I was supposed to run this Sunday New York City marathon, but I didn't do it. Something happened to my knee the very last week - I had grown used to feeling some soreness there after long runs (OK, to not being able to walk after long runs), but this time it stayed sore, and two days before the marathon I couldn't even complete a short four miles. The outside of my left knee felt tighter and tighter, and then started to hurt more and more, until I had to stop.

I suppose one consolation is that I can now write "a short four miles" with a straight face, considering how unattainable that distance seemed before I started training. But I would rather have my knees back!

In the end, I had a wonderful time just watching. I had never seen a marathon up close before, and certainly not any kind of race of this magnitude, with over thirty thousand runners taking part. Somehow the Sudbury Road Race (20 runners, 10 kilometers) did not quite prepare me for the New York City marathon. Even as a spectator.

We got to the sixteen mile mark just in time to see the lead men streak past. One thing I hadn't really understood before starting my own lumbering fitness program was just how fast a champion marathon runner goes. The fact is, there is no distance at which I could match a competitive marathon pace. Even in a ten yard dash to the refrigerator to get another box of Mallomars, I'm no match for a good distance runner. Consider that at the 18 mile mark, the leaders were clocking mile times of 4:30. The slowest mile of the race was a leisurely five minutes and change. Nothing makes you feel like a wuss quite as effectively as a marathon.

Relative speeds, as observed at the 16 mile mark:

FAST

Elite female runners
Kenyans
Very very thin white men
Buff fit people with shades
Buff fit people in funny hats
Holstein cow
Man in clown nose
First of many annoying cellphone users
Santa Claus
Man juggling four balls in the air
Spiderman
Waiter carrying full bottle of vermouth on tray
Man filming race on camcorder
Transvestite in full evening gown
Racewalkers
Man running backwards
Foam-rubber rhinoceros #1
Lumpy people in funny hats
Lumpy people running slowly
Assorted walkers
People staggering towards the med station
Me
NOT FAST