Marci Actually Runs the Marathon (part three) My Visits to MSKCC and Liam!

The longer I wait to post the remainder of my NYC Marathon 2008 experience, the harder it gets. There is just so much to say about it, it overwhelms me, and I find myself avoiding the blog altogether.

So I will be as descriptive and succinct as I can, and then we can move on to more recent events.

Before we commence, though, a HUGE shout-out to all my Honor Roll members. There have even been some more donations that came through in the last couple of weeks, bringing the total amount of money sent to the Aubrey Fund for Pediatric Research at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cencer Center to an astounding

$5,068

As much as I want to shout their names from the mountaintop, the donors asked to remain anonymous.

I have been running lately, I'm trying for 20 miles a week or so, but my nieces gave me a lovely Thanksgiving gift -- a cold. I tried to shake it off, and even ran through it a few times, but now that it's made its way chestwards, there's no running for a few days while it works its way out of me. Blech. I love running in the cold, and now that I've got an early Xmas gift from Laura, the Brooks Wanganui Cabrio mittens, I fear not the wind whooshing through my fingers. The only thing I don't like about winter running is my hands and ears getting cold. As long as they're warm, life's good.

But back to the topic at hand. The after-marathon.

One of the perks of being on Fred's Team is that we get to rendezvous at the Cherry Hill finishing area, where are bags are waiting for us, instead of heading out to Central Park West to retrieve our bags. We're told to stay to the right in that vast sea of people heading from the finish line to get out of the Park, where we're plucked from the line and escorted to the transverse and up to the waiting tents.

At last, right at the entrance to Cherry Hill. A porta-potty never looked so good!

Chip clipped, bag retrieved, and I head over to the Team tent to put on my warm clothes and see who's there and how folks did. There were some PRs and some BQs, some great times (Lynn ran a 3:33:33!) and a few injuries. I was surprised to see Rich without Harrie, as they were running together. Rich said Harrie was having trouble and told Rich to go on. A lot of our first-timers did great, with some really amazing finishing times. After about half an hour of stretching, warming up and catching up, I headed for home.

The hardest thing about the marathon is not running it, it's getting out of Central Park afterwards. Even though I live A BLOCK AWAY, it typically takes me over an hour to get home. First of all, the only way to get out of the Park from Cherry Hill is to cross over a bridge, over the sea of runners in their heatshields. Yeah, after you run a marathon, you have to climb two flights of stairs, and worse, down two flights. Not pretty. Then the crush of runners trying to get out of the Park meeting the friends, family and supporters trying to get in the Park. It's a madhouse. God bless the NYPD for keeping as much order as one can possibly keep. And lastly, the streets are just choked and crowded, and with all the construction in the area, there are so many detours that just getting from 59th to 58th Street is a major hike. So I decided to take the subway with Michelle two stops, and come up from the south. Turned out to be an excellent decision.

Stopped at the grocery store. There were two bags of ice left. Bought them both and went home. Dumped the ice in the tub, turned it on, made some hot chocolate, came back into the bathroom and discovered to my horror I turned the HOT water on, not the COLD. All the ice had melted! Feverishly I dumped the water from the tub, turned on the cold, and got all the ice out of the freezer. So it was a lukewarm bath instead of an ice bath. Not entirely restorative.

Cleaned up and went back over to the hotel. Another perk of being on the Team is that the Swedish Massage Institute is there to provide some post-marathon healing. I had two women working on me. Heaven. Then in for the dinner, where I got to catch up with a bunch of people, see some of the pictures that the Team photographer took of us throughout the day, and most importantly, hear speeches from some of the doctors at MSKCC, especially the doctors who work in the research department and pediatric cancer center. You've gotta love a charity that not only tells you where the money you raised goes, you get to meet the people who benefit most -- the doctors and researchers who use the money to treat the patients, and the patients themselves.

And BONUS -- guess who showed up?

Yep, my running hero, Grete Waitz!

Monday morning 6:30AM, I'm on line at Tavern on the Green for the Marathon Monday store. Yep, I'm that nuts. I want to go that early because the first batch of people there get their medal engraved on the spot. That's what I wanted. I saw Dani from Florida there, we talked for a few minutes. She finished in her goal time and was thrilled to get her name in the NY Times (as she said, who knew that 6-point type could mean so much?) I also wanted to get my usual round of Finisher gear (because it doesn't mean as much wearing it on Tuesday!) and some souvenirs for the nieces and for Liam and Ella. Alas, this year they didn't have those little stuffed animals they had the previous years. So hats and bags it was.

