a busted up portion of sidewalk may mean one thing to a juror if it occurred to a healthy 25 year old in clear weather in broad daylight (the failure to see that which is open and obvious) and something completely different if it’s a senior citizen walking the same sidewalk at dusk in the rain. In either case a juror will want to know what the injured person did to keep themselves safe as they measure the liability of the owner of the land.

And yet, cases land in the courts all the time where it seems as if the plaintiff’s attorney simply ignored substantial culpable conduct from his client. I can’t imagine it is the more experienced attorneys that are accepting such cases. It’s important to tread warily on matters where there may be a large degree of comparative fault.

There is also another lesson in this. The gut reaction of most defense attorneys, I think, would be to kick me off a jury panel in a civil case once they learned what I do for a living. But after reading the above, do you think they would be making a mistake in doing so?

Returning to the article, here is the money quote from yours truly for those too lazy to read the story:

“The headlamp is a great device to see and be seen – no matter how dorky it looks.”

(Eric Turkewitz is a personal injury attorney in New York)