On October 13, I ran the Chicago Marathon. This is one of the premier marathons in the
world. It’s closer to home than most of
the other large marathons, so the travel is relatively easy. There’s one other reason, however, why I went
back this year. I love pizza, and
Chicago-style pizza is my favorite. I
went back to Chicago as much for the pizza as for the marathon.
I didn’t fly to Chicago until Saturday, but I made a point
of booking a morning flight, so I could arrive before lunch. That gave me one more opportunity to have
pizza. I flew into Midway airport and
took an orange line train into the city.
My flight was delayed about 30 minutes, so I had lunch before going to
my hotel.
I made a point of putting on a jacket before leaving the
train station, but I didn’t take the Time to put on a hat and gloves. I regretted
that as I walked to lunch. The wind was
much colder than I expected. On my way
to lunch, I had a nice view of the Willis Tower.
Chicago style pizza is my favorite. I’ve already been to several of the popular
restaurants, such as Giordano’s, Lou Malnati’s and Gino’s East. I wanted to try someplace new, so I went to The
Art of Pizza on State Street. I didn’t
want to eat a whole pie, and they save several varieties of pizza available by
the slice. I had a slice of their Art’s
Special stuffed pizza.
After lunch I continued to my hotel. I stayed at the Palmer House, which is only
two blocks from Grant Park, where the marathon starts and finishes. It’s an expensive hotel, and on race weekend,
it’s almost twice as expensive.
Normally, it would be out of my price range, but I was able to get two
free nights using Hilton points.
After checking in, I walked over to the Hilton and got in
line to board a bus to the expo. As
usual, it was held at McCormick Place. I
heard horror stories about long lines to get in on Friday, but on Saturday
afternoon, it wasn’t bad. I picked up my
race packet and then visited a few of the booths.
When I was done at the expo, I had to wait in a long line to
board a bus to get back to the Hilton. I
went back at the Palmer House and organized my clothes for the race.
I wanted to go for a stroll through Grant Park, but most of
the park was already fenced off for the race.
That’s really not too surprising.
It would be quite an undertaking to set up the start/finish area and all
the security checkpoints overnight.
Still, I thought I went sightseeing in the park last year. Maybe it was earlier in the day
For dinner, I went to Pizano’s Pizza & Pasta. There’s no
shortage of restaurants with deep dish pizza, but most of them were insanely
busy. I didn’t want to have to wait an
hour just to get a table and then wait another hour for my food. I chose this restaurant, because I knew I
could probably find a seat at the bar.
When I got there, there were people waiting outside. There were even more people waiting
inside. I walked over to the bar and
found a seat. A few minutes later, I was
ordering my pizza.
After dinner, I went to Stan’s Donuts to pick up something
for my pre-race breakfast. When I got
back to the Palmer House, I asked for a coffee maker, so I could make tea in
the morning. They don’t automatically
put them in every room. Most people just
go to the Starbucks on the ground floor.
You can get a coffee maker in your room, but you have to ask for one.
I went to bed early, but it took a long time to get to
sleep. I woke up feeling hot and had
trouble getting back to sleep. That
often happens after a big dinner. I didn’t
get as much sleep as I wanted, but I felt OK.
I got enough sleep to get by.
Sunday morning, the temperature was in the low 40s, but with
the wind, it felt like 30s. It wasn’t
going to warm up much during the race, so I wore tights, short sleeves, gloves,
and a warm hat. I went with the same
cheetah ensemble I wore for the Beer Lovers’ Marathon. I also had wind pants and a Tyvek jacket as
warm-up layers.
The race started at 7:30, but they recommend getting to
Grant Park at 5:30. In 2016, I left the
Palmer House at 6:45, and had no trouble getting to my corral on time. Last year, I was staying at the Hilton, which
is also close to the start. I again left
at 6:45, but this time, the security checkpoint was so congested that it took
25 minutes to get through. After that, I
only had seven minutes to get into my start corral, and I couldn’t make a
bathroom stop. Not knowing what to
expect this year, I planned on leaving earlier.
