(Sunday Paper, Year VII, Issue 11)

This might have been a little more appropriate a couple of weeks ago when I ran the half marathon…

But maybe not.

Because for the half marathon the 13.1 mark is the end.

And for the Boston Marathon the 13.1 mark only means 13.1 to go.

I’ll tell you what this might be the halfway mark of though -

My little series on spots along the Boston Marathon route.

I’m not sure if I’m doing three more, but it seems like that would be a nice way to take us up to the marathon.

I’ll put some links to the other posts in the series in the Notes section.

And today, well, let’s talk about Wellesley.

For those who don’t know: the Wellesley stretch of the Boston Marathon is best known for Wellesley College. In pre-COVID times this is where runners would sometimes stop for a kiss from the college girls - that’s pretty well-known. What I didn’t know is that stretch of the marathon is called the ‘Scream Tunnel’ because of the shouting and cheering and screaming taking place from the (mostly) women who come out and watch the runners.

But let’s work our way up to that.

Because the funny thing is - the stretch of Wellesley leading up to that is pretty quiet.

You come out of a Natick neighborhood - just a stretch of Natick coming out of the town center with houses lining both sides of the road - then you hit a couple of businesses, and then it’s woodsy.

And unless a train comes by on the left-hand side, during training, it’s a very quiet part of the run.

You can see that part pictured at the left.

But even before you get to the end of that picture’s horizon there, you hear the screams.

And - I have to say here that my experience in October was only a fraction of what it’s normally like.

Don’t get me wrong - the October crowd all along the route was amazing.

But - from pictures I’ve seen - I know that the crowd in the stretch along Wellesley College was smaller than it usually is.

And I am here to tell you it was still incredibly loud.

So you turn that curve - I think there was a water station right before hitting Wellesley College - and what’s pictured at the right here is the stretch of road.

But on Marathon Monday it’s not empty - there’s the waist-level metal barriers to hold the crowd back lining the road and the Wellesley students are leaning over it, shouting, high-fiving, and holding signs. (No kisses in October. I’d guess there might be some in April.)

And it’s not a super-long stretch of the marathon, but it’s one of those milestones that you wait for and it kind of distracts you and you kind of float on through to the next milestone.

Which, in this case, is just beyond the horizon of that picture - and it takes us to the picture at the top of this post: the halfway point.

You hit a little rise at the end of the college and come down into Wellesley Square, and the clock is the halfway mark and you start having fewer miles to run than you’ve already gone.

I’ve written about this a lot by this point - I didn’t run the ideal race back in October. By this point I was kind of shot - I passed the halfway mark and I walked a little bit and had to stretch my quads as I walked.

I’m especially looking forward to this stretch in April. My goal is to get there at about 2 hours, 20 minutes…which funny enough is where I hit it in October. But in October that was because I had started to fade. In April it will mean I have keep the steady pace I will need to finish strong.

I can’t wait.

What I’ve Been Enjoying

‘Draw the Line’ - David Gray
‘Running on Empty’ - Jackson Browne
‘Jolene’ - Dolly Parton
La La Land
West Side Story
Moneyball

See, this week is exactly why I’m doing this little project this year. I had the song ‘Running On Empty’ running through my head early this week so I figured I’d listen to the album ‘Running On Empty.’ And when I listen to something like that I look it up just to see if there’s anything interesting I should know about the album and lo and behold for this one there sure was. All of the songs on the album were recorded from live performances. And that answered the question for me about the song ‘The Load Out’ which always led into ‘Stay’ when I heard it on the radio - it just made more sense in the context of the album.

Notes

*As promised, here are the other posts in the Boston Marathon route series: This was the first one, about the stretch towards the end that goes past my old apartment, we’ve got this one about the start line, and this one about the end of the hills.

*As for this week’s running update: the Team Framingham run on Saturday was canceled because the forecast looked awful. As it turned out, it wasn’t quite as awful as the forecast called for…but it still would not have been a pleasant run. I audibled to a 6-mile outside run before the rains came, and then I did 12 on the treadmill. (And that’s where I watched Moneyball which, as it turns out, I kind of remembered having watched before.)

*As always, you can keep tabs on the running news with my new-ish running Instagram - @johnnyrunsalot. I have a pretty good post there about the tread run that will likely make its way to the other social media this week.

*What other social media? Oh, I’m glad you asked. You can Like my Facebook page here, and you can follow me on Twitter here.

*And why would I be cross-posting it? Well, it’s a big week to make some fundraising gains. I’ll be making some appeals. And we’ll start here: If you would like to help me raise money for the Wonderfund and help me meet my fundraising goals for Team Framingham, you can do so at this link. And, you know, feel free to tell your friends.

*I didn’t exactly watch Moneyball because baseball was on my mind this weekend, but I will admit it’s good timing. I went from pretty angry at baseball to pretty excited about the 2022 season pretty quickly after the news came Thursday afternoon that the labor issues were resolved. But…I’m not completely no longer angry. This situation will stick with me for a bit.