Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J.

My first marathon = 40 years ago

It’s difficult to remember something from 40 days ago – maybe even 40 hours ago! – much less 40 years ago. But alas, today, we’ll try. As hinted at in a previous post, the 40^th anniversary of my first marathon has just passed.

It was the fall of 1983 – specifically, it was Sunday, November 13, 1983 – and I was a lanky 19-year-old sophomore cross country runner at Marist College. Although I had only been running for a few years, it dawned on me early in my college years that I yearned to try out longer distances. That drive was fueled, in part, by the stark realization that I couldn’t keep pace with most of my faster teammates and nearly all of my competitors. But it was also driven by a desire to push myself, by myself, in longer solo pursuits (see previous post, solo 20-miler up and down Route 9).

So that fall, I decided to return to my native New Jersey to run in the Jersey Shore Marathon, in Asbury Park, something I would do three years in a row while in college (1983, 1984, 1985). That first year, it was a two-loop course on a chilly autumn morning. I don’t remember specifics about the race – certainly, any race splits have been long lost to history … I don’t even recall my half-marathon split. I still have coffee mugs from the race (one damaged, one intact, one lost to time) and the memory of the really cool race T-shirt, modeled after the album cover of Bruce Springsteen’s debut release, “Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J.” (that shirt is also lost to time)

Here's what I do remember (about the race): My hands were cold. My legs were cold, but they warmed up on the second lap. I was dreadfully anticipating “the wall” … but it never really came. My legs got tired and tight toward the end, but no glycogen-depleted bonking occurred (don’t worry; that would happen at Jersey Shore in 1984!). In 1983, for my first marathon, it was a good experience, and I craved more and faster times at the distance.

The Internet is an amazing place. A few weeks ago, I looked up the results of this long-forgotten race, and got a clipping of all finishers, from the Nov. 14, 1983, Asbury Park Press. There were close to 1,000 finishers (979 to be exact). Of those, 132 runners broke the 3-hour mark. I was one of them, placing 78^th in 2:53:54. It stands as my third-fastest marathon. A fine debut.

Forty years is a long time. A really, long time. Practically, a lifetime. I have fond (if faint) memories of that long-ago 26.2-miler. I also have some fondness for the fact that – although my running is greatly diminished these days – I’m still moving forward after all these years, and specifically, 40 years after my first marathon. Neat.