I set my alarm for 4:45, so I could be ready to leave by
5:45. Arriving early really makes a
difference. Not only did I breeze
through the security checkpoint, but there wasn’t anybody in line for the
port-o-potties.
The race was divided into three waves. Each wave had its own gear check area. The gear check for my wave was on the east
side of Buckingham fountain. I made my
way to the fountain, but it was much too early to discard my warm-up
clothes. I still had 90 minutes before
the start of the race. There were some
benches near the fountain, so I found a place to sit, and I waited. To make sure I wouldn’t get cold, I wrapped
myself in a space blanket.
In a large race like this, it’s always tough to decide when
to get in line for your last bathroom stop.
I wanted to wait long enough that I wouldn’t need another bathroom stop
before the race. The longer you wait,
however, the longer the lines get. I
needed to guess how long it would take to get through the bathroom line, how
long it would take to check my gear bag, and how long it would take to get into
my start corral. They close the corrals
10 minutes before the start of each wave.
If you’re not in your corral by then, you have to line up in the
back. I think I timed it just
right. By the time I was done in the
port-o-potty, I had 30 minutes to check my bag and get to my corral. That was plenty of time.
In my previous two races, I was able to qualify for
Boston. I wanted to see if I could qualify
three weeks in a row. To do that, I just
needed to break 3:35, but I was fairly confident I could run faster. I could see myself running anything from 3:25
to 3:35. There was a 3:30 pace group in
my corral. I was originally planning to
start the race with them, but then I noticed there was also a 3:25 group in my
corral. I made a last-minute decision to
start with them instead. It was an
aggressive pace, but I wanted to see what I could do.
I bumped into my friend Cade in the start corral. In recent years, he’s generally been faster
than me, but he’s had injuries. We both
lined up near the front of the corral, but neither of us knew how fast we would
run.
As each corral started, the corrals behind them moved
forward. The first time we moved
forward, I got my feet tangled in a plastic bag that was discarded by one of
the runners in front of me. I fell
forward and had to grab the waist of the runner in front of me to keep from
falling. I apologized, but couldn’t get
my feet untangled until we came to a stop.
After that, I payed more attention to the ground in front of me.
When it was time for our corral to start, I started fast and
kept my eye on the 3:25 pace leaders.
There were several other people between us, so I had to work hard to
keep from falling farther behind. The road
split, and I had to decide which way to go.
The 3:25 group kept to the right of the median. I went left.
That made it harder to see where they were, but gave me more room to try
to catch them. In the first half mile, I
was already finding the pace to be tiring.
When the two sides merged again, I moved over and got right
alongside the pace group. Now that I was
no longer working to catch up to them, the pace felt more manageable.
There are several sharp turns in the first few miles. Before the first turn, I sped up enough to
get in front of the 3:25 group. I could
no longer see them, but it was less crowded in front of them. It’s tough to stay with a group when you’re
following them around corners in a crowded race.
Aid stations came frequently. I think they were about two kilometers apart
on average. I skipped the first one to
avoid the congestion. After that, I
drank at only two thirds of the aid stations.
I wasn’t sweating that much, so I didn’t need to be drinking constantly.
The aid station volunteers at this race seem to really know
what they’re doing. They know just how
much to put in the cups and how to hand them to the runners. I was consistently able to grab a cup without
spilling and drink the Gatorade without stopping or slowing down.
Because I was in front of the 3:25 group, I had to pay
attention to my own pace. At two miles,
I checked my watch. I was going a little
too fast, so I eased up a bit. For the
first three or four miles, I could see Cade a short distance ahead of me. I was tempted to catch up to him, but I was
already worried that I might be going too fast.
