Sweet Way to Kick Off Next "Century" of Marathons

Harrisburg is a nice short drive for me -- only about two hours -- so it's become a quick jaunt of a regular pacing gig the last few years.

I arrived about noon on Saturday and made a quick stop at the Y for packet pickup. Took all of, maybe, two minutes to give them my name, get my race bib and sweatshirt, snap a photo, and head on out. Nice and efficient!

A couple of hours later, my friend Jess arrived, having trekked from a fair bit further away for the brief weekend prior to some crazy work hours upcoming over the next several weeks; don't envy her those.

We walked around Harrisburg a little bit. The capitol building is pretty nice.

Looking up what these sculptures are now, as I write this, the south one (on the left above) is "The Burden of Life: The Broken Law" depicting struggles, hardships, negativity, etc. The north one (on the right above) is "Love and Labor: The Unbroken Law" depicting family love, faith, positivity, etc. We didn't walk around the full complex, as it was a VERY windy day, and we weren't quite warmly enough dressed. We made our way down to the Broad Street Market -- very small, even combining the two structures -- and then across the street to the bookstore for a little bit.

As it was still fairly early and there wasn't much else that we wanted to look at that was also open (that we knew of), we made a brief trip to some place I haven't been in at least 40 years, if not more: Hershey! It's only about 15 miles to get there, after all.

Just opposite from where we parked was Hershey's answer to Oscar Meyer's Weinermobile: the Kissmobile!

As we made our way around the building, buffeted by a fair bit of wind, we heard a couple of marching bands seemingly practice on the other side of the parking lot. We figured that Hershey was hosting a marching band competition of some sort. That would've been kinda neat to see, but we were not only limited on time and had things we wanted to do inside, we would have quickly frozen outside.

Chocolate World is definitely welcoming.

Inside was already decorated for Christmas, including lots of kisses on their tree.

While we gawked briefly at the overwhelming amount of merchandise -- both food/drink and clothing and miscellaneous other merch of all sorts -- we were both aiming for the Chocolate Tour.

I don't know why I thought we would really see much real chocolate during the tour -- it's mostly props and a video that plays in the "car" that you ride around in. But there were certainly some cute bits during it.

Soon enough the tour ended, we were handed a small milk chocolate candy bar, and headed back down the stairs into the rest of the huge gift shop that Chocolate World is. It's really rather remarkable all the things that they have available. Earlier in the day during conversation, I was remarking on how they really should have Reese's Peanut Butter Cup made with dark chocolate -- not just the Thins that I had seen a few years ago. Sure enough, they had them available. I avoided buying them, though, lest I go through the bag in only 1 or 2 sittings. I buy snacks to bring home very sparingly because once I dig in, I tend to keep going, despite knowing better.

We exited an saw another sign just beyond, beckoning us to explore a little further.

Beyond that in the distance on the right was Hershey Park, where all the rides are, and yet another large gift shop on the left, which also has a restaurant and ice cream parlor inside. Relatively quickly we took a quick spin through and headed out. We grabbed dinner and dessert back in Harrisburg.

The following morning, my race prep went much faster than normal -- not sure how/why. But we were out the door before 5:45am and parked on City Island before 6am. Once it hit about 6:30am, we headed out into the blustery parking lot to meet up with my fellow pacers. (After all, one of them had everyone's pace sticks, since there was no meeting the night before.) Several of us chatted for a bit, I dropped my warm, fuzzy pajama pants in the car (I'm never going to get rid of these Elf pants that were originally bought as throwaways -- they're just too good) and collected my water bottles, jumped on the portapotty line, and made my way to the corrals (such as they are for this small-field race). I wound up talking with a few people, including several first-timers, calming their nerves, etc. I didn't hear the National Anthem play at all (unusual), and then soon enough, we were off!

Harrisburg is a two-loop course which spends most of the time on the east side of the Susquehanna River, but makes a brief jaunt (twice) across to the far side of the Harvey Taylor Bridge and crossing under it before coming back. The other bridge we run on takes us onto City Island -- in the middle of the River.

For as small a field as it is, there are a respectable number of people who come out to cheer in several pockets -- especially at some of the parks and when we are running along the river.

I had a pretty large group for about half of the marathon by which time people started falling off the back of the pack. While the temps were nice and cool throughout the race, the biggest factor that was surely affecting everyone's performance was the wind. There were large stretches of the race where it was surely 15-20 mph, gusting stronger. And, oddly enough, on out-and-back portions, it was a headwind... both ways! Ugh!

