Seth, Ben and I signed up for the Great Wall Marathon at the end of February. They had both run marathons before, and I hadn't, but I thought it sounded like a good goal and something to work for while I was in Beijing. It ended up taking a lot of time and effort, but it was worth it in many ways.
It cost almost $300, steep for a marathon, but that was only more incentive to train and make sure the experience was worth what I paid for it. Starting in early March, I began running about 3 times a week. I downloaded an iPhone app, RunKeeper, that kept track of my location and speed and told me whether I was ahead or behind of my target pace, and I mostly used that when I ran. I started slowly, only running 5-10 kilometers, but after a few weeks I was ready for longer runs. I would always run on the roads, generally at night after work, often going north past Josef's apartment along line 5 of the subway so I could take it back if I got tired/twisted my ankle or something. I got over my dislike of running, and although I didn't always love it, I became very good at making myself go, even at 9:30 pm after a long day.
I did stairs a couple times before the marathon to get ready for the wall. I would go to an intersection by my house and run up and down and around the four-way circular overpass over the intersection. Some people really got a kick out of watching me run stairs and around and around the overpass!
I only did a few long runs before the marathon itself - a few half marathons and then a 20-mile run two weeks beforehand. On a few of my long runs, I developed blisters on my feet, right on the arch. I don't really have an arch, and my feet are pretty flat, so my feet were rebelling against the constant pounding they were getting. But by the race I had gotten pretty thick calluses on both of my feet and felt like it wouldn't be a problem.
Race day was Saturday, May 19th. Seth and Ben took a night train from Shanghai Thursday night and arrived at 8 Friday morning. Thursday was my last day of work in Beijing, so Seth, Ben, Joel and I hung out in Beijing on Friday; we got lunch at a great Greek restaurant with a buffet lunch, and Seth tried to apply for a Kazakh visa to go in July while Ben and I went shopping and saw Jingshan Park behind the Forbidden City. We tried to get to bed early, and succeeded after watching a comedy skit that had us in tears!
2:30 am came way too early. We left at 2:45 for the hotel parking lot where the bus would take us to the race. The buses left at 3:30 and took until just before 6 to get to the section of the Great Wall outside of Tianjin where the race was held. Then we still had an hour and a half to wait before the race started. It was kind of chilly, so we sat there in the cold hating the organizers of the race for a good 45 minutes. They started some aerobic exercises and stretches, which none of us really participated in. There were about 2500 people there, running and watching runners for the marathon, 1/2 marathon, 10k and 5k, from over 100 different countries. It was an interesting sight.
Seth and Ben were in the first starting corral for the marathon, so after a few speeches by county leaders and other luminaries (requisite at nearly every official and semi-official occasion in China), the gun went off at 7:31! I waited 5 minutes for the second group to start and began the race. I didn't think I would see either Seth or Ben along the course, since they're both good runners and had run marathons before, but I was hoping to still get a good time. Ha ha ha!
The first 5 kilometers was a steep uphill slope, winding up a mountainside. I was grateful for the cool air as we started running, and I kept a pretty good pace, passing some people and getting passed by the career marathoners with all their equipment and packets of energy gel attached around their waists. After we reached the top of the mountain, we started the wall portion, which went for just over 3 kilometers. If you've never been to the Great Wall before, it's intense. The steps are irregular and there are sections with shorter steps and then sections of steep staircases with steps over a foot in height. It slants at times, and occasionally there's only room for one person at a time with a steep drop to one side. Nearly everyone walked the wall - running it only invites busted knees for the rest of the race. But apart from the occasional traffic jam, I felt good. The very end was a series of steep staircases going down to the valley floor to continue the race.
Following that, it was mostly flat for a good 10-12 kilometers. I kept running, but around kilometer 17 or so I started getting a blister on my right foot, and it kept getting bigger and more painful. I was really annoyed with my foot, especially since the blister was right where I had a thick callus. I kept running until kilometer 20 or so and then started alternating a bit of walking with some running. At that point, I thought I would finish at least an hour behind Seth and Ben, but I was determined to keep going, come what may.
There were water stations and places with bananas and sports drinks every few kilometers along the course - I probably drank a third of 20 water bottles, pouring the rest of it over myself and throwing the bottle into a basket or on the side of the road. There were old ladies and men with scooters going along all day picking up water bottles and trash. There were also a lot of kids on the course, particularly as it went through little mountain villages. I high-fived at least 100 kids as I ran, which was fun but may well explain why I've been feeling a bit sick this week.
At one of the stations at kilometer 26, I came across Seth, sitting down at the side of the course. I was so focused I would have passed him without seeing him if he hadn't yelled my name as I ran by. I stopped for a bit, and he explained that his stomach had been hurting since the first wall portion, and he could only run for a bit, then walk, and stop to recuperate before running again. We walked together for a kilometer or so and then ran until about kilometer 30 on dirt roads with lots of little rocks. Perfect place to sprain an ankle. Seth had to stop again after that, so I pressed on. My blister still hurt, and it was filling with fluid and squishing unpleasantly, but it was bearable, and I kept up a light jog.
Around kilometer 34, the course went through the finish line and then retraced the wall portion backwards. This meant that we had to first hike that huge flight of stairs going straight up the mountain before tackling the rest of the wall. I thought to myself how perfect it was that they put the final wall section right where most runners hit the wall anyway. By the time I got up those stairs, my legs were jelly and I had no energy left. The entire wall section was very painful - I kept stopping to rest and then made myself get up and keep going. Everyone around me was doing it, too - I lost track of how many times I would pass the same people only to have them pass me a minute later and then pass them again with a brief burst of energy.
Near the end of the wall section, I found Ben, sitting halfway up a staircase in a daze. He didn't even recognize/look at me until I said hi. I was very surprised to see him - Seth and I thought he was way ahead of us, but here he was on the wall. His legs had been cramping up starting just before halfway through the race, and it got especially bad on the wall. He could only climb 20 steps before stopping to rest, and he had a medic massage them for about 20 minutes before I got there. I didn't want to stop for too long, though, so I wished him good luck and carried on.
After the wall, the last 5 kilometers going down the mountain road were comparative bliss. I was near the end of my endurance, but gravity helped me totter down. I got to kilometer 41 at the base of the mountain and started running for the finish. I slowed to a walk before kilometer 42, but a woman I had passed while running came jogging up and so I ran with her to the finish. I finished in just under 6.5 hours, and it was a glorious feeling! Just to emphasize how brutal the wall was: I ran the 35 kilometers before the second wall section in just over 4.5 hours. The wall took almost 2 hours the second time.
Seth wasn't there - I didn't know whether to expect him to finish the race or whether he would just stop there at the 34 kilometer mark. They closed the wall before the rest of the course to ensure that everyone would finish and no one was left stranded up there. But 15 minutes after I came in, Ben finished, and Seth came running in 15 minutes after Ben. We all finished! I was very surprised to have finished first, considering I had never done a marathon before, but then again this marathon was totally unlike any other. And apparently I had trained much more than Seth and Ben, and that helped a lot.
After the Great Wall Marathon, I think any other marathon will be a piece of cake. :)
