In the long run, marathon was worth the effort

Monday, Dec. 5, 2005 | 8:08 a.m.

It's 5:30 in the morning on Sunday and about 38 degrees outside. I'm wearing shorts and a long-sleeve top that might as well be made out of paper. Little do I realize that it's perfect weather for a 26.2-mile run -- a feat of endurance where the engine is liable to overheat or break down.

This is my first marathon. Until the gun goes off at six, I haven't quite registered what's going on. There are thousands upon thousands of people huddling in the cold, just as crazy as I am. I am imagining that I'm in some kind of bizarre parade.

Running down the Strip is a surreal experience. There aren't really crowds this early in the morning, just clumps of spectators. Some are cheering parties for individual runners but most look like tourists caught in the middle of an off-hours excursion.

A few runners exit at a wedding chapel north of Sahara Avenue. The bride is wearing white running shorts and veils that stick out like wispy tails. It's a public relations stunt for couples wanting to get married during the marathon.

It's also a nice excuse to cut out early.

Mile 5

The Strip is behind us and we need another diversion. Luckily for us, the course takes us through the Fremont Street Experience downtown. It's a bit curvy for a race but there's a band playing something ahead. There's more people cheering. And more bleary-eyed stares.

Mile 8

I'm still feeling fabulous, running faster than I did in training because of everyone around me and a series of unexpected distractions. We pass some posing "Elvi" with bad hair, a full gospel choir, another gospel choir, a group of traditional Hawaiian dancers and some kind of percussion band with guys banging on cymbals and drums.

I am humming a Christmas song: "Four Elvi posing, three Hawaiian dancers, two gospel choirs and a garage band in a pear tree."

Mile 12

I pass Rancho Road, the busiest intersection we will encounter on the course. Drivers are backed up for about a mile, waiting to turn left and cross where a stream of runners are passing. The drivers will be waiting a long time and don't look impressed by the scene.

I pass a runner wearing a bumblebee outfit with antennae and another dressed as a princess.

Mile 13.1

The halfway point. My brain decides that it's time for my legs to start feeling sore. This is too soon. Maybe I'm pushing it too hard. Just in time for a diversion, I pass a runner wearing nothing but a Speedo. His bib number is pinned to his rear.

Mile 20

I cross Sahara Avenue at Torrey Pines Drive. I realize that my calves have been hurting for some time.

No pain, no gain.

Mile 24

I pass Wynn Avenue and cross under the I-15 overpass to Frank Sinatra Drive. The downhill feels good until I realize that my right big toe is pressing into my shoe. I try to move around my foot as I run and my sock gets bunched up in the front, pressing my toe even harder. It's like I'm kicking a wall at each step. My toenail feels bruised but I'm distracted by my calves, which are on fire. They don't feel like my legs anymore.

I think I will have to stop.

Mile 25

I'm one mile from the finish but Mandalay Bay looks so far away when you can barely walk. I stop a few times and bend over, punching my calves to get the blood flowing. It doesn't work. I've never stopped in a race. Ever.

For 24 miles I have passed thousands of people after starting near the back of the race. Maybe a couple dozen have passed me until now. Many now pass me by at slow speeds, doing what looked so easy before.

Mile 25.5

I alternate between shuffling and walking for a while. I kick my knees in the air to stretch my thighs, which also hurt.

That seems to do something.

Mile 26.2

I see the curve in the course that leads to the finish. My brain focuses on the finish line and the pain seems to move somewhere else, a memory. My legs begin moving again. They already feel better. I see the finish.

I cross the line.

My time is 3:45:27 -- about five minutes too slow of qualifying for Boston. I am still very happy with my time.

Someone hands me a finisher's medal. I wonder for a split-second whether it was worth the trouble. The pain comes back and I sit down, kneading legs that feel like they have been beaten. They feel familiar again.

Yes, it was worth it.

How It All Began

I would like to be able to say that I set out to be a marathon runner after seeing Joan Benoit Samuelson win the first Olympic women's marathon in Los Angeles in 1984. My hometown was less than two hours away from the action in Bakersfield, Calif.

