As it seems the entire world now knows, the 2012 New York City Marathon has been canceled.
After living through what has been described as the largest hurricane hurricane ever to form in the Atlantic and most certainly the most devastating in my lifetime, I completely understand an agree with this decision. What I don’t understand is the timing.
Earlier in the week, while we were sitting in our house with no power or water and many friends were sitting in downtown manhattan in the same conditions, I couldn’t comprehend that this marathon would go on. But with every Bloomberg speech, it seemed as if nothing could stop it. I discussed it endlessly with fellow runners. I was shocked at how strongly some felt that their training was more important that those whose lives were affected (including mine!) by this storm. My office is downtown, thus closed for the week, so I also had an entire week of time to obsess. I guess that’s what happens when you have no television to watch!
With the insistence of Bloomberg and NYRR I felt I didn’t have much of a choice. If the race happened, I had to run. Even though actual training was only five months, the program that allowed me to run this year involved running nine races last year. So all told, this has been two years in the making for me. That is half of Bens life. Half of his life I am gone one weekend morning for training and races. I have missed soccer lessons and breakfast at the diner. Things I want to be at, things I didn’t want to miss. These past five months have involved long runs that take hours and hours. Again, none of this is more important that what has gone on this past week but just so you understand, it’s more than “just a race”. It was a life event for me, a bucket list accomplishment.
This week has been such an up and down. I wanted the race canceled from the beginning so we could all focus on what was important. But it wasn’t canceled, it wasn’t even left up in the air. It was definitely on. I have been trying to get into the right mindset. A marathon is mental more than physical in the end. Trying to figure out logistics as we still have no power. Telling people that were coming to cheer me on that because we has no place to house them with no power, not to come. I can’t imagine what it was like for runners flying in with the airports closed. Changing reservations to try and find a way here.
To run, you have to pick your number up in person. The expo takes place in Manhattan in the three days leading up to the race. Manhattan has been gridlocked with cars since the subways ad trains haven’t been running normally. They instituted check points that mandated three people in a car to get into manhattan. All runners not already in the city had to figure out how to do this, all the while trying not to feel guilty that we were clearly straining the city. Stories of evacuees being displaced from hotel rooms to accommodate runners started.
I went to the expo yesterday. It was amazing. Runners from all over the world there to run a race they had been promised would go on. People were so excited and I tried to feed off their energy. If we were do this I was going to take in the experience and be excited!
And then, 36 hours before the race, after people had already strained the roads going to the expo, added to the gas shortage, evacuees had been kicked out of their hotels rooms, THEN they canceled the race.
I used to be a huge NYRR supporter. I used to defend them when people said they were greedy and races cost too much and they didn’t care about local runners. I would say nobody is forcing you to run their races. I am just disappointed in both them and Bloomberg. The fact they even allowed this to be a controversy, allowed all these runners to fly here, allowed this to go on as long as it did, it all disappoints me. This race should have been canceled on Tuesday.
I’m sad I won’t run, but now wasn’t the right time. I’m not sure I will run next year, I am run down from training and don’t know if I want to devote another five months of my life to this. I’m looking forward to spending weekend mornings with Ben after quick 5 milers and just trying to put this whole week o stress behind me.
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