It's a scenic route, and at the end of the stretch of pathway that runs along the river, just before a brief but steep "exit ramp" from the park (about Miles 5 and 18), there was a lady with a sign and company that I had not yet seen on previous marathons. The sign said something along the lines of "You may not be the G.O.A.T., but you're doing great." And, as you may have guessed, she had a real live goat with her. Very cute. If I hadn't been a pacer, I would certainly have stopped to pet the goat, maybe take a photo. 

One of the people who was in my group had been running for many decades, had a heart attack years ago, has had multiple surgeries and stents (all of the stats related to it were on the back of his shirt -- akin to the "demotivational" posters out there), and broke in front of me before the halfway point. As the group made it past the arch at halfway and rounded the curve to go up the ramp to the bridge and the rest of the 2nd loop of the course, I saw him sitting on the curb. I asked him how he was doing, and silently he held up his hand... which had his pinky bent at a "yep, that is very broken" angle. Ouch! Certainly surprising, given it didn't look like he was scraped up anywhere from a fall. Methinks that was the end of his race. :-( I'm confident he'll return for another next year, though.

(UPDATE: After I posted this, one of my fellow pacers flagged that this gentleman actually DID finish the race. He crossed the line in approximately 5.5 hours. Talk about grit!)

After most of my pack had fallen off, I had about four or five people who remained for most of the rest of it. After we finished running along the river for the second time, I recognized that I needed to make a pit stop. Unfortunately, the first opportunity was when everyone else was still behind me having slowed to partake of the water stop -- there's no ducking in without giving fair warning and passing off the stick -- so I kept going. At the second opportunity, I handed off the stick, but the singleton portapotty was occupied. I decided against waiting and kept going. Finally, a few more miles later, I was able to avail myself. I handed the pacer stick to a first-timer who was doing very well throughout. When I emerged about 30-45 seconds later, I bolted at top speed so that I could catch up as quickly as possible (opposite the advice we give any runners in our groups who needs to take a pit stop). Relatively soon, I saw the two others who were right with us when I made my stop, but not the person with the stick. What the...? I scanned a bit further along, and saw that he had broken further up from them, by at least 100 yards? As I approached the pair who were going at the proper speed, I alerted them that I would slow to the right pace once I got the stick back. It took another good 15-20 seconds, at least, for me to catch up, thank him for his efforts, and reclaim the stick, slowing us back down closer to the right pace.

As we were dealing with the turn onto the Harvey Taylor Bridge again (oy!) I was able to feel what seemed like a really nasty blister brewing. Of course, I had many more tight turns in quick succession on steep (though brief) hills once we were to get to the far end of the bridge. Oh, boy, was this going to be painful. Sure enough, one toe on my left foot screamed at me on each turn. "Sorry!"

By the time we got back to City Island -- for the final mile of the race -- one of the people from my pack had broken ahead of me, not to be seen again (nice time!), which wound up leaving me with two more who were by my side for most of the remainder. While one slowly drifted in front -- finishing about 15 - 30 seconds ahead of me, I think -- the last one was certainly struggling a little bit. Also a first-timer, she was commenting on how her legs were complaining. There were several times within those last 6-8 minutes where she would drop back a couple of feet, and I would encourage her and "push" her along to keep going. I knew that I had a little bit of a buffer, so I was willing to slip a few seconds here or there if I needed to to get her across the line and make my one-minute window. But I didn't really need to drop those few seconds. Each time I told her to keep pushing, that we were only (however many) minutes from the end, she would rise to the challenge. My main "demand" of her was that once we cross over the tram tracks the last time right at the Mile 26 marker, that she get in front of me and stay there. No need to break away, but don't fall behind me at all. And to be careful during the homestretch, because that park of the parking lot that we run on is in HORRENDOUS condition. (It's been that bad all three years I've run this to date.) She made it across the line about 2 seconds ahead of me. Wonderful!

Pretty happy with the splits today. There were a couple of places early on where I was a little too fast, so I was 32 seconds faster on the first half (rather than 15 seconds, as desired) compared to exactly halving the goal time. And I was only two seconds faster on the second half (rather than another 15 seconds). All told, I was four seconds from the "pin" (30 seconds under goal time). 

Reunited with Jess after the finish line, we made our way to the same burger joint I went to last year. Joy's Grill and Burger House is a small place (about a dozen tables/booths, plus about as many additional chairs at the grill), with one person doing all the cooking and one waitress handling all the tables. Needless to say, it's a touch slow on the service, since the waitress is trying to be in 5 places at one time. So long as you bring your patience with you, it is worth it. Very tasty burgers.

In what was a whirlwind weekend, I brought Jess back to her car (left at the hotel, since carpooling onto City Island for the race is the way to go) and we departed our separate ways.

Two more races for me in the next two weeks. Unknown whether I will make a late registration for something in December (which would just be for time for me (a rarity nowadays), not a pacing gig).