How to Help and be Helped During a Race

How to Help and be Helped During a Race

I have ran one marathon, a lot of half marathons and tons of shorter races. I really love the race experience. I love training and working hard because I keep striving to get that elusive PR. There are races that keep popping up all over the place. I want to tell about my good experience and bad experiences to hopefully pass a long to race directors so they get some feedback. As well, I want to pass along some advice to fellow runners so they may have a better experience. 

Let’s talk about registration: Registration fees have shot up in the last few years. It used to be pretty common to be able to run a marathon (or half) for under $70. Now it seems the average cost is between $100-$130. I don’t mind paying the $115 most cost as long as I’m paying for good amenities and a good course. What really makes my blood boil is that a lot of races are sending out emails within the week after the race has completed asking people to sign up for the following year and the incentive to do so? Every 3 months registration costs will continue to go up. I really do understand that the race directors do this to get people to sign up early. However, I feel it’s a bit too much for the participants. A price increase should not happen earlier than 6 months from race day and late registration should be 60 days prior to race day. Let me finish paying for the first marathon before I have to sign up for next year. This is doubly important for fall races because then you have the holidays right around the corner after you finish the race. Participants shouldn’t have to choose between paying for a race or putting money towards the holiday festivities. I also feel that if spouses are doing a race together and sign up together, maybe a little discount would help ease the cost burden. 

Packet Pick-up: I don’t think we’ve really had a purposefully bad experience. We showed up at our last race to pick up packets and somehow my registration wasn’t there. We were able to get help quickly and straighten it out.  Packet pick-up can equally be just as an important of an affair for some racers as the race itself. It’s nice to have booths that runners can walk around and pick things that may help them along the way. One of my favorite things I’ve seen at packet pick up was at the Boston Marathon. They had a video that showed the course from a biker’s perspective that people could sit down and watch. The video had interviews on it from runners giving course advice or telling their stories. This is great for first timers or out of towners. 

Race Day: For me, I appreciate an early start time for most races. 7:00am seems to be the best time. The later it gets for the warmer month races, the hotter the start time is. When I line up behind the start line, I really like seeing pace markers. That way it encourages people to start where they should be. Nothing is worse than starting where you should and still have to end up weaving around groups of walkers or people that are running twice as slow as you. Walkers, PLEASE START IN THE BACK. We don’t like having to expend extra energy trying to get around you.   Most courses are chip timed now so you’re not getting ahead in any way. For this reason also, I hate out and back courses. My husband, a marathoner, hates having to weave around half marathoners. One race that I did had an out and back course for the full marathoners and shuttled the half marathoners to the marathon halfway point. They had an excellent plan of starting the full marathoners 2 hours before the half marathon so when they dropped off the half marathoners, almost all the full marathoners had already been through the half-way point. 

My biggest pet peeve is chaos at water stations. Most are run by volunteers and not properly given instructions. I really appreciate the volunteers. They are our support team. However, if you choose to volunteer, please realize all my energy is spent on running. I need the volunteer to do some simple things to keep the water stations a pleasant experience. Please don’t set up a water station on the furthest curve of the road. If I have to go several more steps to get to you, I’ll probably just skip the water. Every step and second counts; I don’t want to waste them if I don’t have to. Also, I need volunteers to shout what they have. If I think I grabbed water only to throw back a sports drink, I’m going to be pretty shocked. Most people have preferences to what they want and when we’re running and seeing a volunteer just holding out a cup to us, we have no idea what we’re getting unless you tell us. Runners- when you approach a water station and want to walk, please get your drink and move QUICKLY to the side. A person that wants to chug while running should not have to come to an almost complete stop behind you. Also, to ease the process, every person that uses an aid station should point to whoever they would like to receive a drink from. This eliminates a lot of fumbling and confusion for the volunteers. Also, I really appreciate the workers that know the sign language “water”. I admit it, I’m too exhausted to speak during the second half of a race. If I hold up a W shape with my fingers in front of my mouth, this means “water”. Or if I hold up 2 fingers right before I get to you, that means I need two cups. 

Post race: I really appreciate races that have a good variety of food post race. Candies, fruit, soup, marinated meat on a stick. Wow, some races go all out. It makes me love you that much more. I feel like the amenities make a race go from good to amazing. I really like the races that make the finish line chute a memorable experience. Free post race photos are a neat perk that I’ve seen at some races. 

