Humboldt Marathon Race Report
by John Boyle

We flew from Baltimore via San Francisco into Arcata airport,then drove into Eureka,which is about 40 north of the race location.We spent 2 nights in town at the Carter House Hotel.

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The room was nice,but the menu was a little exotic for our taste,ex. one appetizer was 'Roasted Bonemarrow'. At 5pm,they have complimentary wine & hors doeuvres which my wife enjoyed,while I got into the 8 pm cookies that were put out in the lobby.
They also had a B&B across the street that you could have stayed at:

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We ate at 'The Sea Grill' restaurant on E st.Fabulous.I tried sturgeon for the first time with a great stuffed baked potatoes(fresh green onions in it). We had desert at the 'Bon Bonier Ice Cream Parlor'-licorice ice cream.
Eureka is very 'artsy-crafty' with lots of shops & galleries to walk through.
Two cool buildings to see are:

The Ingomar Club,formerly home to a lumbermagnate
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and the Carson Pink House
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There's a boardwalk along the bay:
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They've been renovating the old town waterfront section.I'm glad we got to see it since two days after we left,I read an article that said a big section of it burnt to the ground.

We headed south about 6 miles to Ferndale,which bills itself as 'California's best preserved Victorian village'.

Old mercantile store in Ferndale:
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We had a great lunch at the Victorian Inn while listening to the German oom pah band in the adjacent barroom playing waltz & polka music.

Victorian Inn
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Oom Pah band there for the 'Scarecrow Festival'
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If someone wanted to stay in Ferndale instead of Eureka,here's a nice B&B
Gingerbread Mansion B&B
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A 5 mile drive got us to a beautiful deserted beach on the Pacific Ocean. The water was rough that day with good sized waves breaking on the beach.What a view!
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Ferndale is the westernmost city in the continental US.

We continued south on rt 101 to Myers Flat where we stayed at an Inn 8 miles from the race start.
We saw the drive-thru tree here:
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It's not far from the redwoods visitors center to see the travellog house
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The race is about 200 miles north of San Francisco.Myers Flat is about as close a lodging that you can get & still have indoor shower shower facilities.There are no changing/shower sites in the park.

I decided the night before the race that a little preparation would be needed to give me a more aerodynamic racing profile,so I shaved my hair.............so OK,it was just my ear & nose hair,but every little bit helps,right?

Sunday...race day
The weather was 42 degrees to start, & mid 60's at the end of the race. I was dressed in a daringly transparent stunning designer outerwear ensemble (arm/head holes in a Glad trash bag). At 9 am, the 1/2 & full marathoners start together near Founder Grove (named in honor of the men who formed the 'Save the Redwoods League' in 1918) in Humboldt Redwoods State Park.
These trees are amazing
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One of the most famous redwoods here is the Dyerville Giant. Such massive trees have a shallow root system, which probably contributed to its fall in 1991.
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The Giant is considered the king of the coastal redwoods with a circumference of 53 feet, 17 foot diameter, & weighed over a million pounds. It was taller then Niagara falls, comparable to a 30 story building.

The majority of the course is well shaded by 300 foot high old growth redwood trees. At 5 miles,you pass the park's visitor center. There is a tree section with markers counting rings backward to the saplings' birth in 1148 AD. This tree was already huge when Columbus sailed. You run a mild uphill till the 6.5 mile area, then down to the midway point; running alongside the Eel River in the 2nd half. I understand that much of the water has now been diverted for the use of upstream towns. My plan for a post-race cooldown disappeared when I saw the river was now only a few inches deep.

Most of the racers ran the 1/2 (650 half marathon runners),Only 129 others did the 26.2 mile marathon. This is quite a difference from the 40,000 in the Chicago Marathon. The latter middle 5 miles are a bit hilly but then the race finishes in a gentle downslope.
Prerace pic
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1st half of race on Avenue of the Giants
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2nd half of the race on Bullcreek rd
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No cheering crowds,just solitude.The lack of crowd support is not surprising .The park roads are closed to vehicles during the race,so onlookers would have to hike in.Also,the population in this part of California is low.About 16 miles into the race,you're in the middle of Rockefeller Forest Grove.In some sections,no other runners are seen,just a splendid view of the spectacular Sequoia trees that sop up sounds so the only thing you hear in the still air is the noise of your own breathing & the slap-slap of your footfalls.

As I approached the finish line,I saw my wife busily snapping pictures of me with my digital camera.I tried to keep my cheeks from puffing out as I wheezed on by with a big smile,waving & giving a 'high 5' for posterity. I found out after the race that she forgot to turn the camera on. Oh well.

The marathon winner did the race in 2:38:29. I finished 82 out of 129 with a time of 4:16:42 (4th in my age group). Since my previous PR was 4:40:52, I was real happy with shaving 24 minutes off my time.

nice shirt
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Postrace massage (eat your heart out :)
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