All these weeks and months of training and preparation, I was feeling so good, so ready, so strong and so fast. I was prepared for my best run ever, even holding out the possibility of a personal best time - faster than what I'd pulled off fourteen years ago. I was ready to finish the day feeling exhilarated, powerful, time- and age-defying-ly fast, ready to return again in 2017, for the first time ever, as a Boston qualifier.
In the end, I had an amazing experience.
But also a very different experience than the one I'd picture in my head.
By the time I crossed that finish line on Boylston Street, my heart is full. Between miles 21 and the finish it just about burst. And, instead of power and speed, it was humility and humanity and my limits and pain, and me barely holding it together at multiple points, and just one foot in front of another, and another. And then it was over.
The day came together something like this:
All week, I had been so keyed up for this race, I wasn't sleeping well. Race day was no exception. Awake for good by three something. Lay there until 4:30 AM. Then just got up.
In the spirit of gratitude, I'd just written about here on this blog and knew would go live just as my race began, I wrote a pair of thank you notes for a pair of Dream Big! gifts that came in at the 11th hour, propelling me beyond the $10,000 mark - and with more still trickling in.
I checked my messages and found a word of encouragement from a friend and running partner, including this quote by Harold Whaley:
"Just do your best, it is all you can do. Don't ask how, just begin and do it now. The world waits for you"
The perfect word for the day.
Coffee. Breakfast, and unhurried, cheerful time with my family over the next few hours. Final preparations and gathering of gear. And a little before 8, they all walked and ran and sang me down the hill towards the T.
Clear blue skies. Sun shining. A beautiful day for a Marathon.
On the Orange Line, it was easy to pick out the other runners. I sat across from a woman from New York, running Boston for her fourth time. More joined at each stop, until we all spilled out at the Chinatown stop and, a block away, joined the masses queuing for buses at Boston Common. A scene to make one think everyone in the city was a marathoner. Wave after wave after wave of yellow school buses. They pulled up two abreast, twenty rows back. Each filled up with giddy runners, then pulled away. Replaced by a new wave. And on again.
And off we went, in a grand caravan, police officers waving us by at every intersection, people waving at us and us waving back, cars honking - so much joy directed our way and beaming from inside each bus, as we pulled onto the Mass Pike and pointed West towards Hopkinton.
"Don't look out the window from the bus," our coach had quipped, "You'll get a sense of how far 26.2 miles really is."
And the ride did feel long. But soon enough we pulled into the parking lot of Hopkinton High and spilled out into the Athletes Village. Already the temperature was rising to where I dumped my $1 winter coat from Boomerangs in JP - though I kept my Edgartown Yacht Club INSTRUCTOR pants on until I found my way through the throngs into our (what a gift!) charity VIP indoor staging area at the Brown Gymnasium - the private cluster of porta-potties reserved just for us the most treasured luxury, as the great masses queued up 15-20 deep out on the flaying fields behind the school.
A team photo. Some stretching. Vaseline under arms and between legs against the chaffing miles ahead. Pre-race snacking. Sipping water and Powerade.
One of the volunteers working the gym stopped by to advise us that, given the rising heat outside (already in the 70s) with no cloud cover, and only very limited tree cover (still early early spring in Boston), to be sure to drink Gatorade along the way, to keep our electrolytes up. With water only, they'd flush right through us and we'd cramp bad. I hadn't planned to drink any - I can't really stand the sticky stuff mid-race, but thought, OK, maybe a few sips every once in a while.
Then, at 10:30, it was time for the charity wave to queue up, which we did first at the edge of the Athletes Village, and then again, after a 1/4 mile walk, at the start. I sucked down a sticky-sweet, chocolaty goo for a last jolt of energy before we got going, and shimmied my way as close to the rope at the front of our corral as I could get.
I noticed that, even though I'd guzzled that whole Powerade and bottle of water, my mouth already felt dry.
Counting down to the start, I took note of the thick crowds ahead of me in the three earlier corrals of my wave. The runner next to me looked fast, like a veteran. Turned out he was. Expect to take 3-4 miles to clear through the traffic and run your own pace, he advised. Ready to go fast, to run the race of my life, I couldn't quite accept that, and didn't.