Other: One thing stands out for me that I remembered from the Washington Newport Marathon this year. They had free childcare in a theatre. I didn’t know they had that until I got there to pick up my packet. If I would’ve known about that, I would have signed up my husband too. However, he wasn’t signed up because he watched the kids so I could run. I was thoroughly impressed with the idea of the childcare though. 

Also, never forget to fill out your personal and medical information on the back of your bib. You never know what’s going to happen in a race. You want to be prepared. 

If you have anything you would like to add, please let me know in the comment section. Thank you to all the people that put on races! 

My Boston Marathon Experience

Hope & Persevere Boston!

I've had a lot of people ask me what it was like to be in Boston. Coming home to the opposite side of the country where people feel like this could never happen to them or anybody that they know has left my husband, friend, and I interesting people all of a sudden. So I thought I would recount our experience.

Me after the Boston 5K Run (3.1miles)

We left for Boston from Spokane on the Thursday morning before race weekend. We touched down into Boston around 9:30pm and was able to pick up our rental car and drive the 12 miles north of downtown Boston to our hotel in Wakefield. Friday morning we were able to go down to the convention center in Boston where Joe and Cody (our friend) picked up their race packets. I was surprised to find out the BAA also holds a 5k race on Sunday and managed to get a spot in the race. Even though Friday held nasty weather in Boston, we still managed to do a lot of walking and sigh-seeing along the way to and from the convention center. Saturday morning we decided to drive to downtown Boston and do more sightseeing. Our sightseeing ended up being pretty limited that day as the guys wanted to go back to the convention center and meet some of the elite runners. However, Sunday morning we woke up early and made it down to Copley square where my race was near. I had a fantastic race, running with nearly 6,000 people. My time was 25:19 and overall I placed 1702 out of 5649 people. It was a wonderful experience that just flew by. It seemed by the time was dissipating a bit, we were in the home stretch, ending the run in the same spot as the marathon. After the run, Cody went back to the convention center to hang out trying to get Ryan Hall's autograph. Joe and I decided to go on a harbor cruise. After that, we walked quite a bit and met back up with Cody in the afternoon and made our way over to Fenway park where to took some photos. Then we went back up to the hotel to try to get some rest for the guys race the next morning.

Joe flexes to show off the Union Logo.
Thanks to the Machinist Union for all the support!

My view of the finish line where I waited for 4 HOURS. The 2nd bomb would later go off just across the street from where I was at.

Joe runs across my field of vision!

