Park City Marathon: the wall elevated

"You came all the way from New Jersey for this marathon?!  You're crazy!"

So said Sue, the nice lady at the first aid tent, while I laid there half-dazed with an oxygen mask on my face.  How did my ninth marathon end like this?

I did my hill training. I got to town early to adjust to the elevation. I spent all day Friday studying the course.  I did everything I could. Yet nothing seemed to prepare me for the challenge of the Park City Marathon.

Access to the start line was fast and easy. I love these small marathons for that. There was plenty of space to park in the Newpark plaza. No crowds, no shuttle buses, no problems.

It was still dark with perfect weather - cool and cloudy. I felt surprisingly ready. When the race kicked off, I bolted out behind the front-runners and out of the plaza on Newpark Boulevard and then Highland Drive. I deliberately tried to hang back a bit and not keep up with the leaders, but kept a healthy pace for fear of going too slow in the easy section.

At the first mile marker, I nailed a 6:20. Way too fast. I slowed it down for a few miles, still pushing on the uphills, especially the steep one around the next turn from Old Ranch Road to Trailside Drive, but relaxing on the downhill.

By the time I wove my way through the neighborhood with its lovely houses, past the school, and onto the bike path, I was in the zone. When I came to the end of the bike path and started the seven-mile stretch on the part dirt, part paved Rail Trail, I was on target for my 3:03 PR. I watched the sun rise over the mountains and everything felt right.

The nine-mile stretch of uphill began gradually in the eighth. By the ninth mile marker, I was still right on track with my goal pace of 7:01 I was working a lot harder than I should have been. Maybe the elevation (6600 feet above sea level) really does have an effect. Though it did not look like I was going uphill, it was feeling like it.

By the tenth mile I fell behind, but I was thoroughly in the moment and intent on simply running the best race I could at that time. And if I had to adjust and readjust the definition of that as the race went on, so be it.

The course turned off the Rail Trail and onto the bike path alongside Deer Valley Drive and that is where the real work started. The incline was no longer gentle.  But now in the 14th and 15th mile, after already running an incline for seven miles how could I gather the strength to push it to the top of the hill in this ski-lodge portion of town.

It is too bad that all my focus had to be diverted to this problem because from time to time I did notice that the path would have been aestethically enjoyable on any other day - snaking through underpasses and winding past parks.

If the final uphill push to the summit of 7200 feet was the end of the race, maybe I could have summoned some last blast of energy. Instead, I merely trotted at a pace of around nine minutes to that 16-mile mark figuring that I would make up lost time (or not lose any more) on the 10 miles of gradual downhill. The worst was supposedly over.

To my surprise, I had nothing left for the descent. Gravity helped me hit my last sub-8 mile in the 17th, but that short, steep monster of a hill in the 18th, just past the shopping plaza and the two small pedestrian bridges, was the final nail in this marathon's coffin.

Everyone that I usually beat was passing me - women first, then older guys, then the costumed guy. Somehow I mustered up the energy to yell to the guy that was way ahead of me on the road as I was about to make the turn he missed. And in a few minutes, he passed me for a second time as we ran through the residential streets.

How did this happen? When did this happen? I had hit the wall and I did not even know it.

On the bike path alongside Highway 224, I hit Mile 20 with a 10-minute mile. Each mile was slower than the previous one. On the dirt path back toward Old Ranch Road, I struggled to run an 11-minute mile. In the 24th, 12 minutes was the best I could do.

I can not describe the misery of the last two miles. This was now a race to beat my worst time (3:54 in Delaware last year), so I kept forcing one foot in front of the other, determined not to walk, even as I was now shuffling at a 13-minute pace.

Crossing the finish line, there was no triumph, only sweet, blessed relief. Too much relief, actually, as my body immediately began to shut down. My legs buckled a bit...my head started getting dizzy...my eyelids heavy...

Suddenly a woman was holding my arm while I entered the finish chute. "Come this way," she said, and then there was a man holding my other arm. My memory of it is fuzzy, but by the time we finished the short walk from the finish to the first aid tent, Sue and Herb were basically holding me up.

I was laid down on a cot and Herb put an oxygen mask on me as Sue took my blood pressure. A doctor who was originally from Paramus, N.J., (small world!) checked on me.

It took about a half hour for me to feel some kind of normalcy (discounting the soreness in my legs). I hung around a few minutes longer, but I had a schedule to keep - check out of the hotel in Sandy and head to Arches National Park in Moab.

There were no stomach troubles and no missed turns to blame for my poor showing.  It was a difficult course - one of the hardest in the country, according to Sue, after telling me I was crazy - and I gave it my all. 

That made me feel good.  Proud, even.  Crazy?  No way - it was worth everything I put into it.