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This year’s St. Jude Memphis Marathon Weekend is in the books. I come into the half-marathon each year with three goals. The first is to finish. The second is to finish in less than three hours. The third is to improve my time from the previous year. Two out of three, and I’m amazed that I came close to accomplishing the third. 22 seconds.
The lead runners took off at 8:00 Saturday morning. The temperature was brisk, but not nearly as cold as last year. Nevertheless, starting in corral 13 of 16, I knew that my group wouldn’t get to the starting line for a half-hour. The chute runs past the Peabody Hotel, so I waited inside until I saw the crowd starting to push forward. I went outside and merged into the mass of people. It was still another fifteen minutes before we reached the starting line. Our group was held short by two people with a rope stretched between them across the road while the group in front of us launched. As we approached, one person dropped her end of the rope and the other gathered it up. A local radio personality was giving motivational play-by-play over a loudspeaker. Then the countdown: 3-2-1 … a really loud air horn … and my group embarked.
It’s hard not to sprint across the starting line. Anticipation has been steadily building. The course also starts on a slight downhill, and it’s important to take advantage of the downhill portions. But take it easy.
The first challenge came just twenty minutes in. I had my air pods plugged in overnight, but apparently the battery was old and had lost its charge. Looks like I’m on my own from here. I never did get into a good racing headspace. I tried thinking about other stuff. All sorts of other stuff, but nothing stuck. Reflecting on this later, I realized that trying to find something to think about was, itself, something to think about.
I like the training course I take through my neighborhood. First, because it’s quiet and there’s not a lot of traffic. I wave at the cars as they go by. And second, because it’s made up of a lot of short segments. Start on the main road a little bit. Turn up the cul-de-sac. Back down to the main road. Six cul-de-sacs and back home makes 5 kilometers. Four laps is roughly a half-marathon. I train through November to three laps.
In contrast, the course downtown is characterized by long, long, straight stretches. One mile. Two miles. A little more. Sometimes it feels like you’re not making any progress. I try not to look too far ahead. Just enough to know “Am I going uphill?” or “Am I going downhill?” Thinking about the course in that way helped make the long straightaways more tolerable. (Earlier this summer I did a 5k on an airport runway. Talk about long, long, straight stretches and not feeling like you’re making any progress.)
I started the race hungry. I don’t know why. I had eaten as usual the previous evening and that morning. My stomach growling as my corral approached the start. A few miles in we passed Gus’ Chicken. I love Gus’ chicken. They were in front handing out drumsticks! I couldn’t resist. And then came the challenge of trying to eating without choking while breathing heavily. Little bites. Delicious!!
The highlight of the course, I think for everybody, is the section that runs through the hospital grounds. There seemed to be more people outside than there had been in previous years. Caregivers and staff. Families standing with their children. Families standing with pictures of their children. Two of my wife Karen’s students were St. Jude kids. Each year I think about the son of a former co-worker who was a St. Jude patient and recovered. Many, many runners have “I’m running for…” or “I’m running in memory of…” signs on their backs.
The last five kilometers were the hardest. They’re always the hardest. My watch was telling me I had four kilometers left, but the course splits and measurements taken around the neighborhoods suggested that it was closer to five. There was no way I was going to beat my time from last year. Finishing in less than three hours still seemed likely, but at one point it was “one foot, next foot, one foot, next foot, and let’s just finish ….”
The last major section is a long stretch down Danny Thomas Blvd. Many people I’ve spoken with find it grueling. I do, too. It’s a very wide road and you’re going mostly straight. Again, you don’t feel like you’re making any progress. Up the overpass, then back down. Up another overpass, then back down. After those is the curve that fakes you out because you think that you’re taking the off-ramp to the finish; but no, it’s the next one.
The off-ramp to the finish is twice as steep as the others, but once you get to the top the finish line is just a couple blocks away. All downhill. Large, loud crowds line both sides of the street. Your name pops up on the message board over the finish line. No need to save energy at this point.
I was stunned by my finish time.
2 hours 41 minutes 44 seconds.
It seemed like it would be much more than that.
Taking a closer look at how I placed (as compared with last year):
- Age/Sex Group: 130/192; 68.59% (131/191; 68.59%)
- Male: 2,342/2,969; 78.88% (2,352/2,951; 79.70%)
- Overall: 4,829/6,843; 70.57% (4,813/6,792; 70.86%)
I would have finished in exactly the same place in my age/sex group as last year. Same hours. Same minutes. That qualifies as pretty consistent.
Last year’s race went extremely well and I felt good throughout. This year’s race was challenging and I felt less good throughout.
But maybe last year wasn’t an outlier after all. Maybe this year wasn’t as bad as sometimes it felt at the time. My splits were actually slightly better this year until the very end. Maybe one’s own evaluation of one’s own performance is skewed, or at least not totally accurate.
Thinking back on the race, despite not feeling like I got into a flow, the course didn’t seem as long this year as it had the past two. Maybe there was more flow than I thought. My heart rate was much, much better this year than last year (I use it sort of like a tachometer to regulate running and recovery intervals). The long stretches downtown didn’t seem so long. Going down and back up North Parkway didn’t seem as interminable. The up the overpasses and down the overpasses of Danny Thomas Blvd. passed faster. The last off-ramp seemed to come sooner.
And then it was over. I started training back in May.
I know what I need to do to improve, and I know what I need to keep doing. I have some ideas for changes in training, preparation, and the race. But even if I don’t finish faster, I’ll still do everything I can to be out there. And I’ll still do everything I can to finish.
I’m already looking forward to next year.
My detailed race results are here (search for my name).
If you’re interested in contributing to St. Jude, please see my 2025 fundraising page or the St. Jude website.