Monday morning, the day of the race, the guys had to be up really early to catch a taxi that took them downtown where they would meet up with the buses that took them out to the start of the marathon. I tried to go back to sleep, hoping that I would get a little more sleep being able to hog the whole bed. No such luck, so I got up and got ready to make my way down the the finish line. Originally, I was going to try to catch the guys during the race a few times, but I had talked to a guy at the convention center told me it would be really hard to get around and that it would be best for me just to stake out a spot at the finish line. So, I rode the train into downtown Boston then caught the subway over to the convention center/finish line area. I arrived just after 8:30 downtown. Joe and Cody would leave the start line at 10:00am. Facing the finish line, I was on the right side of the street. When I arrived, there were so many people all ready staked out. There wasn't much curb side reality left by the time I got there. Originally I made my way up the finish line where the bleachers were. I was hoping to stand up there, however when I got there I found that it wasn't actually an ideal spot to take photos of. The finish line shoot was to the left side, so I decided I would go back a little further down the street. I ended up nearly right across the street from where, later, the second bomb went off. I ended up standing in front of a trash can/recycle bin. I met this wonderful man who was friendly and chatted with me the whole time while we were waiting. He had brought down his iPad and ended up streaming the live footage of the race. It was funny because initially he said, "I hope my iPad's battery will hold out until the runners get down here." I said, "Well, it's too bad we don't have a charging station because I have my iPhone cord that would work." He was really excited because I guess he did have an external power source but had forgotten the cord. We chummed up quickly, realizing that we could help each other out. During the time while we were waiting, I got to know quite a bit about him. I found out that he lived in Boston but was from Philadelphia, where his son still lives. I got to find out quite a bit about his son because he trains his son and his son had just had their first grand baby. A cute little girl that I got to see a few photos of.  He was in the pharmaceutical industry. The surprising thing was, he wasn't watching anybody specifically. His son would of ran it, but being as they just had their first child, he opted to not do it. He told me that it was his first time ever seeing the race in person. Anyhow, after the guys came in (the clock read 2:56:04), I painstakingly made my way towards where they would come out of the finisher's area. I only had about a half a block to walk up to get down a side road, but people were at a stand-still, no matter how much people shoved from behind. I would say it took me 1/2 an hour to get to the side street. Then I made my way to the family meeting area and on the way finally finding a bathroom! We met up probably 45 minutes after they had finished. The guys were thinking about staying for some of the free events that the runners can do, but I told them the subway was a huge ordeal trying to come in (even super early) so I talked them into leaving. We were able to get on the green subway line that was close quickly because a police officer let us on the platform because the guys had run. Lucky for us, the subway train had just pulled up and we were able to jump on. 8-10 minutes later, we were at North Station to catch the train to go north to the hotel. We did have to wait around a 30 minutes for the train. Just after we got on, I got a phone call from a good friend. She asked if we were all ok. I said of course and the guys were just a little sore. She said, "You don't understand. My uncle just said there was a bomb at the marathon." I told her that maybe it was a rumor; we just left there and everything was great. Shortly after that, my phone blew up with people calling, texting and face booking  me. A lot of Facebook friends had seen me put a photo on Facebook earlier of my spot near the finish line. My friend Janelle recalls the moment when she found out. She said she texted me when she found out and immediately started pacing until I texted back to her. She knew I had been right there. You could see the flags in my photos that were near where the first bomb went off. We were lucky in the facts that: the guys run fast, I was able to talk them into leaving, we caught probably the last subway and train before they shut them down, and our hotel wasn't in downtown (which we initially regretted in the trip). 

Joe at the Finish Area

There was definitely a strong Police presence

We arrived safely back to our hotel where we glued ourselves to the news until we decided we needed to go get dinner. We got up at 2:00am to go to the airport because we knew the security would be heightened. We arrived at the airport probably around 3:30am. We were ecstatic to find out our flight was on time and the schedule went smoothly. We boarded United Flight 636. We seemed to be waiting a bit longer than normal but we eventually made our way to the end of the tarmac. Just moments before the plane took off, there seemed to be some sort of emergency. A passenger had hit the call button. The pilot came on and said, "if this is an emergency, please press your call button again." Again, the person pressed the call button. After a few moments, the pilot came back on and stated we would be returning to the gate. When we got to the gate, FBI, police, TSA boarded the plane. They eventually took 2 men off the plane. Then they had us de-board the plane with our carry-ons. I sprinted to the bathroom. Eventually they had us get back on the plane after they did a security sweep. Several people did not get back on. United never told us what happened or commented on it. We flew to Chicago where we transferred to American Airlines and flew to Seattle. When we touched down, I was able to find the flight info that had made it onto the news.
The link to our flight news: http://my.chicagotribune.com/#section/-1/article/p2p-75452168/

The flights were super interesting because we got to meet fellow runners. Some had made it across the finish line, some didn't. Meeting so many different people was just an emotional experience. Hearing their experience and prayers for all the people that were hurt and killed… just wow! You start looking at all the people that you saw or chatted with nonchalantly and start wondering if they made it out safely. I weep for the mother that lost her son in the blast. She and her daughter were hurt. I just can't even imagine. I don't mind seeing the images of the incident. I was there. Those people are real. Their hurts are real. Seeing the images for me is acknowledging that actual people were hurt. It's not just something that happened far away and doesn't touch my life. Tragic events can touch your life or you can ignore it. I let it touch my life; I pray continuously. I pray for the people involved, the people that helped, the people that witnessed. I pray for all the people around the country scared to go to big public events now. 

Joe, Me, Cody

Runners are tough. We endure long distances that tax our bodies, we endure outsiders that shun us for being "crazy", and we will endure this. We are runners and we see the good in the aftermath of tragedy, we know there's a finish line at the end of a long race. 

As for Joe and I, this will not detour us in going to events including running in or watching races. We will happily be doing the Wandermere Marathon in a few weeks in Spokane and later the Portland Marathon in October.

Wishing all those touched by the Boston Marathon, I wish you the best!