When the Go! call finally came, I snaked my way up the edge to the left, as advised by a running friend and experienced Boston Marathon runner. Then I dodged and weaved, and occasionally jumped up on a sidewalk. And though that was all counter to the sage advice of our coach, by a mile or so in, I had cleared through most of the traffic and settled in to what felt like my pace. Not pushing too hard. Focused on cadence. Soaking in the scene.
At the 5K mark, we crossed the first chip-reading sensor, sending data on our progress immediately to all those following us via text or the app or the website. I thought of all those I'm running for, and those I knew would be tracking me, and said, "Hello everybody."
I learned later, I'd run that first 5K in sub-7 minute pace; 25/seconds a mile faster than my personal best marathon pace. I didn't feel as if I were pushing it. Felt really comfortable and, in my mind, as if I was even heeding our coach's advice to hold back at the start.
Those next few miles were great. A total blast. The crowds weren't thick that early in the race, but present and full of encouragements. Kids reaching out their hands for high fives. "This way to Boston?" I asked now and then to one of them who caught my eye. "That's right!" they said, "You're headed the right way."
"You got this, Dream Big!" many shouted for me.
I danced as I ran to music blaring along the sidelines.
I saw a first familiar face around mile 12 - a colleague at a front yard BBQ. He shouted my name and ran with me for 50 yards (beer in hand). "You're doing great," he said, "Fast!" And I felt it. And a jolt of adrenaline from from his company and good cheer.
Then into the woods and towards the roar of the famous Wellesley College Scream Tunnel, where I resisted the many offers of kisses and proposals of marriage, and wondered what, if anything, was behind that sign held by the bare-shouldered, bare-legged coeds that read, "If you run fast enough, we'll drop this sign!"
"Dream Big!" yelled one of them. "You were in my big dream last night!"
Then further into the woods.
Near the half-marathon mark, I spotted Linda Driscoll, Founder and ED of Dream Big! and mugged for this photo. Me in my yellow, Wave 4 bib, now deep into the Wave 3 blues. Feeling great.
In the miles ahead, as we rolled along the relative flats before plunging down into Newton Lower Falls, the headwinds really picked up. At the water stations, the discarded cups chased and bounded and raced past us in the breeze.
"I tackled all the Kenyans," said one poster, "You still have a chance!"
"Beer 10.5 miles, right this way." said another.
"Stefan Lanfer!" called a grad school friend from amidst the crowd. Another jolt of cheer and energy.
Climbing up out of Newton Lower Falls for a first long ascent to Newton-Wellesley Hospital. My legs started feeling a little tight. But then I spied the firehouse and recalled our coach's words - "Where you turn towards home."
That's also where we turned to the famous Newton Hills.
I ran through the water spray tunnel outside the firehouse and raised my arms high above my head to psych myself up for that first big hill.
A cry of "Dream Big! Go Stefan!" from the left-hand side. And I turned to spot one of my wife's teammates.
Brought a smile to my face and jolt of energy for my legs.
But as I crested that first hill and started downwards, all of a sudden, something was decidedly off. My right hamstring seized up - and had me hopping for a few momentum strides, until I slowed to a walk, and kept walking to stretch it out and let it calm down enough that I could shuffle onward. Like an old lady on a frozen lake, I thought.
Come on, old lady, let's go.
Not long after, I heard "STEFAN LANFER!" and turned to see another colleague and his whole cheering family. I waved and smiled and gave a thumbs up and kept going.
I had no idea what my time was at that point. But I knew my various power- and strength- and speed-goals were slipping away, and that a different test of endurance was taking shape. Now, I just wanted to get to the finish.
I started walking through every water stop, and gulping down a whole cup of Gatorade at each one.
Down the hill by the BC reservoir, and a left turn onto Beacon St., into a stretch where I expected to see the greatest number of friends and family and more colleagues and the biggest most boisterous crowds of the whole course.
To be honest, I had imagined that, at that point, they'd see me and think, "Wow! He barely looks like he's working at all! How effortless. How fast."
I knew then they'd see a very different version of me. They'd see me and think, "Ouch."
That's when I spotted the sign, "When your legs give out, run with your HEART!"
I don't know what it was about that sign. But it so spoke to where I was at that very moment. And I was overcome. I started crying. And shuffled on.
More colleagues spotted me and shouted for me near Coolidge Corner. Another jolt of gladness that checked the emotional and physical overwhelm.
