After the weekend in DC, I am happy to report to Born to Run readers everywhere that Baby Liam is truly born to run! Tall and lanky – just like his father – Liam has an ultrarunner’s body and the endurance to persist at basic activities (sleeping, feeding, and eventually running) for most of the day. Keep an eye on this kid’s career! “Baby Li-am’s born to ru-huuunnnnn!”
He’s also extremely cute.
And the run was also extremely fun. We didn’t have much of a plan going in to the race, with Brome’s status as a runner or support unclear (at least we chose to maintain hope that he would run without training!), Will training through this race, and myself lacking both mental and physical fortitude. The basic plan was to run the race in around 3:20.
Despite that plan, running with Will is just too much fun! So we went out a bit faster than planned and were having too much fun to slow down. It was a beautiful day and we raced past excellent music (“Everybody get up!”) and had intense debates with the crowd about questions such as “what does the fox say?” - which in fact is something like “Chacha-chacha-chacha-chow!”
Brome provided most excellent support. He woke up around 2 am San Francisco time, walked to the start with us, carried our clothes back to the car, picked up essential power donuts, and hurried over to watch us.
I was lucky enough to run with Will for the first 18 miles, although I am sure that I was becoming significantly less fun with each passing mile. After coming through the half in 1:32, I was starting to slow down while Will was just warming up.
As a result of the increasing deviation of blood from my brain to my legs, I became more and more paranoid with thoughts that people were following us. I couldn’t quite pin the reasons down, but I had a suspicious feeling that about 30,000 people were tracing our every move. Despite our efforts to lose the tail (we looped around several major landmarks), it appeared that we were still being followed.
We decided to split up for safety, with Will racing on ahead while I stayed behind to fight for our safety. I pulled off to the side to drink some water and Will took off like a Mako shark. It was amazing! One second I was talking to Will and a second later all I saw was a blurry bullet of an image fading rapidly into the distance. Well, either that or he was too skinny to see from more than 10 feet away.
The last 8 miles got pretty difficult and, while not feeling great, I realized that I needed to make a sacrifice to the running gods. With Marines lining the roads, I decided not to make an actual sacrifice and instead sacrificed some of my own nipple blood to the gods. They were pleased with this gesture and helped me to the finish.
Also, god appeared in the form of Daniel S. Zwrome, who ran with me for most of the last 7 miles. His presence was most joyful and his ability to run while carrying donuts, a sweatshirt, jeans, and several other items was truly an inspiration. Brome is a true Birkie! Warrior!
The weekend and race were most enjoyable. I’m sorry to report that Will failed to achieve the 3:20 goal, finishing in an effortless 3:03 while I finished in an effortful 3:21. Since I was slightly slower than the goal, Will would technically have won under Price Is Right rules, but I won the race by all other objective measures.
While I accept this (self-provided) recognition, it is a bittersweet victory as I know that it will only be a few years before the next generation of the Born to Run dynasty flies by me in the middle of a marathon, again like I’m driving an Amish buggy on the Autobahn. If Liam teams up with Jermichael Haakon Zwrome, then I clearly am in big trouble.
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