A tale of two marathons

Running a marathon is one of the toughest things you can do and, as Sarla Donovan found out, not everything always goes to plan. 

Something special happens in New York on the first Sunday in November. Runners of all colours, creeds and speeds chase their marathon dreams through the city’s streets.

It’s the biggest event of its kind in the world, and in 2012 my partner and I had a ticket to the start line in Staten Island. I’d run a qualifying time, he’d sweet-talked his way in with a heart-tugging email about living through the Christchurch earthquakes.

Neither of us had run a marathon before, but we found a 16-week training programme in an old copy of Runners magazine which became our bible.

In terms of time, fitting in 70km-80km of running each week was a challenge. The 30km runs were the toughest. We had to build up to them mentally: three hours seemed like a really long time to be out pounding the pavement.

To liven things up, we chose different places to run, including the track around Lake Wakatipu, Christchurch’s Port Hills, and the country lanes of Tai Tapu on its outskirts. We’d run them in the morning: you had to get it out of the way early or you’d never do it. Afterwards, we weren’t good for anything much, footsore and stiff in knees and hips. Late nights, booze and unhealthy food faded out as the start date loomed.

TROPICAL STORM SANDY

When Hurricane Sandy was predicted in the last week of October we didn’t worry too much. It’d probably be no more than a southerly blow by the time it hit New York.

A few days later the press was calling it the biggest storm to hit the US in 100 years. A super-storm with a tropical hurricane running into an extreme early winter front. Still, we weren’t buying into the drama. Remember Sars? We were all going to die? Overhyped nonsense swallowed up by the media. All the same, we rang our travel insurance company and double-checked our coverage.

Two days before we were due to fly out on October 31, the news was full of what was being called Superstorm Sandy. She was barrelling straight for the New Jersey coastline and after eight months planning and training in post-quake Christchurch, it felt deeply unfair. Of all the cities in all the world, Sandy was about to smack straight into New York.

The full moon and high tide intensified the storm surge: waves inundated the seawall at Battery Park, flooding parts of the subway and cutting power to large chunks of the city. Staten Island was hit hard.

The storm passed through and we were still in Christchurch. Mayor Bloomberg said it was bad, but the marathon would provide an economic and morale boost and advised all runners to come.

Taxis on a flooded street in Queens

ARRIVING IN THE US

We flew out, after checking with Qantas: all flights were showing OK. Christchurch-Sydney-Los Angeles-New York. We got to LA only to find JFK Airport was still closed and all flights to New York were cancelled. We checked the internet. Mayor Bloomberg was steadfast: the marathon must proceed. The New York Road Runners had a clear message: the marathon was definitely going ahead.

Somehow, we had to get ourselves to New York! Qantas diverted us to Boston, where we spent a great night and day. From the Marriot Copley Place, we walked to the Boston Public Library, Trinity Church and Boston Common, the oldest city park in the United States.

It was late autumn, there was woodsmoke in the air, squirrels tore up tree trunks and we bought sweet roasted almonds from a vendor. JFK reopened later in the day and we flew to New York that night. Half of Manhattan was in darkness and the cut-off line was our hotel on 30th St. Across the road was good, but we had no electricity, no hot water and freezing rooms, and the noise from traffic combined with a roaring generator in reception made any chance of getting a decent night’s sleep impossible.

Sarla with her New York Marathon race number

BLOOMBERG’S ANNOUNCEMENT

Friday morning, tired but excited, we headed out to register and pick up our race packs. On the way back we spotted a hotel on 35th St and somehow managed to fluke the last room. It was unbelievable luck; accommodation is always at a premium during marathon week, even without the added pressure of hurricane refugees.

We moved our stuff and headed uptown for a final run around Central Park, only to find it was closed due to storm damage. Along with thousands of others, we ran around the old cobblestones, outside the park. Our final run. The big day was Sunday.

It was 6 pm when we got back to the hotel. We turned on the television. Breaking news: Mayor Bloomberg was calling off the marathon.

"We’ve been so entranced with the marathon we haven’t stopped to see what’s going on."

The broadcast showed the horror of Sandy. The marathon starts in Staten Island where people had died, thousands were homeless and almost all had lost electricity. New Jersey had similar problems and parts of Brooklyn and Manhattan were without power. Running through Staten Island and Brooklyn, in particular, would be totally inappropriate.

Locals weren’t happy that police and generators would be redirected to the marathon. We were shell-shocked. If he’d cancelled on Tuesday, we might not have come. There were 20,000 foreigners in New York for the marathon, taking up beds. We understood why he’d cancelled, but so late in the piece, it was heart-breaking.

DELAWARE AND LEHIGH

We had tickets to a Knicks game at Madison Square Garden that night but our hearts weren’t in it. Months of planning and training; when would we ever be this fit again!

After the game, we went online and tried to find an alternative. There was one on Sunday, two hours away in Pennsylvania: the Delaware and Lehigh Heritage Marathon.

We emailed the organiser Renee at 10.30 pm and she emailed back to say sorry, sold out.

We tracked down her home number and called her. She was adamant. There was no way we could get in, she’d been inundated with entries the moment Mayor Bloomberg announced New York was cancelled.

Next morning we phoned the Northhampton Recreation Centre, where people were going to pick up race packs. It was a long shot, but we hoped someone might have cancelled. The guy who answered said, "Sorry, you want the other side of the building".

We mentioned we’d come a long way, from New Zealand. He said, "Hey wait a minute, I think that’s the organiser there."

We heard him chatting to Renee on our behalf. She came to the phone and we asked if there was any chance we could run. Straight away she said she could get us in. Whatever that guy had done, it worked!

We caught a bus to Bethlehem, the nearest town to our replacement marathon, where we’d managed to book the last room at the inn, the Holiday Inn that is. We passed through Allenton, one of the main towns in eastern Pennsylvania and the world’s second-biggest steel producer in its day. Made famous by the Billy Joel song, it was now dominated by old abandoned steel mills. This was about as far from the five boroughs as you could get.

We scoffed a pre-run meal of pasta and waffles. Next morning it was close to zero, crisp but sunny. There were 200-300 runners and the organisers and volunteers were all so welcoming.

The route followed a trail along the former Lehigh Valley railroad, noisy supporters lifting our spirits as we ran. We both finished and were surprised at our times and that we could still walk afterwards. I ran 3.43.41 while Simon’s sprint finish saw him cross the line in 3.58.01.

Renee insisted on a photo for the local paper featuring us with local mascot Smokey the Bear as we were officially the runners who’d come from furthest away.

A fellow New York marathoner from Washington drove us back to the Holiday Inn where we hot-tubbed for hours, then ate and drank like maniacs at the main employer in Bethlehem these days, the Sands Casino.

Sarla beside a computer screen showing her time for the Delaware and Lehigh Marathon.

ONE YEAR LATER

The 2012 marathoners were given automatic right of entry to compete the following year. So on November 3, 2013, we padded over the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge with 50,740 other runners. It was the largest number of participants in any marathon in history.

This story was originally published in Life & Style Magazine, Otago Daily Times 

New York Marathon

• With the exception of 2012, it has been run every year since 1970.

• Entry is either by time qualification, through a lottery system, committing to raise money for charity or booking through selected travel agents who provide a package of entry, flights and accommodation.

• Accommodation prices in New York go up by about 25% in marathon week, on a par with Christmas and New Year.