By the time we reached the three mile mark, we were done
with the early turns and were on a long stretch headed north. On some sections, the street was
divided. I didn’t know which side of the
street the 3:25 group was on. If they
were on the other side, they could pass me without my realizing it. I kept looking across the street to see if
they were there.
At about four miles, I saw the 3:25 group just behind me on
the opposite side of the street. The
next time we reached an intersection, I crossed over to their side. I was still in front of them, but now I would
know if they caught up to me.
Over the next few miles, I sped up again. To finish in 3:25, I needed to average 7:48
per mile. I was consistently running
faster than that. On some miles, I was
as much as six seconds faster.
After about seven miles, we reached the northernmost part of
the course. After two sharp turns we
began running south again, back toward downtown. As soon as I made the second turn, I felt a
headwind. I was on the left side of the
street where I was exposed to the wind.
I moved to the middle of the street, so there would be more people in
front of me to block the wind.
Whenever I tried to settle in behind a group of runners, I
found they were going too slow for me.
I’d go around them, and then I’d be exposed to the wind again. I was getting farther ahead of the 3:25 group
and eventually decided I was going to run most of this race at my own pace.
By about 10 miles, I could see that we were running toward
the downtown buildings. Up until this
point, I wasn’t paying much attention to my surroundings. When I wasn’t navigating around other
runners, I was watching my footing.
We occasionally crossed bridges over the river. Some of the bridge surfaces were an
uncomfortable steel grate. They usually
had carpet covering at least one side of the bridge to give us the opportunity
to run on a more comfortable surface.
By the time I reached downtown again, I was halfway through
the race. I reached the halfway mark in
1:41:26. I was on pace for 3:23. At this point, I was expecting to run
positive splits. I was just hoping I
could hold on to finish in 3:25.
As we left downtown again, we headed west. I still felt a headwind. If anything, it was stronger. The wind was actually out of the southwest,
so I felt a headwind whether we were running south or west. I worked to keep up the pace, but sometimes
had miles as slow as 7:51.
The crowds at 15 miles were particularly loud. Their cheering helped me to keep up my effort
at a time when the wind was starting to wear me down. After two miles running west, we made two
turns and headed back toward downtown.
Now I had the wind at my back.
Going into the wind, I couldn’t quite maintain my pace, but now I was
able to pick up the pace again. Now I
was running directly toward the Willis Tower.
For the next several miles, the course snaked back and
forth. My pace was a little bit
erratic. Going into the wind, I would
slow down by a few seconds. When the wind
was at my back, I would speed up enough to make up the time. At one of the aid stations, an announcer
said, “If you’re having fun, you’re not doing it right.” A second or two later, I ran right in front
of him and said, “I’m not doing it right.”
I was enjoying the day, and that helped me keep up my effort during the
sections that were into the wind.
In the second half of the race, we ran through several
ethnic neighborhoods. I somehow ran
through Greektown and Little Italy without really noticing. At 19 miles, I reached a predominantly Mexican
neighborhood. Here, I heard music and
saw lots of Mexican flags. When the
crowd saw a runner from Mexico, they went crazy.
I got to run two more miles with the wind mostly at my back
before crossing a bridge over the river.
This is a very flat course. The
only hills are bridges, and most of those are fairly flat too. This bridge was a slight hill, but I knew
when I got across the river, I would enter Chinatown. Chinatown is my favorite neighborhood. It’s easily the most recognizable neighborhood
and it’s another place where the crowds really turn out.
The course took us south for two more miles. Finally, at 23 miles, we reached the
southernmost point on the course. As I
turned the corner, I saw a beer stop. I
was committed to running a fast time, so I skipped it. After a few more blocks, I turned again to
head north. For the rest of the race, I
would have the wind at my back. Knowing
that, I picked up my effort.
The next mile was my fastest of the race. I knew I was picking up the pace, but I was
still surprised to see that I ran that one in 7:08. At 24 miles, I realized that breaking 3:25
was no longer my goal. That was in the
bag. I was still on pace to break
3:23. With a strong finish, I could run
negative splits.
