The LA Marathon was this past Sunday and I volunteered at the water/Gatorade station at mile 25. We were told to arrive at 7am but when I got there we had to wait to set-up until the 'bike tour' was done. I wish I had known about this bike tour beforehand! It turns out that they open up the course for a bike race on the morning of the marathon... I use the label 'race' loosely, as the vast majority of bikers were just out to take advantage of the street closings for a cool tour of LA which is something that I would definitely be interested in next year. Anyways, once the bikers were done we set up folding tables lining an entire block and then packed them with cups of water and Gatorade so that we wouldn't have to worry about filling once the race started. It was fun to see all the different groups go by (handicapped, pro men, pro women, mortal men, mortal women, etc) and it made me a little nostalgic for my cross-country days, but not so much so that I wanted to be racing - by the time the runners got to us they looked like they were
more than ready to be done! The exception to that rule was the lead pack of runners, they flew by us at somewhere around a 5:20 minute mile pace - let me put that into perspective by saying that when I ran cross-country our races only lasted for THREE miles, my personal best time was 18 minutes 55 seconds... that would put me at about a 6:20 minute mile pace and you will just have to trust me when I say that no one would have described us as "graceful" by the end of a race ;) These guys (and girls!) were not only running much faster than we ever did, they were running more than EIGHT TIMES as far (26.2 miles)! And they made it look effortless! It was worth volunteering just to see them. Here is a picture of one of the leaders passing our water station:
The LA Marathon was this past Sunday and I volunteered at the water/Gatorade station at mile 25. We were told to arrive at 7am but when I got there we had to wait to set-up until the 'bike tour' was done. I wish I had known about this bike tour beforehand! It turns out that they open up the course for a bike race on the morning of the marathon... I use the label 'race' loosely, as the vast majority of bikers were just out to take advantage of the street closings for a cool tour of LA which is something that I would definitely be interested in next year. Anyways, once the bikers were done we set up folding tables lining an entire block and then packed them with cups of water and Gatorade so that we wouldn't have to worry about filling once the race started. It was fun to see all the different groups go by (handicapped, pro men, pro women, mortal men, mortal women, etc) and it made me a little nostalgic for my cross-country days, but not so much so that I wanted to be racing - by the time the runners got to us they looked like they were more than ready to be done! The exception to that rule was the lead pack of runners, they flew by us at somewhere around a 5:20 minute mile pace - let me put that into perspective by saying that when I ran cross-country our races only lasted for THREE miles, my personal best time was 18 minutes 55 seconds... that would put me at about a 6:20 minute mile pace and you will just have to trust me when I say that no one would have described us as "graceful" by the end of a race ;) These guys (and girls!) were not only running much faster than we ever did, they were running more than EIGHT TIMES as far (26.2 miles)! And they made it look effortless! It was worth volunteering just to see them. Here is a picture of one of the leaders passing our water station:
No comments:
Post a Comment