10 Things I Think About Running

10 Things I Think About The Oaktown Half Marathon

1. Oakland

I think that I was unnecessarily scared of Oakland. I had heard many terrible things about Oakland. I was picturing some sort of post apocalypse streetscape with barriered up shops, sort of like a bad dangerous North Main Street. The only thing that made me think it might be ok was that the race was starting at 7am. Sure nowhere is bad at 7am, is it?

2. Parking

I think that the main thing I was scared about in Oakland was parking the car. I had numerous warnings “leave absolutely nothing visible in the car, nothing.” The race organizers email said to take the BART but at 7am this probably wasn’t going to work. So being the very brave man that I am, at 6am in the semi darkness, I drove into the heart of Oakland, to my surprise it was perfectly normal, very clean, tidy and modern with a parking lot just before the start. I couldn’t pay for the parking as I’d no phone reception, so another runner kindly gave me their phone to pay. So far so good.

3. Razzmatazz

I think that you should always be wary of races with too much stuff not related to running. The race looked like a super slick operation, loud music, a DJ, big gantries, and lots of stalls selling stuff that you don’t need to run. It made me realize where the $150 entry fee was going. Yes, you read that right $150 for a race and this was if you selected none of the Ryanair style add-ons on the super slick website.

4. No Easy Day

I think that my hopes of an easy day were dashed by the sight of a pair of Alphafly 2s on the start line. I was half hoping that there would be absolutely no-one at the race and that I could run around at 6 minute mile pace win and run the cross country the next day with no problems. Unfortunately, a guy with a new pair of Alphafly 2s took the race out at 5:30 pace so I knew that my easy day plan was gone.

5. East Berlin

I think that the first 5k of the race was the part of Oakland that people were talking about. Once we left the start area near the nice lake we entered what I think was downtown Oakland. It reminded me of those streets in East Berlin that look kind of dangerous but actually aren’t with lots of bars and warehouses. I felt perfectly safe as there was no-one about except the many police officers who were marshalling the race. After about 5k I had two other runners for company, a fella in a t-shirt who I knew wasn’t going to get much farther and the fella in the Alphaflys who looked very comfortable, too comfortable.

6. Lake Merritt

I think that the race should just have been four laps of Lake Merritt. I am unsure of what the race organizers were trying to achieve with what was the most convoluted course designs I have ever seen. Lake Merritt is a lovely lake to run around, but for some reason they decided that the Lake wasn’t nice enough and we were sent out into downtown Oakland before coming back to the Lake to do a lap before going back around the lake in the opposite direction and then back out into downtown Oakland before finishing back at the lake. Four laps of the lake would have been fine with no need for all the police officers and cones.

7. So Many Cones

I think that traffic cones must be the cause of all race course problems. Has there ever been a problem with a race that wasn’t caused by a misplaced cone. Once we had completed the first lap of the lake I was expecting to have to turn around and go back around the lake in the opposite direction like the map had said. Instead, the police officer on the lead bike kept going, there was never any obvious turnaround, so I assumed that he knew what he was doing. He looked like he knew what he was doing.

8. Kiplimo

I think that it would have been a great finish if we’d followed the actual course. Up until 9 miles I had been leading keeping the pace around 5:35-5:40s. Then at mile 9 the guy in the Alphaflys picked it up and tried to drop me. Amazingly with some effort I was able to follow him. To both of our surprise just as our watches ticked to 10 miles the police officer drove us back through the finish and parked up. We jogged over to him unsure of what was happening, “Wow, you guys are amazing, you’re done, super-fast”. “No we aren’t” “We didn’t break the world record for the half marathon”

9. Right on Harrison

I think that it was a bit optimistic of us to think that we could remedy the situation at this point. I always have hope. I convinced the guy in the Alphaflys that we could just run back to the 11 mile mark which was about a mile back the road and resume from there, sure no one would notice. We ran back to the 11 mile mark, fist bumped and resumed racing. I seemed to have more interest in the resumed race and got a gap quite quickly. Then after we passed the 12 mile mark we were sent the wrong way again. We ran on until 14 miles appeared on the watch with no sign of the finish. Then I saw one of the many the police officers picking up the cones. The game was up. We stopped and asked the police officer for directions back. “Turn Right on Harrison”, “Thank you Sir” and off we jogged defeated.

10. Refund > Prize

I think that I was lucky that the half marathon went so wrong. When we finally got back to the start after turning right on Harrison we met the race organiser who was very apologetic, my Alphafly buddy and his coach (think American Donie Walsh) were a little more angry about the whole thing than I was. They obviously hadn’t heard of the Raheny 5 or the Cork Half Marathon. We asked to be refunded the race entry fee which the race organiser said would be no problem, this would only happen in America. As it turns out there were no prizes for winning the race anyway so the best result was to get a refund of the entry fee. The lesson is always enter a race because it’ll be great fun no matter what happens especially abroad, just maybe don’t take them too seriously.