Marathon is cold feat

It was 29 degrees and still dark at 7 a.m. as Mark Reddie of Tempe sat in the heated shuttle bus on the way to the starting line of P.F. Chang’s Rock ’n’ Roll Arizona Marathon & 1/2 Marathon. As he munched on a sandwich, he said he wasn’t nervous about the impending 26.2 miles, but he was anxious to get started. He felt prepared.

Near the start line, at Wesley Bolin Memorial Plaza in Phoenix, runners huddled in trash bags, space blankets and old sweats. They ate bananas, drank water and stood in 50-person lines for the portable toilets. Brave ones stripped down to tank tops and shorts.

Hearts shot into throats as the gun sounded promptly at 7:40 a.m.

Within the first 100 yards, one elite runner joked to his friend: “I’m doing OK, I’m OK! I’m not exhausted!”

Racers soon began dropping gloves, hats and sweatshirts along the roadside.

At mile four, cheerleaders chanted: “Yes you can! Sí se puede!” and a man in hot pink shoes and a pink tutu bounced by, looking strong and fit.

Paces varied, creating a constant stream of bodies, which flowed, uninterrupted, through neighborhood after neighborhood from Phoenix to Scottsdale to Tempe.

By 9:10 a.m., it was still only 32 degrees.

For some, the middle miles were a struggle. At mile 12, Tempe resident Doss Walters stopped to walk a bit. It was his first marathon.

“I started out at a 7:30-per-mile pace, then gradually moved my way down to 9 minutes, then 9:30.” Walters said his training lagged the last month, but he’d decided to try the marathon anyway. “You see all these people that could finish it; I figure I’m one of those people.”

But by the half-marathon mark, most were still strong. Chandler resident Leann Bohn, of the 1st Marathon Running Club, said the fans and bands had energized her, and she was feeling good.

Runners got another boost just past mile 15. The band Gooder was the peppiest yet, reinspiring both runners and fans. In times ranging from 2 1/2 hours to more than 6 hours, runners gutted their ways to the finish in Arizona State University’s stadium parking lot.

There, some sat on the pavement and propped their heads in their hands, exhausted.

Others glowed and were chatty. David Willemsen of Springfield, Miss., felt overwhelmed as he crossed the finish. He said he thinks back to the time, 10 years ago, when he weighed 300 pounds. “I took five years to lose 120 pounds, and now I run this marathon every year to celebrate.”

Mesa Desert Ridge High School student and race volunteer Kelly Povar handed out medals at the finish line. She described the feeling of watching marathoners achieve their goal as “amazing.”

After racers received hugs and greetings, they hobbled away from the stadium, intent on hot baths and pasta dinners.