LET'S GO OAKLAND - the sequel

Since I was saving my legs for the now ruined Big Sur Marathon next month, I didn't run the full Oakland Marathon this year, just the 4-person relay. It was so much fun! I wasn't sure if I would enjoy a relay, I thought I would be dissatisfied with the short distance. Ryan ran the first leg, he was one of the first relayers to arrive at the transition. I took the "baton" (not a baton, just a timing tag) and ran like the wind. Well, a short gust. I was sick and feeling a little funny, but I gave it all I could. I passed Lake Temescal (up), a bunch of beautiful homes (up), fun families and sleepy kids cheering from their driveways (up), cowbells, Ricola horn blowers taking requests (Eye of the Tiger as I passed, steep up), Montclair Village streets lined with Starbucks customers cheering (mini-down), more cowbell (I had to have it), one last hill to the Mormon temple and Greek Orthodox cathedral (big up), and then DOWN Lincoln (thank you gravity). When I arrived at my transition under I-580 and passed on the timer to runner 3, I grabbed some water and headed for the bus back to the finish line. There were 4 other people on the bus. A busload must have already left? Nope, we were that fast, only a few teams ahead of us! My leg of the race roughly encompassed the top/right corner of this map (5.5 miles):


...and that big serpent boa qui dejirait un elephant looking lump in the middle of this elevation map.

see?
Here I am paralleling Hwy 13 near the start of my leg.


And our results. We came in 16th overall, of 165 teams. So you don't have to do the math, we finished in under 8-minute pace, and would have qualified for Boston if any of us could have gone this fast for the full 26.2 miles on our own!

Until this day I was perfectly happy with 4:25ish marathons. No more. 4 hours, here I come.

Running leg 2 of the relay meant I was back to the finish line in time to see the marathon and half marathon winners, to see all my work buddies finish their half marathons, and to see leg 4 of my team cross the finish line. I never get to see that stuff, I'm always still running! It was really fun cheering for everyone, but the yelling definitely didn't help me feel better, and I ended up with a super raspy voice followed by a terrible cough. Worth it for sure. cough cough.

I'll be back next year, hope some of you are with me!