I got up early to get ready for my morning volunteer shift at Dodger Stadium. I left the house a little before 6 am. I entered the stadium through the Sunset Gate and parked in lot 10. It was a long walk over to the check-in spot for volunteers. I don't like being late, so I ended up having to jog to make it to the check-in location before 7 am. Once I signed in, I received a pink volunteer t-shirt.
Dodger Stadium parking
Volunteer check-in
Volunteer shirt
Back of volunteer shirt
At around 7:40 am, the guy in charge of the volunteers gathered us and started explaining to us our assignments for this morning. We then walked over to the bib pick-up location on the other side of the fencing. He then split us up into 2 groups based on the volunteers' preference. One was for t-shirt distribution and the other was for bib assignments. They definitely needed more people for assigning bibs especially for the runners in the open corral. Just as last year, I went with assigning bibs in the open corral tent. I knew that there would be a lot of runners for the open corral versus the seeded and LA Loyal bibs. Since I already knew what to do, I only half-heartedly listened to the instructions. Once again, we were given some really old iPads. The camera could barely scan and recognize the QR codes. Most of the time, we had to search by the runner's name.
Bib assignment for the open corral
Assigning race bibs
Volunteering in action
I wanted to keep going, but I was given a lunch break at just after 12 pm. Once again, it was non-stop action! There were so many people picking up their bibs! For lunch, we had Noah's NY Bagels. There were a couple of choices and I went with the deli pastrami.
Lunch break
Deli Pastrami from Noah's NY Bagels
After I was done with my lunch, I used a portapotty and went back to the same tent to resume work. However, all spots were occupied. They were also getting ready to bring in the next shift of volunteers, so I got permission to end my shift. I then walked over to the LA Loyal tent to pick up my race bib. I saw that they had laptops to assign race bibs! Along with my bib, I received a program guide, a shoe charm, and a LA Loyal pin.
LA Loyal tent
Program guide
Shoe charm
LA Loyal pin
I then moved on to the race shirt tents to pick up my race shirt. The design for the race shirt wasn't bad for the 40th anniversary of the race. However, the shirt itself was weird. The sleeves were cut weird. They reminded me of those irregular shirts that you can buy for cheap at outlet stores.
Race shirt pick-up
Race shirt
After getting my shirt, it was on to the official merchandise and the expo with all of the different vendor booths. I was pleasantly surprised to bumped into my good friend, Andrea. She will be one of the race announcers for tomorrow's marathon. I didn't even bother with the official merchandise as I didn't need any more race gear. Per the usual, I found my name on the participants name wall before moving on to the vendor booths. Quite a few of the vendors were giving out samples. It reminded of the old days where free samples were given out. There was a stretch of a few years where nothing was given out for free.
Race expo
Andrea!
Participants name wall
Found my name
Jonny Pops
Taste the rainbow!
Before heading out, I stopped by the Chiquita tent to see what they were giving out as they had long lines. The first line was for a banana and a Chiquita branded item. To get the item, I had to show them on my Instagram account that I was following them. Then there was a second line to take a picture with the person in the banana costume. I had to post the picture on my account in order to get a nice yellow t-shirt or a cap. Since I already had too many shirts, I went with the cap.
Chiquita banana
Chiquita swag
Expo haul
Sunday 3/16
Man, it was rough getting up so early, but I got ready and left the house at about 2:20 am to drive out to Century City. Originally, I was planning to park for free at Dodger Stadium. However, I balked at the idea. I didn't want to leave my car there as it's just not a very nice area and I also didn't want to deal with finding my own transportation back to my car after the race. Just as I got to the downtown area, I came up on a pretty bad multi-car accident. Fortunately for me, the accident had just occurred and I was able to get around it before part of the freeway was shut down. I certainly hoped that everyone involved were okay. I arrived at the Westfield Century City mall at just after 3 am. Instead of pulling a parking ticket, they had a couple of employees stationed at the gate. If you had not already prepaid for parking, they collected $32 on the spot. This year, they had us go down to P2. I drove over to the orange section before finding a vacant spot.
