Race Report: Antarctica Marathon
“Well this is probably the first time I’ve remembered to floss before a marathon”.
I was noting this major life accomplishment looking in the mirror inside the head aboard the Akademik Sergey Vavilov, a Russian “research” vessel from the Cold War, anchored somewhere between 62º and 63º South. I declared my teeth fit for the night and walked back to my bunk. For the first time in three days our porthole had signs of civilization in it — small specks of light from the Chilean research station on King George Island, where tomorrow we would be attempting to run a very cold, very windy 26.2 miles.
“We” were about a hundred people, who had spent the last three days getting to know each other intimately on the way from Buenos Aires to the Antarctic Peninsula via the Drake Passage, known as one of the roughest seas on the planet. As we left the Beagle Channel and entered the Drake, there was strong chop in the forecast, and I reluctantly backed off my plan to brave the rollers without any meds. I knocked on the door of Alex, my newest friend and drug dealer, who grinned and handed me a tube of dramamine pills.
The next morning I woke up…and then took a nap. I moved up to the bridge to get a sight on the horizon — having a point of reference is supposed to help — and then took another nap, with my head resting against a comfortable metal pole. By lunch I had fallen asleep involuntarily a total of four times, and I swore off the next dose that I was scheduled to take with the meal. By that afternoon the haze wore off, my sea legs kicked in, and I took to scanning the sea for the wandering albatross that Derek, the ship’s ornithologist, could identify with startling accuracy.
By dinner my recovery was complete, and the next day I stuck to the plan of a short run on the ship’s treadmill. It was located in the hull, which maximized its stability but deprived its room of windows, so staying upright meant keeping a close eye on the jump ropes hanging from the ceiling in order to infer which direction we were currently tilting.
The Vavilov was built in the 1980’s to receive sonar communications from its sister ship, the Akademik Ioffe. We were now following the Ioffe down to Antarctica, lagging its itinerary by a day (despite my requests/inquiries to the Russian crew, we wouldn’t be exchanging any messages via the old transmission equipment, which was about 40 cubic feet and took up an entire room). The Ioffe was also carrying 100 people who were, coincidentally, also eager to run 26 miles through snow and wind at the bottom of the planet.
We got our first sight of the Ioffe as we pulled into the inlet that harbored the Chilean research station where we would start the race. Soon we saw it jettison one of its Zodiacs, the small rubber rafts that were our means of going ashore. This one was loaded with five people, all clad in the standard issue bright red waterproof outers (“wetskins”). They were the race organizers, and they had spent most of today out on the marathon course as the denizens of the Ioffe completed their race. They looked cold.
Thom Gilligan, the silver-maned race director, was one of the people in bright red wetskins on the Zodiac. His face was also bright red from the wind he’d gotten that day, and he started the pre-race briefing by saying that the race that today had been “perfect” — snow at the start that tapered off, temperatures in the 20’s, and winds in the 30 mph range. Everyone had finished and was back on the boat. Despite pressure from the Polish contingent, Thom was tight-lipped on any times or results — the official results would be combined after both days, and he didn’t want anyone to have any conceivable advantage.
The briefing cleared out apart from a few stragglers who lingered to talk to our affable bartender Cody. It was early, and I wasn’t ready to sleep yet, so I snuck off to a corner to eavesdrop and gather my own thoughts for the race. I went over my mental checklist for what I’d bring ashore. Running shoes that had been scrubbed and disinfected so they wouldn’t introduce foreign bacteria to the ecosystem. Twelve Clif bloks removed from their packaging so there was no chance of a wrapper blowing away (they’d live naked in my back pocket). And my unofficial race jersey that would be finishing its tour of the seven continents.
Then there was race strategy. Above all I wanted to finish in one, non-hypothermic piece. There were a lot of unknowns with the weather, the course, and the actual race logistics, so with this in mind I planned specifically to not have a plan and just run as I felt comfortable. Which was comforting in itself.
There was nothing left to do but floss. Now I was ready for bed.
“Still planning to wear shorts?” Alex was grinning again. Three days ago in Buenos Aires we’d been discussing gear strategies, and I’d asserted that if it wasn’t that cold, I’d probably opt for shorts and calf socks rather than full tights, which I always felt hindered proper running form.
Now we were standing on the aft deck, waiting to descend to a Zodiac to take us to shore. The wind was whipping around and I was carefully watching as the other Zodiacs made their way across the chop, wondering if at some point the conditions would be considered too windy to take them out. If we were in the middle of the race and things deteriorated, we’d have to pull everyone off the course to get back to the boats. Not good.
