It’s official. The Medtronics Twin Cities Marathon in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota is officially my favorite marathon that I’ve ever had the privilege of running. I’m not entirely sure if that is because of the race itself: the course, the spectators, or the proximity to my birth place and the subsequent nostalgia, OR if it was because of what the race meant in the scheme of the past three years, which has been rife with injury and after injury, tears upon tears, and plenty of cursing of the universe.
Yes, it has been three full years since my last marathon in Long Beach, California. As the Twin Cities Marathon fell right in the middle of my leave of absence from work to travel, taking place after several weeks in the Middle East where I neglected to run nary a mile, I knew I was in for a treat.
I had basically abandoned my dream of running a marathon in all 50 states once I was diagnosed with my third incurable injury, so when my mother suggested that we run the Twin Cities Marathon in the fall on the 30th anniversary of her first marathon, an old, long-forgotten spark lit up inside me. A marathon. I had seriously signed up for and deferred so many marathons in the past few years that I truly never thought I’d be on the starting line of 26.2 miles ever again. And there I was, weeks away from the race, miraculously without a single injury flare-up. Against all odds, it appeared that I would actually follow through.
So on Friday, my mom and I, along with our boyfriends Bill and Travis, packed a bag, hopped aboard our tiny Spirit aircraft, and flew to Minneapolis. It was happening, and I could barely even wrap my mind around it.
If you have any reservations about doing this race, don’t. It was amazing, and by far the most exciting and exhilarating marathon I’ve done. It was well organized, it was well-attended, and it is the (self-proclaimed) “most beautiful urban marathon in America.” I am having a hard time disputing that claim, regardless of its veracity.
The Expo
I was a big fan of this race before I even showed up to the start. The expo was nothing short of impressive. It was located at the Saint Paul RiverCentre, and had over 100 exhibitors with tons of merchandise to be purchased, massages to be had, free samples to taste. We ended up spending hours there as my mother and Bill stopped at every last booth, just to make sure that they didn’t miss a single deal. I picked up my bib, my complimentary Twin Cities Marathon gloves, and a handful of Gu and called it a day, though I was tempted by a Minnesota running tank top and a Minnesota sweatshirt. However, my leave of absence did not afford me much frivolous shopping.
The expo was open Friday 11 am to 8 pm and Saturday 10 am to 7 pm, so there was plenty of time to get in and retrieve your packet.
The Race
The gun was set to go off at 8 am on Sunday, and we had booked a hotel room about half a mile from the start (at the Westin, which is such a nice hotel and was somewhat of a culture shock to me, after spending months sleeping in a bunk bed in a room with ten other people). The Twin Cities has a decent public transportation system, so we were able to hop on the light rail and get dropped off directly at the porta-potties (which actually moved pretty quickly; the porta-potty situation is always my biggest fear going into a big race, but this race has been around for decades, so the number of pots was adequate).
There were almost 10,000 marathon runners registered, so the start was broken into corrals based on your predicted start time (I put something ridiculous down, knowing I would not be setting any records that day. I was in the final group, corral three). It took us about 15 minutes from the first gun to get to the starting line, but the spectators and announcer were so freakishly animated that I barely noticed how chilly it was.
The race is called the “Twin Cities” Marathon for a reason. It starts in downtown Minneapolis, runs around the Lake of the Isles, Lake Calhoun, Lake Harriet, Lake Nokomis, and then along the Mississippi River. A little before mile 20, it crosses over the river and enters Minneapolis’s twin city, St. Paul, the capital of Minnesota. The race finishes right at the capitol building, near where the expo took place.
My mom had not run a marathon in 28 years, and I had not run one in three and had only probably run a few hundred miles since then. So it would be an understatement to say we went out slow. And after about two miles of a blistering pace of 11 minutes per mile, I realized I was about to pee my pants.
This has never happened to me before. In my first marathon, I actually did pee my pants, thrice, but not until well into the race. Learning my lesson after such unacceptable decision-making, I stopped once at a porta-potty on the course in all subsequent marathons, about halfway through the second half of the race. And that worked out flawlessly for me and my bladder.
However, a full, sloshing bladder two miles in was new territory for me. I cursed myself for not peeing once more before starting, but knew that what was done was done. Thankfully, my mother, who has birthed four children, never says no to a pee stop, so we stopped for a few minutes, because guess what?
The course is brimming with porta-potties. There are several scattered every couple of miles.
I guess putting together a race for over three and a half decades teaches you some things about the urinary needs of a runner.
For a while after our pit stop, everything was going well. Both of us were wont to continue at our slow pace in fear that we would hit the dreaded marathon wall way too soon. The course was beautiful, almost always beside a body of water and running through some absolutely gorgeous (and high brow) neighborhoods (I even remembered some of the addresses so I could look up the sale prices of the homes on Zillow afterwards, and BOY, I could not afford to live there in this or in the next lifetime).
The spectators were unlike anything I’d ever seen. About 90% of the time there was always a group of people cheering you on from the sidelines, and they actually seemed excited about it: smiling families, trumpeters, entire bands, block parties. It was motivating and thrilling; there must be something in the midwestern water, because no one on the east coast is that friendly, much less thousands of people all in one place.