Then I passed a whole crowd of Jamaica Plain running friends and their families. I knew they knew how rough I looked, how much slower than planned I was going, how I was crashing. But their cheers and smiles made me smile, brightened my spirit, spurred me onwards.
And then I passed the temple in Brookline where, in 2010, while watching the marathon, Ashley and I went in to participate in a donor drive for Leukemia. A picture of a smiling young baby on a poster out front, with some version of, "Please, help save me!"lured us in. Our oldest two children were 3 and 1 at the time at the time, and we thought, "If that were our child, we'd be praying for people like us to stop in."
A year later, in 2011, my college roommate, a father of three, died only days after being diagnosed with Acute Leukemia.
Three weeks ago, I got a call of the Gift of Life Donor registry that I'd been identified as a possible match for a 37 year old man suffering from the same disease. The next week I went into Mass General for a series of blood tests to find out whether I am or not.
Passing that Brookline temple again, I lost it again, was completely overtaken by emotion - and still was, a quarter mile later when I spotted my family with their homemade Go Daddy! signs and bright pink Dream Big! t-shirts.
Just get to them, I had been telling myself for miles and miles. They'll get you to the finish.
I stopped to hug each one of them.
"I'm hurting real bad," I said through tears to Ashley.
Then kept going.
Up that last real hill on the overpass by Fenway Park. Mile 25.
Down into Kendall Square.
Across the "Last Mile to Go" sign freshly painted on Beacon Street.
Under the Storrow Drive exit overpass painted blue with yellow letters reading, "Boston Strong!"
Down the underpass under Mass Ave.
Up again and right on Hereford.
That banner again.
Gratitude.
I held my arms above my head for whatever jolt of adrenaline and testosterone I could muster from that power pose.
Left on Boylston.
And there was the finish - 1/4 mile away.
I raised my arms above my head again, held them there for a count of twenty, then brought them down slowly, holding them straight out to my sides like I was flying.
And I was,
sort of
(not really).
Shuffling on.
Then I raised them high again one last time.
And crossed the finish line.
And that
was
it.
A long journey finished.
Not the one I planned.
The one I got.
The one I'll always remember.
I wonder what will come next.
But for now, I am simply savoring every step of this journey.
A little sad that its over.
So thankful that it happened.
And to everyone who helped in ways uncountable along the way.
In the end, I had an amazing experience.
But also a very different experience than the one I'd picture in my head.
By the time I crossed that finish line on Boylston Street, my heart is full. Between miles 21 and the finish it just about burst. And, instead of power and speed, it was humility and humanity and my limits and pain, and me barely holding it together at multiple points, and just one foot in front of another, and another. And then it was over.
The day came together something like this:
All week, I had been so keyed up for this race, I wasn't sleeping well. Race day was no exception. Awake for good by three something. Lay there until 4:30 AM. Then just got up.
In the spirit of gratitude, I'd just written about here on this blog and knew would go live just as my race began, I wrote a pair of thank you notes for a pair of Dream Big! gifts that came in at the 11th hour, propelling me beyond the $10,000 mark - and with more still trickling in.
I checked my messages and found a word of encouragement from a friend and running partner, including this quote by Harold Whaley:
"Just do your best, it is all you can do. Don't ask how, just begin and do it now. The world waits for you"
The perfect word for the day.
Coffee. Breakfast, and unhurried, cheerful time with my family over the next few hours. Final preparations and gathering of gear. And a little before 8, they all walked and ran and sang me down the hill towards the T.
Clear blue skies. Sun shining. A beautiful day for a Marathon.
On the Orange Line, it was easy to pick out the other runners. I sat across from a woman from New York, running Boston for her fourth time. More joined at each stop, until we all spilled out at the Chinatown stop and, a block away, joined the masses queuing for buses at Boston Common. A scene to make one think everyone in the city was a marathoner. Wave after wave after wave of yellow school buses. They pulled up two abreast, twenty rows back. Each filled up with giddy runners, then pulled away. Replaced by a new wave. And on again.
And off we went, in a grand caravan, police officers waving us by at every intersection, people waving at us and us waving back, cars honking - so much joy directed our way and beaming from inside each bus, as we pulled onto the Mass Pike and pointed West towards Hopkinton.