Mile 25 was disappointingly slow. I was no longer sure if I would run negative
splits. The Chicago Marathon is one of
the few races I knew that has a sign at one mile to go. That gave me another chance to check my
pace. At that point it was obvious. I was going to run negative splits.
I poured it on running north on Michigan Avenue. I saw a sign for 800 meters to go. That’s like two laps around a track. Soon, I could see the runners ahead of me
making the right turn at the southwest corner of Grant Park.
In some of my recent training runs, I tried to visualize the
last mile of this race. I imagined
myself on pace for a fast time, but needing to fight for it in the last
mile. I knew the hardest part would be
right after the turn.
On the south end of Grant Park, we had to go up a ramp to
cross a bridge over some railroad tracks.
As I came around the corner, I saw the ramp. I also saw the 400 meters to go sign. Just beyond it, I saw the 26 mile sign. Knowing how close I was, I was able to
maintain my pace going up the ramp.
Right after the bridge, there’s a left turn where we enter
Grant Park. From there, you can see the
finish line. It’s only about 200 meters
to go. I kept up my effort and finished
in 3:21:48.
This race exceeded my wildest expectations. I thought 3:25 was an ambitious goal, but I
ran three minutes faster than that. I
ran negative splits by more than a minute.
It was my second fastest race since 2014. The only one that was faster was on a
downhill course.
I qualified for Boston in three consecutive races for the
first time since April of 2015. I did it
on three consecutive weekends for the first time since November of 2014. Finally, after lots of ups and downs, I feel like
I’m the same runner I was five years ago.
I didn’t think I would ever get back to this point.
After getting my finisher medal, I got a much needed space
blanket. Now that I was no longer
running, I would get cold quickly. As I
continued through the finisher chute, I skipped the water and Gatorade, but ate
a banana, and picked up a snack bag with a variety of post-race snacks.
I made my way to Buckingham Fountain and retrieved my gear
bag. With difficult, I untied it and put
on my warm-up clothes. Then I made my
way to the post-race party area and had my free post-race beer. While I was there, I learned that the top woman,
Brigid Kosgei, set a new world record, shattering the mark set 16 years ago by
Paula Radcliffe. This was one day after
Eliud Kipchoge broke two hours in a highly publicized time trial. It was an exciting weekend.
It wasn’t as cold in Grant Park as I thought it would
be. It was sunny, and I didn’t feel the
wind as much there. It helped that it
wasn’t coming off the lake. I finished
my beer and ate about half of the post-race snacks. Then I walked back to the Palmer House to
take hot bath and change into clean clothes.
Later in the day, I went to a post-race party at my friend
Eliot’s house. This was Eliot’s 100th
marathon. He had to take four weeks off
from running to recover from an injury, so he didn’t know how the race would
go. He finished in less than four hours,
despite the lack of training.
Eliot and I have a lot of friends in common. At the party, I saw about a dozen
friends. I also met several other
runners. We had a variety of food and
beer, including deep dish pizza from Lou Malnati’s.
The nearest train station was several blocks away, so I had
to do a fair amount of walking to get to and from the train station. I didn’t have any sore muscles. I didn’t feel like you’re supposed to feel
after an all-out marathon. It felt like
it was just another day.
Sunday night I slept better.
I still had some of my post-race snacks, so I ate them for
breakfast. Walking though the airport, I
still didn’t feel any stiffness or soreness in my legs.
My flight home wasn’t until noon, so I had lunch at the
airport. The pizza you can get at the
airport is disappointing compared to what you can get in the city. Maybe I should have booked a later flight, so
I could eat at Lou Malnati’s.
Race Statistics
Distance: 26.2 miles
Time: 3:21:48
Average Pace: 7:42
Lifetime Marathons/Ultras:
388
World Marathon Majors:
19
Boston Qualifiers:
128
