Randon Thoughts on Chicago Marathon Expo

I was in a mellow mood when I sauntered into the marathon expo this morning.  I played hooky today, slept in a bit and cabbed to the correct entrance of McCormick Place (the east building of the new expo center which is actually on the west side of South Shore Drive).  So my walk was about a block instead of 3/4 of a mile if I had driven.  Very efficient check in system, scanning a bar code sent me to station 34 which had my chip, and then a longish walk through the festival of commerce to get my check bag and tee shirt.

I actually spent about 45 minutes and $250 at the fair loading up on a heavily discounted pair of Kinvara 4s (now one model out of date), a long sleeve winter running shirt for me and my daughter, and a new running hat, gel, and cotton throw away gloves.  Browsed the various foreign and domestic marathon booths (I'm still leaning toward Budapest for our next antitrust marathon), picked up everything from microwavable fried rice (gluten free!) to string cheese and all manner of sample bars and tschotckes.

Then cabbed back to my neck of the woods for a Japanese lunch and the final massage and chiro adjustment.  Glad my tibia is back in the groove but that adjustment really hurts.  Back home, 20 minutes on the bike and a slow mile on the tread completed my race prep.  Tonight is laying out my stuff and packing the bag for L to hand me at mile 8.5. 

Tomorrow is taking it easy at a family bat mitzvah and then heading home to meet Max and a fine pasta dinner at Sappori trattoria. 

Over lunch, I enjoyed the complementary marathon edition of Chicago Athlete where I learned that there are 8 guys who have run all 36 Chicago marathons.  (Started in 1977 but no race in 1987 because no sponsor).  Half are still close to their original times with the rest anywhere from high 5s to low 10s.  This was inspirational in several ways including validating the notion that if I have to walk I will be walking.  I also learned that was passes for celebrity runners in Chicago is pretty sorry.

So now a day of heat ice rest and then either a rousing ramble through my backyard and/or a second induction into the marathon Hall of Pain.

Excelsior.