Which brings us to the visit to the pediatric floor at MSKCC. Unfortunately I can't show you the picture this year, they're a little stricter this time around. But I can certainly tell you about it! Harrie was there (he wasn't at the dinner.) He had a LOT of trouble during the marathon, ended up in an ambulance for a while, even. But he finished. I remember reading a conversation between an elite marathoner and a mid-pack runner. The elite runner was amazed when the mid-pack runner said it took him 4 1/2 hours. "How could you stay on your feet that long?" the elite runner said, "I could never do that. That's amazing!" For the elites it's a question of speed; for us normal people it's an endurance issue. Looking at it that way, it's harder to finish in 4 hours than 2, and harder still to finish in 6. It's pretty amazing to have that endurance.

The first place we visited was the dayroom, where the outpatients are. It's a bright, cheery room, and they had pictures of everyone from pediatrics who ran up on the wall. There were a bunch of children in there, and they were all wearing Fred's Team shirts! Even the littlest peanut of a girl was wearing a shirt that was more of a ballgown on her. We showed the kids our medals and played with them a little while. A lot of them were having a good day, especially these two boys who carted each other around in a wagon, shouting "BEEP BEEP!" as they ran around the room, bumping into everybody and everything. Eventually the nurses had to step in. And that's the amazing thing about MSKCC. Yes, these are children who are very sick, but they are CHILDREN first, and treated like children. There are rules they have to follow, and when they misbehave, they get scolded like any child would. Dr. K was there, Liam's doctor, and I got to spend a few minutes talking with him. He's got so much love for the children, you just know that they're in good hands. Dr. K also runs the marathon for the Team; he's a pretty good runner too.

We split up into groups to visit some of the in-patients. Our group met a teenage boy and his mother. He had been a big sports player (basketball, I think) but couldn't really do that. We told him about all the survivors we had on the Team and tried to talk them into joining. His mother seemed really enthusiastic -- you could tell she was a real force of nature -- and who knows, maybe one or both of them will be there next spring, lacing up.

We met a young guy for a minute or two who really wasn't feeling too good, so we didn't stay too long with him, and then the other people we were supposed to see were sleeping, so we went back to the dayroom to play with the children some more. There was a little toddler there, just maybe a hair over 1, just a little butterball, rolling around on the floor, his parents pushing his IV pole. And again, I said this last year, you think you'd cry seeing all these sick children there, but because they're being treated like children, not like patients, and because of all the love the staff has for the children there, it's just the opposite. It's just the most relentlessly positive place you could ever be, and you come away feeling so good, so lucky to be able to play a small part in making the place what it is.

And a few days later at last, my long-awaited visit to my buddy and my inspiration, Prince Liam! You might be surprised to hear, after how much I talk about him, that Liam and I have never met. I've met Gretchen, but never Liam. So I was super-excited to get to see my little champ in person.

Gretchen was at work, but the kids were home from school with their nanny. I brought little gift bags for Liam and his sister Ella, because I know what it's like when one sibling gets a toy and the other doesn't (tangent: there's an absolutely hilarious picture of my brother and I on is probably his second or third birthday. He's just been given a toy car parking garage, and there's a picture of him standing on a chair in the kitchen, holding onto the garage, and beaming from ear to ear, the happiest boy in the world. In the corner is me, literally seething, teeth bared, holding my hands out like claws, ready to pounce.) They were less interested in the gifts and more interested in taking me into their rooms and showing me all their toys. We read some books and then we started playing trucks. At one point Liam said, "Don't leave, I love you!" Oh boy. My heart melted.

Then we started getting silly. Now, there is something about me that I think little kids pick up on, I don't know what it is, but I somehow inspire children between the ages of 2-5 to get really hyperactive and nutty. Within minutes, I had Liam jumping on my back, Ella jumping on my front, and me trying to remember if I had my physical therapist's number on speed dial.