"Don't look out the window from the bus," our coach had quipped, "You'll get a sense of how far 26.2 miles really is."
And the ride did feel long. But soon enough we pulled into the parking lot of Hopkinton High and spilled out into the Athletes Village. Already the temperature was rising to where I dumped my $1 winter coat from Boomerangs in JP - though I kept my Edgartown Yacht Club INSTRUCTOR pants on until I found my way through the throngs into our (what a gift!) charity VIP indoor staging area at the Brown Gymnasium - the private cluster of porta-potties reserved just for us the most treasured luxury, as the great masses queued up 15-20 deep out on the flaying fields behind the school.
A team photo. Some stretching. Vaseline under arms and between legs against the chaffing miles ahead. Pre-race snacking. Sipping water and Powerade.
One of the volunteers working the gym stopped by to advise us that, given the rising heat outside (already in the 70s) with no cloud cover, and only very limited tree cover (still early early spring in Boston), to be sure to drink Gatorade along the way, to keep our electrolytes up. With water only, they'd flush right through us and we'd cramp bad. I hadn't planned to drink any - I can't really stand the sticky stuff mid-race, but thought, OK, maybe a few sips every once in a while.
Then, at 10:30, it was time for the charity wave to queue up, which we did first at the edge of the Athletes Village, and then again, after a 1/4 mile walk, at the start. I sucked down a sticky-sweet, chocolaty goo for a last jolt of energy before we got going, and shimmied my way as close to the rope at the front of our corral as I could get.
I noticed that, even though I'd guzzled that whole Powerade and bottle of water, my mouth already felt dry.
Counting down to the start, I took note of the thick crowds ahead of me in the three earlier corrals of my wave. The runner next to me looked fast, like a veteran. Turned out he was. Expect to take 3-4 miles to clear through the traffic and run your own pace, he advised. Ready to go fast, to run the race of my life, I couldn't quite accept that, and didn't.
When the Go! call finally came, I snaked my way up the edge to the left, as advised by a running friend and experienced Boston Marathon runner. Then I dodged and weaved, and occasionally jumped up on a sidewalk. And though that was all counter to the sage advice of our coach, by a mile or so in, I had cleared through most of the traffic and settled in to what felt like my pace. Not pushing too hard. Focused on cadence. Soaking in the scene.
At the 5K mark, we crossed the first chip-reading sensor, sending data on our progress immediately to all those following us via text or the app or the website. I thought of all those I'm running for, and those I knew would be tracking me, and said, "Hello everybody."
I learned later, I'd run that first 5K in sub-7 minute pace; 25/seconds a mile faster than my personal best marathon pace. I didn't feel as if I were pushing it. Felt really comfortable and, in my mind, as if I was even heeding our coach's advice to hold back at the start.
Those next few miles were great. A total blast. The crowds weren't thick that early in the race, but present and full of encouragements. Kids reaching out their hands for high fives. "This way to Boston?" I asked now and then to one of them who caught my eye. "That's right!" they said, "You're headed the right way."
"You got this, Dream Big!" many shouted for me.
I danced as I ran to music blaring along the sidelines.
I saw a first familiar face around mile 12 - a colleague at a front yard BBQ. He shouted my name and ran with me for 50 yards (beer in hand). "You're doing great," he said, "Fast!" And I felt it. And a jolt of adrenaline from from his company and good cheer.
Then into the woods and towards the roar of the famous Wellesley College Scream Tunnel, where I resisted the many offers of kisses and proposals of marriage, and wondered what, if anything, was behind that sign held by the bare-shouldered, bare-legged coeds that read, "If you run fast enough, we'll drop this sign!"
"Dream Big!" yelled one of them. "You were in my big dream last night!"
Then further into the woods.
Near the half-marathon mark, I spotted Linda Driscoll, Founder and ED of Dream Big! and mugged for this photo. Me in my yellow, Wave 4 bib, now deep into the Wave 3 blues. Feeling great.
In the miles ahead, as we rolled along the relative flats before plunging down into Newton Lower Falls, the headwinds really picked up. At the water stations, the discarded cups chased and bounded and raced past us in the breeze.
"I tackled all the Kenyans," said one poster, "You still have a chance!"
"Beer 10.5 miles, right this way." said another.
"Stefan Lanfer!" called a grad school friend from amidst the crowd. Another jolt of cheer and energy.