I forgot about all that for a second and I grinned right back. “Yup.” I was currently bundled up in my bright red wetskin, but I had a plan for leaving all of that on until the last possible second and then quickly disrobing to minimize the time spent standing around with cold knees.
We fit twelve people onto the Zodiac (instead of the usual ten) and Harry, our pilot, guided us out around the bow of the Vavilov where a blast of wind greeted us. “We’re going to fight it here for a bit and then angle back,” he shouted as he accelerated, tilting the front of the boat upwards and pointing it decisively parallel to the shore. I braced against the pontoon and pulled my hood tight around my face.
We made it to shore and I spotted the gaggle of “red penguins” gathering for the race start about half a mile away. I also spotted the Russian Orthodox church that I had determined was the closest thing Antarctica had to something that looked like the SF Ferry Building. This seemed like the best chance I’d have to get a photo for my catalogue while I was definitely still able to operate my phone’s camera.
The start/finish area was makeshift, in the best sense of that word. Two Festivusian poles with a banner, “Antarctica Marathon”, strung across them. Just enough blue tarp to hold everyone’s rubber boots, packs, and wetskins. A growing line of water bottles (sans packaging) labeled with your race number or other identifying symbol. And of course the toilet, which consisted of a single bucket with a plastic bag secured to the inside. In other words, it felt like a cross country meet.
Thom called out a five minute warning and it was time to strip down. Boots and outers off. Cold. Tucked into each other on the tarp. Cold. Wind. Pack on top of the outers. Cold. Cold. Cold. Wind. Wind. Wind. “Two minutes!” Shoes on. Laced tight for the mud. Fingers cold. Gloves back on. Over to the pack of runners corraled at the start. Wind. Cold. “Runners ready!” Set. Go.
More cold. More wind. But now I could do something about that.
The course started with a gradual downhill, which meant that several rabbits shot out to the front. I was happy to let them go while I got warmed up. We made our first pass of the Chilean base, where some of the researchers were, well, not spectating exactly, but they were outside and looked bemused as we ran by. I noticed one in particular who had a beard that extended about halfway down his body and looked around for Andrew, a fellow runner whose beard, while impressive, couldn’t hold a candle to this guy’s. I shouted something that seemed clever but was mostly unintelligible after the wind blew it to pieces.
Soon a small pack formed. In theory this would help to shield us from the wind, but in practice the wind was whipping around at 30 mph and kept changing direction, just as Thom had said, which made our little peloton mostly useless for anything but camraderie.
After a mile or two, the rabbits all faded back and were absorbed into our pack. Wait — really? I poked my nose off the front. Nothing but cool, gray, empty Antarctica in front of me. Cut to my internal monologue: Okay, well, this is pretty good. Let’s not get too excited too soon though. There’s still 24 miles left, plenty of time for things to go south. [I make bad puns even while running.] Just stay steady and run your own pace.
The lead pack stayed consistent, if not thick, through the next couple miles, as it kept breaking up and reforming as people weaved in and out of the mud and ice. Even the best patches of ground were soft and slick on top; we hadn’t seen the snow that the previous day’s runners got, but we were getting the leftovers.
“Where did everyone go?” Andrew and I had just hit mile 7 and realized that we were definitely off the front, separated from the rest of the field. Okay, just keep it up for another 19 miles. We both stopped at the water bottles we’d placed for ourselves and exited the “aid station” quickly. We would be matching stride for stride if it weren’t for Andrew’s 6'3" frame.
The wind made most conversation impossible except for yelling at runners passing by in the other direction, which was pretty much constant with the course being a loop. The entire rest of our boat had now seen the two Andrews locked in battle and yelled words of encouragement. Should probably make it a good show, right? For another three miles we traded the lead back and forth, adding bits of commentary to the absurd situation we now found ourselves in. Around mile 10, Andrew joked, “So were you sandbagging us with your marathon time?” Oh right. We’d been comparing PR’s on the boat. Andrew had run a 2:55 at Boston, a full 20 minutes faster than my best. I protested between breaths: “No that was true! Might be in better shape now. Or this might be too fast and I’ll blow up.” He wasn’t convinced.
We kept on slicing through the wind and approached the turnaround at 13 miles, the halfway mark, which presented another opportunity to access our water bottles. I reached into my back pocket to fish out some of the Clif bloks which had recently frozen into a single, large hunk of sugar and maltodextrin. Make sure you get something down. There’s no way to run this long in these conditions without adding fuel to the tank. Getting it down meant slowing down just a bit for water as well, and as I headed back out on the course, Andrew was in the lead, a couple hundred meters ahead.
