State # 14: Detroit Free Press Marathon (MI) October 15, 2017

I first heard the rumor that Beast would be pacing Detroit while on my way to the expo for the KY Derby Festival marathon in April of 2017. This was an exciting prospect for a couple of reasons: 1. I needed a MI race 2. I'd never even been to MI 3. The Detroit marathon also involved crossing into Canada, two countries in one race! This would also mean that I would need to renew my passport since it was long expired after I had gone to Europe in college. The rumor was true, and I quickly found myself with the 4:40 pacer slot.

Upon arriving in Detroit the first thing was to get to the expo where I had to work a shift in the pacer booth. Bib pickup is where you had to show your passport. You were supposed to carry your passport during the race, but they would really only stop you if your bib wasn't clearly visible. Getting to the booth was fun to meet more of the team. The really challenging questions in the booth came from the Canadian runners who only knew their pace in minutes/km instead of miles. Stupid metric system! After finishing my shift I walked through the vendor area of the expo and then needed to get checked in to the hotel. We were staying at the 70-floor Marriot at the Renaissance Center. Our hotel rooms were provided by the race, but Vanessa (owner of Beast pacing) somehow managed to get us a 3:00 late checkout. The hotel staff couldn't believe it! They told us that nobody gets 3:00 checkout!

Next up was the pacer dinner. This was a huge team and Vanessa was actually on-site for the race. This has only happened to me one other time in 3 years of pacing for Beast. Getting time to actually hang out with the team was one of the highlights of the trip. I had gone to college with one of the other pacers, so it was fun to catch up.

On race morning we were greeted with a warm and windy day. I was also concerned about the possibility of rain, but stayed dry for the entire race. The wind helped to make the temperature more bearable for the early part of the race. The pacers gathered to walk to the start, get a picture, and have a team meeting.  After dispersing, I stopped by the bag drop, took a final bathroom stop, and headed to the corrals. I was joined by Falko who would be my co-pacer. I was very happy about this, because he had run the race 8 times before.

After 2 national anthems, the race began. The corral system was very regulated in 2 minute intervals so that the border crossings wouldn't get overwhelmed. Heading out from the start towards the Ambassador bridge I saw my friend Halbert about 1 mile in. We met the first time I paced a full marathon, and I've seen him at a number of races since then.

The course was pretty crowded until we made it to Canada, which was the first 4 miles. We had intended to take some walk breaks on the Ambassador Bridge, but it didn't go that way since we had been a little slower than our intended pace up until then. We did actually speed up a little on the "down" side of the bridge but were still a little behind as we crossed the border. On the Canada side we ran a couple of miles along the river towards the tunnel. Falko took the pacer sign for a bit and it felt quite freeing to just settle back into the group. I was back at the lead when we entered the tunnel. I pushed the pace again as we went down under the river. When we emerged from the tunnel we hit the 8 mile marker and seemed to be on time, but at 10 we were mysteriously behind. We needed to make some tough decisions since we were pacing the half and the full. In order for the half marathoners to make it in on time we would need to pick things up, but it could be at the expense of tiring out the full marathoners by making up the time too quickly. I pushed us along trying to strike a good balance. As we neared the split we cheered the half marathoners on hoping that they would make 2:20.

As the marathoners struck out for the second half we were right on time. There was a long straight stretch as we headed due east from downtown. In this area I met another of my former pace group members from a previous race, Sarah. She had been in my group in North Carolina in 2016, and we had also bumped into each other at the post-race party at Buffalo. The group had thinned out a bit from the push to get us back on track. I kept tending to drift a little fast, but Falko kept me in check. At around 17.5 we entered an interesting section of the course--Indian Village! Lots of community support! There was a big cut out on the side of the course where you could "break through the wall", there was a guy holding up his golden retreiver's paw so you get a dog high five, there was more alcohol than I had ever seen on a marathon course!

Despite having just broken through the wall, we were now entering what would be the toughest part of the race. As we headed toward Belle Isle the wind became much more noticeable and once we were on the island it seemed we were headed into the wind no matter which direction we were facing. We only had one person left in our group, a young man named Emerson. He had run a good half marathon over the summer and decided it was time to run his first full. Out on the island we made a couple of realizations: Emerson had started in an earlier corral than us, and Falko and I both needed a bathroom stop. Falko gave Emerson a quick run down of the rest of the course and we sent him ahead, then both of us stopped at a permanent bathroom in the park. Falko was in and out and back out on the course, but I needed a longer stop because of my colitis. When I caught back up to Falko I started to chew him out for running faster than needed to be on pace, but at the next mile marker (23) I found out that we were right on time, because the course kept measuring long compared to my Garmin. As we pushed toward the finish the wind kept getting stronger and the course kept getting longer! Falko faded back, but I kept pushing on to finish on time. I was able to encourage some others along the way, but it really was a fight all the way to the finish.

Emerson made it in right around 4:40! He had run so strong with us and pushed it through to the end. My timing chip "blew up" somewhere between mile 25 and the end of the race and I had to contact the timing company to actually get my official time of 4:39:03. My Garmin measured 26.74 miles, the longest I've ever had for a marathon course. Of course, there was the complication of the mile long tunnel where we couldn't actually get a satellite signal.  There wasn't really much of a post race party or food spread, but I loved all of unique elements of this course and would love to do it again with better weather.