We crashed around like that literally for hours, until Gretchen and Larry came home. Turns out, we played right through dinner, and the family was getting ready to head to Jersey for the weekend, where they have a house. Gretchen and I talked for a while as the kids were getting their pjs on and eating some chicken nuggets. She updated me on Cookies for Kids Cancer and what was going on with them. She is really amazing. So many people, when something like this enters their lives, turn inwards and concentrate on the family. Gretchen is one of those rare people who can also turn out and say not just my family, what can I do to make sure this doesn't happen to anyone else either? Where she gets the energy to work, run Band of Parents and Cookies for Kids Cancer, and most importantly share her life with a husband and two children, one of whom happens to be ill, is beyond me. Their whole family has really been, at the risk of sounding repetitive and sappy, a real inspiration. Every time I felt I couldn't do one more hill repeat, or take one more step, I thought about Liam and what he was going through, and I thought, if Liam could deal with something infinitely more painful and life-threatening, and do it without complaint, then so could I.

Which is why I was so proud to be able to give him this:

I may have run 26.2 miles, but he's running a much bigger race, and I know he's going to finish strong.

I have to tell y'all, at one point Liam thought it was medicine day (he was getting his second round of antibody treatments) and that he had to go to the hospital when his parents got home. Two-year-old Ella looked at him with big eyes and asked, "Liam, does it hurt?" He shook his head, said "Noooo," and waved dismissively, like it was no big deal. Contrast that with some of Gretchen's posts in her blog, talking about some of the tests and procedures Liam has had to go through, and how much he cried and how much in pain he was -- and keep in mind, this was less than a week after his most recent trip to the hospital for an infection/allergic reaction -- and is it any wonder why this four-year-old boy is my hero?

SHOE REVIEW -- New Balance 1062s

We take another break from my race report of the NYC Marathon (oh, yes, there's more!) to do my first-ever shoe review! I have been a loyal Saucony wearer for years, but they dissed me MIGHTILY this year. I wrote them asking for sponsorship of my marathon effort, sent them pictures of Liam and of the Team and everything, and what did I get? Goose egg. No money, no shoes. Not even a "no thanks." So when I was contacted by New Balance Harrisburg and offered a pair of shoes in exchange for a review, needless to say I was very receptive.

New Balance was the first running shoe I bought when I realized I was actually going to be a runner. I didn't really understand the concept of discontinuing lines, so when they stopped manufacturing the one I liked, and the improvement didn't fit as well, I abandoned NBs for Adidas Supernovas (which felt like running on marshmallows) to Avias, then Reebok, then Saucony, where I've been for the past three years. So it was kind of nice to return home.


Since I'm unfamiliar with their current lines, I went to a NB store and tested a number of their shoes. I wear neutral-cushioned shoes, having been somehow cured of my pronation with my bunion surgery. One thing I will say about NB shoes in general, at least the ones I tested, was that they tend to run a little narrow. I am hyper-aware of my toes, and they will find a way to scrape against air molecules and blister. I prefer a shoe with a wider toe box, and the 1062s fit the bill. What was most exciting to me about the 1062 was the Abzorb cushioning. After my bursitis, I was looking for a shoe that would adequately cushion the ball of my foot and help prevent a recurrence.

I've been wearing the 1062s for about three weeks now, and ran one race in them. I have both good and not-so-good things to say about them, but I have good things to say about the not-so-good things. Huh? Read on.


They are extremely comfortable (they do run small, you must get at least 1/2 size up!) and fit snugly without being tight. They also have SureLace shoelaces, which are the most amazing laces I've ever had. They stay put without me having to double-knot them. My orthotics fit inside them with no trouble. The Abzorb cushion works really well. They're cushioned without being pillowy, my bursitis hasn't returned, and they feel extremely stable and sturdy, like they're going to last more towards the upper end of the mileage spectrum.


There are two things about the shoe that I found troublesome. The first is the sole is rather inflexible. Though my form is not the stuff of legend, one of the things I am normally proud of is my soft footfall. In the 1062s I can hear my footfall even while wearing an iPod. I notice that these shoes change my form a little. I'm a heel striker, and I roll my foot down from the heel to the ball and push off. In the 1062s I can't roll my foot. I strike, then my foot slaps down. Slap slap slap. A lot more flatfooted. It hasn't hurt me -- thanks to the Abzorb technology, I don't physically notice the pounding -- but I notice that they make my stride a little more inefficient (as if it could get more inefficient.)


