Marathon2Marathon

After I got in a run in Huntsville last Thursday morning, Marilynn and I made the 560-mile drive to Alpine in southwest Texas. That night, we drove further west to Marfa to see the Marfa Lights. They are mysterious. We drove nearly 100 miles south on Friday and spent the day in Big Bend National Park. It was the only part of Texas I had never been to. Beautiful place. I will post some photos here tomorrow. We came back up a different way to get to the town of Marathon. I picked up my race packet, got in a run around the town and then headed back to the hotel in Alpine. The marathon start point was a couple miles outside of Alpine on Hwy. 90 east toward Marathon. Marilynn dropped me off and stayed until we took off. Our friends, Charlie and Ruth Fields from Montgomery, Texas were there and we had a nice visit with them. The race started at 8 a.m. and we ran 26.2 miles on the shoulder of Hwy. 90 to downtown Marathon. Not a building or a crossroad the entire distance. Mountains on both sides and rolling hills. With less than 60 runners and all spread out, there were times when I seemed to be there all alone. In places, you could see the highway for miles ahead. No spectators, except for the aid station volunteers every two miles. There was a train track on the other side of the highway and several train engineers blew their whistles and waved as they drove by. The temperature was about 50 at the start and got up to about 80 during the race. Really ideal weather. During the first mile, I tripped on a chunk of asphalt, fell and cut my left knee. Blood ran down my leg. It was not a problem, except for having to explain it at each aid station. I gave them a different story at each one. I got hit by a 18-wheeler, a mountain lion got me, I was attacked by a bobcat. One lady at an aid station said that being attacked by a havalina would be more plausible. I finished the race in 5:46:02. That's 12 seconds slower than the Tyler Rose Marathon last Sunday. It took me about 12 seconds to get my butt off the asphalt, so I will call it a tie. I took 2nd place in the 60-69 age group (there was 3 of us). While I enjoyed this unique race experience and had a great time, I doubt that I will do this one again. It is just too far to drive to get there. After the race, we drove down to Del Rio and spent the night there. We stopped and visited Langtry, Texas (pop. 19). That was the home of Judge Roy Bean back in the late 1800's ("Law west of the Pecos"). There use to be a TV series about him many years ago. They have a nice museum next to his home and tavern. Nice place to visit if you are in that very remote part of Texas near the Rio Grande and Pecos Rivers. We drove back from Del Rio today and had lunch in San Antonio. We went to church this evening and I had my running clothes on underneath my church clothes. I went to the track afterwards and ran laps. Annie was there and I ran a couple laps with her. She use to run trails with us and ran the Tyler Rose Half Marathon last Sunday.