Climbing up out of Newton Lower Falls for a first long ascent to Newton-Wellesley Hospital. My legs started feeling a little tight. But then I spied the firehouse and recalled our coach's words - "Where you turn towards home."
That's also where we turned to the famous Newton Hills.
I ran through the water spray tunnel outside the firehouse and raised my arms high above my head to psych myself up for that first big hill.
A cry of "Dream Big! Go Stefan!" from the left-hand side. And I turned to spot one of my wife's teammates.
Brought a smile to my face and jolt of energy for my legs.
But as I crested that first hill and started downwards, all of a sudden, something was decidedly off. My right hamstring seized up - and had me hopping for a few momentum strides, until I slowed to a walk, and kept walking to stretch it out and let it calm down enough that I could shuffle onward. Like an old lady on a frozen lake, I thought.
Come on, old lady, let's go.
Not long after, I heard "STEFAN LANFER!" and turned to see another colleague and his whole cheering family. I waved and smiled and gave a thumbs up and kept going.
I had no idea what my time was at that point. But I knew my various power- and strength- and speed-goals were slipping away, and that a different test of endurance was taking shape. Now, I just wanted to get to the finish.
I started walking through every water stop, and gulping down a whole cup of Gatorade at each one.
Down the hill by the BC reservoir, and a left turn onto Beacon St., into a stretch where I expected to see the greatest number of friends and family and more colleagues and the biggest most boisterous crowds of the whole course.
To be honest, I had imagined that, at that point, they'd see me and think, "Wow! He barely looks like he's working at all! How effortless. How fast."
I knew then they'd see a very different version of me. They'd see me and think, "Ouch."
That's when I spotted the sign, "When your legs give out, run with your HEART!"
I don't know what it was about that sign. But it so spoke to where I was at that very moment. And I was overcome. I started crying. And shuffled on.
More colleagues spotted me and shouted for me near Coolidge Corner. Another jolt of gladness that checked the emotional and physical overwhelm.
Then I passed a whole crowd of Jamaica Plain running friends and their families. I knew they knew how rough I looked, how much slower than planned I was going, how I was crashing. But their cheers and smiles made me smile, brightened my spirit, spurred me onwards.
And then I passed the temple in Brookline where, in 2010, while watching the marathon, Ashley and I went in to participate in a donor drive for Leukemia. A picture of a smiling young baby on a poster out front, with some version of, "Please, help save me!"lured us in. Our oldest two children were 3 and 1 at the time at the time, and we thought, "If that were our child, we'd be praying for people like us to stop in."
A year later, in 2011, my college roommate, a father of three, died only days after being diagnosed with Acute Leukemia.
Three weeks ago, I got a call of the Gift of Life Donor registry that I'd been identified as a possible match for a 37 year old man suffering from the same disease. The next week I went into Mass General for a series of blood tests to find out whether I am or not.
Passing that Brookline temple again, I lost it again, was completely overtaken by emotion - and still was, a quarter mile later when I spotted my family with their homemade Go Daddy! signs and bright pink Dream Big! t-shirts.
Just get to them, I had been telling myself for miles and miles. They'll get you to the finish.
I stopped to hug each one of them.
"I'm hurting real bad," I said through tears to Ashley.
Then kept going.
Up that last real hill on the overpass by Fenway Park. Mile 25.
Down into Kendall Square.
Across the "Last Mile to Go" sign freshly painted on Beacon Street.
Under the Storrow Drive exit overpass painted blue with yellow letters reading, "Boston Strong!"
Down the underpass under Mass Ave.
Up again and right on Hereford.
That banner again.
Gratitude.
I held my arms above my head for whatever jolt of adrenaline and testosterone I could muster from that power pose.
Left on Boylston.
And there was the finish - 1/4 mile away.
I raised my arms above my head again, held them there for a count of twenty, then brought them down slowly, holding them straight out to my sides like I was flying.
And I was,
sort of
(not really).
Shuffling on.
Then I raised them high again one last time.
And crossed the finish line.
And that
was
it.
A long journey finished.
Not the one I planned.
The one I got.
The one I'll always remember.
I wonder what will come next.
But for now, I am simply savoring every step of this journey.
A little sad that its over.
So thankful that it happened.
And to everyone who helped in ways uncountable along the way.
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