The other thing about this shoe is that it's heavy. 10.2 ounces. That's heavy? you non-runners who read this ask. The other shoes I wear are 9.6 oz, and believe it or not, those 6 ounces make a difference. Just ask anyone who's been to Weight Watchers. I have, and they do. I'm not such an advanced runner that I race in lightweight racing shoes, but I don't think I will race in these shoes again. Between the slight extra weight and the inflexible sole, they make it hard to reach and maintain top speed, and they make my legs tired. Not hurt, tired.


Ultimately I think the weight and sturdiness of the 1062s are best suited for a heavier runner. That being said, I think the 1062s can be a really good winter running shoe for someone like me. Here in NYC, the roads get snowy and slushy, but nothing so bad that I'd need a trail shoe. I think the extra stability the shoe provides will give the 1062 an advantage over my other shoes. Also, even though the upper is mesh (the bane of wearing old running shoes in the winter -- the wind blows right through them) it feels slightly thicker than my other shoes and my feet do feel a little bit warmer in them. So I'm not getting rid of them just yet.


Come to think of it, they'd also be good shoes to train in before a race, much like the principle of taking practice swings with two bats before heading up to the plate with one. Wear the heavy shoes the day before, and lighter shoes on race day.


So, to sum up: a good, sturdy well-cushioned shoe with a roomy toebox. Best suited for heavier runners looking for a stable shoe that's not a stability shoe.

The 1062s no longer appear on the NB Harrisburg site -- another shoe site says these are on the endangered list -- but their predecessor, the 1061s are extremely similar (in fact, they appear be the exact same shoe, with some slight difference that I cannot see), or look at the 1062 itself on the NB website.


Two more things: first, my opinion of NB shoes has changed as a result of my shoe testing. They are definitely a better quality running shoe than I recall. I don't think I could wear the 1062s as my regular shoe, but I wouldn't be unopposed to finding an NB shoe that COULD replace my current shoe.

Also, my hats off to the folks at New Balance Harrisburg. Their customer service is phenomenal. I originally asked them for a odd-size shoe, which they had to special order for me, and they felt so bad about the "wait" for my shoes (three days) that they overnighted them. When they turned out to be the wrong size (I swear they fit perfectly in the store) the turnaround time to send me the correct size was less than a week. If you are a New Balance wearer, or want to be one, New Balance Harrisburg is the website for you. Click here or on the link to the right of the page.

Next time, for real, I wrap up my marathon experience, including my visit to MSKCC and my playdate with Prince Liam!

Complete Tangent

Many of you know (many? as if more than my mom read this blog!) I'm training to be a court reporter. Part of that training involves going to court and sitting in, and writing along with the court reporter. This past week and a half I've been at 60 Centre Street, NYC's Supreme Court. It's the courthouse they use for Law and Order exteriors, and many of the interior courthouse sets are modeled after the rooms at 60 Centre. There's a giant rotunda with a huge mural on the ceiling, and a gorgeous floor.

So yesterday, I'm sitting in on a case, and we hear applause. And again. And again. And then samba music. Huh? We head out at the break and look down into the rotunda and lo and behold, there's a samba band, and Vera Wang, Nathan Lane, Joel Gray, Kathleen Turner, Dick Cavett, Uma Thurman and Katie Couric are doing the samba, along with about another 150 or so people. Turns out, yesterday was Juror Appreciation Day, and these celebs were recently serving as jurors. So the courts decided to hold a celebrity samba party in the rotunda!

Oh, here's a quick Dick Cavett story. Every year I work an event called "Broadway Bares," which I've mentioned on this blog. It's basically a strip show for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, performed by Broadway dancers. Dick Cavett was in "Rocky Horror" when it was on Broadway, and he was a special guest at Bares that year. he came backstage during the post-show fiesta, when the dancers literally go-go-dance for tips on the runways (all $$ goes to the charity) looking for one of his castmates. I pointed his friend out, who was on the runway, go-go dancing away, and jokingly said that if he goes out there, he'll have to start dancing. Dick Cavett thanked me and headed onstage to his friend. I went about my business. Five minutes later, I look out, and there's Dick, in his underwear, shaking it for all it's worth!!

Dick remained fully clothed yesterday.

Never a dull moment.