I decided to stalk from afar and wait to see if he slowed down. In my last marathon I’d moved from 8th to 5th in the last six miles just by not completely blowing up (and by not getting lost). The pace I was on felt right, and there was still a lot of running left. I knew I wouldn’t be able to get as much sugar as I would have liked, which meant there was a good chance that over the last 6 miles it would be a challenge to hold the pace steady.
It was somewhere around here that my internal strategy session was interrupted by a fur seal (lest I forget that this was no ordinary marathon). He seemed a bit perturbed that the course went right along the rocky beach where he’d camped out, and loudly made this known to me by barking and bluffing in my general direction. We’d seen some fur seals the day before, and had been assured that, at this time of year anyway, they were all talk. I still put on a little extra kick down that straightaway.
The miles kept sailing by, and I kept an eye on Andrew up ahead. The course had pretty good visibility in a lot of places, and it seemed like we were still matching pace, just offset by about a quarter mile.
Mile 19 sent us past the starting area again, and its “toilet”. I’d had a building urge to relieve myself for about 7 miles now, but there is something about the pristine state of Antarctica that makes even the thought of marring it in any way seem unholy. Also the 1961 treaty that specifically forbids it. Could be the treaty.
But more importantly, stopping to use our approved “toilet” would mean just that — stopping. I was already concerned about dropping off the pace, and trying to restart and regain momentum seemed like it would be flirting with disaster. On I went.
I’ve never paid such close attention to what my body was telling me while running as I did for the next couple miles. Would the limited nutrition catch up with me? Or the cold and wind? Perhaps as a result, I got completely dialed into the pace I’d been going. The miles were no longer easily sailing by, but they were still passing, and I was inching towards having only a very short distance left. The wind and the cold and the exhaustion in my legs were now familiar — I was in a groove and I wanted to make sure I finished the race before I came out of said groove. Other runners were coming in the opposite direction and yelling all sorts of encouragment, and I began to suspect that instead of hitting any wall, I had in fact paced this exactly right.
With two miles to go I passed the last of the race staff before the finish line and gave them a thumbs up. I knew I was still more than quarter mile back from Andrew, and it would take either a collapse or a superhuman surge to catch him. But I also knew that by chasing him we’d opened up a huge gap on the rest of the field, and I had to believe that we’d probably be ahead of the leaders from yesterday’s race as well.
When the finish line came into sight I had the now-familiar sensation of disbelief that something I’d thought about for a very long time was now almost over. The poignant moment didn’t last long — one final gust of wind blew me sideways, so I let loose with a spontaneous, primal yell worthy of William Wallace and charged around the last corner and up the hill to the banner.
I quickly became incoherent and very cold. This was the price to pay for accelerating through the groove I’d found myself in. Or perhaps for choosing to run a marathon in shorts in Antarctica. Luckily there were plenty of race staff who got me back into every layer I’d brought ashore, which still didn’t keep my fingers from becoming mostly numb and completely useless.
“Where’s Andrew?”
I hadn’t seen him yet and there weren’t many places where someone as tall as him could hide. Then I realized he was curled up in the fetal position on the ground.
“Hey, let’s go back to the boat, it’s time for a beer.”
We returned to a very quiet Vavilov and I hobbled my way to my room. The Zodiac ride back involved a lot of crouching and cold and I could feel myself becoming stiff. As a last order of business, I asked someone to document the posterior half of my body which was caked in mud, and then jettisoned all of those clothes for what surely was the warmest shower I’ve ever taken.
People started to trickle back to the boat and the celebration kept growing. Eventually the race staff appeared on the last Zodiac back from shore and received a cascading, raucous round of applause when they appeared back on deck. Everyone had finished and was back safely.
The next day we had a rendezvous with the Ioffe for the overall awards ceremony. Thom, ever the master of suspense, addressed the crowd of two hundred runners and their supporters:
“The Ioffe ran two days ago in some really tough conditions. The next day for the Vavilov, it was even colder, windier, and muddier — and as a result, the times were much…faster”
The Vavilov had in fact swept the top three spots overall, with Andrew and I finishing first and second, his 3:27 besting my 3:29. “Andy was hard charging there at the end,” Thom said as he called me up, “and with a couple more miles of race to run I think he would have caught him.”
I remember thinking as I crossed the line that “that was the best race I’ve ever run”. It wasn’t the longest, or the fastest, or the most beautiful. But I knew for certain that it was the *best* race I could have run, and a race fit for the last continent.