Around mile 13, I realized I was struggling again, almost doubled over in discomfort, but this time, I was about to poop my pants. Was it that I had forgotten how to prepare myself for races, or was it just an off day? It had been years since I’d faced runner’s trots and I forgot what a pain in the ass it is. LITERALLY. I was beginning to waddle and sweat profusely. Runners near us probably were pretending not to hear my cries of how bad the poop was hurting me. My mom kept looking over at me nervously, bracing herself for a disaster.
AND WHAT DO YOU KNOW. Porta-potties, and lots of them! And not a moment too soon.
If you’re a runner, you know exactly what I’m talking about. If you think I’m gross and uncouth, I am okay with that.
The course happened to be pretty flat. I had heard that I was in for some REAL hills, and had accepted my fate to die out on the course, but it actually ended up being relatively mild. The largest hill was around the 20 mile mark, which was not easy to ignore, but the other gradual inclines were slight and manageable.
After three years sans marathons, it was really shocking to me just how long the race is. I mean, that bitch goes on forever. It’s like three long runs back to back. The slow pace helped a lot, though, because although I was mentally exhausted and my knee was shrieking in anguish for many, many miles, I was able to keep going without slowing even more. Around mile 24, I told my mother I loved her and took off on a downhill, a second wind carrying me at a fast clip towards the finish (I found out later it was actually closer to an average 9:15 pace, but at the time, it seemed like an all-out sprint). I crossed the finish line at 4:50:08, the results telling me that I passed 282 runners in the last two miles, and I finished feeling strong, using all my power not to burst into tears of joy.
I, Robin, after years of doctors telling me I probably would not be able to run anymore, after years of family members telling me to try to find a new hobby, after years of disappointment and let down, finished my sixth full marathon, with my incredible running partner and mother, and I finished it strong. I didn’t care that it was an hour off of my Long Beach Marathon finish time. I can’t remember a time recently when I have been quite that elated.
The App
In 2017, the Twin Cities Marathon rolled out a free phone app, which contains, in detail, all the race weekend information, including information on the expo schedule, the course maps, and traffic and transportation. There is a runner tracking feature for spectators, and after the race, all results went right into the app, so you could easily look for your official time and photos.
Weather
The weather? Oh, it was cold. Startlingly cold. Having come from the desert of Wadi Rum, Jordan, and then a week back in Baltimore where the summer hadn’t quite quit, the Minnesota weather was a definite surprise. The temperature stayed in the 40s for the entirety of the race, there were some portions where the wind coming off the lakes was enough to chill you to the bone, and the sun failed to make an appearance all day long.
The race was the first weekend of October, a month that generally has an average temperature in the mid to high 50s, so we were unequivocally gypped. We did manage to avoid rain, however, which was a blessing.
Pricing
The Twin Cities Marathon is reasonably priced, and comparable to what you’d pay for other large, urban marathons. My mother registered early and paid a little over $100, but I paid $150, as I registered closer to the race after a long battle with myself over whether or not I would actually do it (and thank Jesus I did).
Swag
We received our Brooks long-sleeved tech shirts at the end of the race (a $36 value), along with a shiny, curvy silver medal. The shirt is simple and comfortable, and the medal has the marathon year on the back with a spot specifically for finishers to get their times engraved (which my mother, of course, did promptly).
Overall Thoughts
I have two complaints about the race. In the scheme of things, two complaints is incredibly minimal. I will continue to hold this marathon near and dear to my heart until its very last beat. I truly loved it so much.
However. I did not love that the finish chute was 20 miles long. After finishing, with my knee about to crumble beneath me and desperately in need of a good lie down, we walked along the road, picking up bananas and chip bags as we went, directed through the chute by a chain-link fence. Once the fence ended, we had to wind around and go back the other way, for what felt like eons but was probably only about a quarter mile. I’m pretty sure no one needed to walk a full quarter mile right after sprinting across the finish line after 26.2 miles, thank you very much. My mom was hobbling and dropping her snacks all along that endless chute, her thermal blanket slipping off her shoulders, pain emanating from her face as she looked longingly towards the chute’s end. I limped back to her and spent approximately 15 agonizing minutes just trying to bend over to pick up her granola bar off the asphalt. Why did they make us walk so far through the finish chute? I am seriously looking for answers. That was torture.
The second complaint, and this one is slightly less egregious, was the lack of race photos. The system glitched a little bit following the race, and so everybody had three photos of the same two men and one woman at mile 21 when they searched for their results. Later, there were a few additional runner-specific photos, but I was a little saddened by the quality. You can see me in the photos, also at mile 21, and for some reason I am grinning ear to ear, but I’ve definitely encountered much more impressive race photos.
Despite these two caveats, I was blown away by this race. The pre-race communication was unparalleled, as was the unbelievable crowd support and the organization. Honestly, everything went suspiciously smoothly, and the fact that there was always a porta-potty when I needed it seemed too good to be true. At the end, there were plenty of snacks and a beer garden for those so inclined to pound a can right after a traumatically long physical exertion. It is obvious that this is a very established race, because they clearly have all their shit together.
Thank you, Minnesota, for a wonderful weekend, the most intense runner’s high ever, and, of course, for hosting the country’s most beautiful urban marathon. I am much obliged.