But the track at the Coliseum might as well have been halfway around the world. I grew up believing marathons were for Olympians and elite runners.

I got into running completely by accident. A friend in high school wanted me to join the cross country team so she could have a gal pal around and meet boys. It turns out that I had a knack for running.

I was lean and tall for my age. But I didn't take it seriously, nor did I push myself. My coach berated me when I was passed up by girls who were much shorter than I was but, it seemed, more determined to win.

Burned out on running, I avoided the cross country team in college and found that jogging occasionally -- without a coach shouting in my ear -- was much more appealing. It would take years for my competitive streak, warmed by a nostalgia for cheering spectators, to come back again and encourage me to sign up for 5K races here and there.

It wasn't until I moved to Las Vegas about 3 1/2 years ago that I decided to devote more time to running. I didn't know many people and running was something I could do on my own.

The decision to get serious about running after moving to the high desert, I soon discovered, is like taking up skiing in San Diego. Las Vegas' daily wind gusts put Chicago's to shame. It's also fiercely hot for four months of the year and just plain hot for another few. It's also pretty cold at times in the winter.

Runners are known for saying how great and relatively inexpensive the sport is, no matter the circumstances. "It's as easy as slipping on a good pair of shoes and stepping outside," I've heard. In Las Vegas, it's a way our relatively small community of runners can convince themselves that what they are doing is normal.

I'm not a morning person, so I will run at 10 a.m. when it's 100 degrees outside rather than get up at 5 a.m. to beat the summer heat. I prefer asphalt roads to treadmills, so I regularly contend with aggressive, drunk and oblivious drivers.

During a run I've had people shout and point at me like I'm some kind of bizarre spectacle. Others ask what I'm running from. Thank goodness for the tracks at Green Valley High School and Silverado High School.

There are few decent running paths in town, leading many runners to picturesque Red Rock Canyon. But the hills and rocky trails there aren't for beginners.

I discovered the Las Vegas Running Team, a non-membership group of like-minded runners and fitness walkers, early on. The team hosts regular runs each day of the week at different locations across the valley and also organizes more than a dozen races per year.

The Las Vegas Track Club also hosts several runs and a few races. From those two groups it's not hard to find marathon-training programs that promise to whip beginners into shape in time for the big race.

But the world had changed since I watched my first marathon on television. Record numbers of people were getting off couches and running marathons. Running has become a highly technical sport, with all manner of training regimens, self-help books and expensive shoes with ever-improving features. It seemed to me that many of these training tools were geared toward marathoning as the ultimate goal.

As life achievements go, it's not half bad. The marathon remains the only major Olympic sport in which amateurs can compete alongside top professional athletes. It took me years to realize that a smart training program can turn some average people into elite runners. It's all a matter of how much time and effort you put into it.

I began training in earnest less than a year ago after finishing the Las Vegas Half Marathon in January. I planned to run my first marathon in Los Angeles in March but changed my mind after the new marathon organizers changed the start of the Las Vegas marathon from Jean -- a relatively boring route to Sunset Park -- to the Strip.

Marathon training is more than running long or even fast. Two runners who know this well are Rob de Castella, an Australian who dominated the sport in the 1980s, and Jeff Galloway, an American Olympian and track star. Both recommend mixing short tempo runs and long, slower runs with track sessions and hill training.

For the past several months I was running about 40 miles per week and got up to 55 miles per week after extending my long, Sunday run to more than three and a half hours.

After several months of training I realized that I was in the best shape of my life. I knew what it felt like to put one foot in front of the other for three hours and forty-five minutes. I had felt the early runner's high, then the lowest of the low, then the second, even better high. I could run five miles with the same effort as climbing a flight of stairs. I could run three miles like I was taking a stroll.

There will always be a huge gulf between amateur marathoners and elite runners. I was still panting through mile 18 Sunday when Adriana Fernandez of Mexico was crossing the finish line. I'm not enough of an obsessive-compulsive to be a top athlete. I like junk food and stay out too late on weekends.

But I know I can run a marathon with enough energy left over to feel the most exhilarated I've ever felt in my life.

Liz Benston can be reached at 259-4077 or at benston@lasvegassun.com.