Fitness Files: Mile by mile, the marathon was run

I brought a first-place award home from the Carlsbad Marathon on Jan. 17. That’s one part of the story. I ran my slowest marathon by an hour, coming in at 5 hours 28 minutes. That’s another part. But before I share the conclusion, here’s the way it all unfolded.

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Saturday, the day before the marathon

Don, Evie’s partner, picked us up at 10:30 a.m. Cristina, Evie’s daughter-in-law, celebrating Evie’s first marathon, made us all shirts saying “Team Evie” and “Run Now, Wine Later.”

Rolling into Carlsbad, Don dedicated his day to us, first sightseeing along the marathon route. Curled up in the backseat of Evie’s smooth-driving Mercedes, I didn’t notice the rolling nature of the path for the next day’s marathon, but Don’s reaction was, “Driving this exhausts me.”

At lunchtime, we found an organic taco place. Tantalizing organic beans came with lunch, but we couldn’t risk eating beans the day before the marathon, nor could we toss them, so we packed ‘em into our water cups. Yum, post-marathon bean snack!

Next, Don good-naturedly accompanied us to the health and lifestyle expo, where participants were to pick up their bib number. Our goodie bag also included shirts and an unusual marathon perk — a fitted athletic jacket. Then he tagged along as we meandered through booths of energy bars, racks of running socks, sunglasses, displays of up-coming races and sign-ups for adventure vacations.

Finally Don dropped us at the hotel and went home to watch football.

That night we found an Italian restaurant where Evie and I cleaned generous plates of pasta, while Cristina packed her leftovers to add to her bean cup back at the hotel. All three of us felt celebratory, laughing like school girls, as we toured lively downtown Carlsbad on the way back to the Best Western.

Evie, Cristina and I were determined to sleep. We set the alarm for 4 a.m. for a 6:15 marathon start. Sleep took turns with trips to the john. We’d hydrated at dinner.

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Sunday, zero hour

It’s race day. With Spandex on, numbers pinned and breakfast downed, we set out for the start in pitch-black Carlsbad. No streetlights. Evie used her iPhone flashlight.

A scant two miles from the motel to race, our desk clerk and a policeman we met along the way judged it an impossible distance to walk. For “Team Evie,” two miles was a light pre-race workout.

Arriving at the marathon lineup, we stepped into a crowd of 1,500 runners standing quietly for the national anthem. Horn sounded. Evie and Cristina flew off, 26.2 miles to go. We’d reunite at the finish.

I’ve seen more than one racer take a spill at the start, so my head’s down for the first mile, dodging hundreds of running feet. With a temperature of about 60 degrees, I finally got my wish for a cool race day. I set to work to keep a pace at 11:30, which I achieved for the first 13.8 miles.

Though Evie and I had run 10 miles of the course weeks ago, racing it was different. There’s only one real hill at mile 19, but the course undulates, slowing runners on the many inclines. I like inclines because they give my feet something new to do, but uphills break my pace. Downhills require short steps to prevent knee damage.

At the mile 9 turnaround, I got high-fives from Evie and Christina. At mile 11, a young man joined me, saying, “You move your left foot to the rhythm of my right foot and we’ll finish this thing.” I agreed, having no idea what he was talking about, but soon I outran him with my fastest two miles at 10:22.

Hours later he showed up again, accusing me of “kicking his butt.” By then, I felt like kicking myself for doing this marathon.

I forced my feet onward, eyes glued to the horizon, yearning for the next mile marker. This is a scenic course beside the blue Pacific, but I wasted no energy gawking at whitecaps. I keep to myself on race day, but when a lanky gray-haired guy passed me, I read his shirt out loud, “Leona Divide 50-mile-race!”

“Yeah, he said, “and it was yesterday.” I laughed through weariness.

A young woman thanked me for my even pace, which slowed to 11:48 by mile 18. Then I found an empty port-o-potty for a stop. Thinking I’d go lots faster post-potty, I willed a second wind but instead slowed to 11:54.

I’d taken a hint for marathon food from the book “Ultramarathon Man,” by Dean Karnazes. He runs 100 miles all night, keeping a rapid pace with handfuls of chocolate-covered coffee beans. Having given myself chocolate and coffee bean doses every five miles, I now hate them.

Approaching the end, I agreed with a guy who ran past me saying, “The only thing that keeps me going is that I have to get back to my car.”

I shuffled along, convinced I had only one mile to go when I saw the mile 24 sign. Drat! 2.2 miles remaining. Approaching the chute, another young man who’d been at my pace for miles shot ahead, calling back, “Sprint in! You’re not tired; it’s all mental!”

“Yes!, I agreed, GO!” Only my feet ignored my command to dash.

As I crossed the finish line, Cristina greeted me, fresh and energetic. I hit the chain link fence, grabbing links to remain upright. An hour before, Evie and Cristina crossed the finish, holding hands. Evie headed straight for the recycling bin with dry heaves. A paramedic saved the recyclables, diverting her to the medical tent, where she recovered, replenishing her electrolytes.

Don, returning to Carlsbad, found us collapsed on folding chairs outside the medical tent. I looked like a bedraggled waif, and the glamorous Evie’s skin was the color of her platinum blond hair. Watching gurneys of fellow runners wheeling out to ambulances, IVs attached, Don commented, “Isn’t this a great sport!”

We hobbled over to a tent with posted printouts of runners’ times. Evie’s name was nowhere. We knew her finish matched Cristina’s, 4:30. We searched out the guy behind the computer who was compiling race results and asked for Evie’s time. He found it and announced, “You’ve won third place.” Team Evie cheered. Evie’d placed in her first marathon!

Then we asked for my place. “You got a first,” he said.

“How many in my age group?” I asked.

“You were the oldest women on the course,” he said, “the only one in the 70-74 age group.”

Nice to be first, even when you have no competition, but I just looked up the 65-69 age group, and I would have come in 4th there. I’m signing off to eat my leftover beans for lunch. (Cristina ate hers with her fingers when we returned to the hotel to pack up.)

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Epilogue

Not long after we got home, I got two texts from Evie.

“I’ll pick you up to run Friday.”

“Are we running the Huntington Half Marathon, 2/7/16?”

I texted back, “I’m not prepared to answer.”

Newport Beach resident CARRIE LUGER SLAYBACK is a retired teacher who, since turning 70, has also run the Los Angeles Marathon, placing first in her age group twice.