Westfield Century City mall parking
I took the escalator up a level to use the mall restroom. Then I started heading over to the bus pick-up location on Ave of Stars near Olympic Blvd. I took the long way and exited out onto Santa Monica Blvd to get a peak of the finish line. I was about a block from the buses when I was able to reach my friend. She had just arrived at the same parking lot, so I turned around to go get her.
Finish line
Taking the bus to school
After we were dropped off at Dodger Stadium, we went through security bag check. We used a portapotty before going over to the food table to get some water and gels. Then we headed over to Dodger Stadium to wait. We hung out near the restrooms. As it got closer to 6 am, we headed over to the start line hospitality tent to meet up with fellow Marathon Maniacs for our pre-race group photo. I bumped into a coupe of familiar faces along the way.
Dodger Stadium
Willie!
Dexter!
My friend, Robert, who was tasked with organizing the photo, had texted me that they were not going to make it in time. I had to step in and wrangled the Maniacs for a quick photo. It would end up that a fellow Maniac ended up taking the photo for us while not knowing that we were the Marathon Maniacs! We wanted to do a redo with him in the photo, but he insisted that he was okay without being in it.
Marathon Maniacs
After the photo, I headed over to the gear check trucks to check my bag. I pretty much checked only my jacket. It wasn't all that cold of a morning, but I kept on my McDonald's long sleeve shirt on for the wait inside the corral. I was planning to donate the shirt. Before going to my corral, I quickly went back inside Dodger Stadium to use the urinal one last time. On the way over to corral C, I bumped into Julie. Once inside the corral, I bumped into the usual suspects.
Gear check
Julie!
Corral C entrance
Ely!
Paul!
Dan & Karen
Robert and Beth
The seeded corral system for this race continued to be a complete joke. While they were pretty strict at the corral entrance, people in the later corrals were just pushing their way up to the front corrals. They also continued to put charity runners inside corral B and legacy runners in corral A regardless of their running capabilities. It's just flat out not safe for them to continue this practice. It will only be a matter of time before slower participants get trampled!
Quite chaotic starting corral
I crossed the starting mat at about 7:01 am. I stayed mostly on the right side of the course and followed a runner ahead of me as we tried to plow through some much slower traffic. My goal for this race was to try and keep my heart rate under 140 bpm. Although my lungs were getting better, they were still not 100%. Even though the pace should've been considered easy, my heart rate was running a bit higher than normal. As I reached the peak of the steep climb up to the Walt Disney Concert Hall, I decided to pull over for a quick walk break to allow my heart rate to drop a bit. As it had climbed into the 150s, I knew that I would be paying for that further down the line. I bumped into my friend, Lea. I ran a bit with her, but she was moving a bit too fast for me. I continued to run at a controlled effort. However, the heart rate continued to remain slightly above 140 bpm. Once I had reached Hollywood and Highland Ave, I just had to pull over for a quick walk break. I had not reached mile 12 and I was already beginning to struggle.
Here we go!
Just after reaching the Walt Disney Concert Hall
10k
El Capitan
I continued to struggle more and more with each successive mile. I clocked my slowest mile thus far for the race with the 14th mile. I took advantage of the next downhill mile, but quickly went back to struggling. After reaching mile 17 at Rodeo Dr, I had run another slow mile. However, once I made the right turn onto Wilshire Blvd, there were people handing out bottles of PRIME hydration. I took one and started drinking as much of it as my stomach would allow. Apparently, it helped for the next 8 miles. Unfortunately, that was only enough to get me to mile 25. The legs cramped up where I just could not run any of that last mile! I forced a jog during the last .2 stretch, but it was a very uncomfortable trot to the finish line!
25k
Andrew pacing 4:40
Rodeo Dr
Rodeo Dr
Yvonne!
Jas!
Brentwood
Approaching finish line
Screen grab of the finish line video
Finish: 5:07:02
Click here for my Garmin data.
Man, this marathon was a disaster of a race for me. However, my mediocrity remains consistent. Just as I was hoping to sneak in under 5 hours, the legs cramped up to make sure that I finished somewhere between 5:05 and 5:10 which seems to be the norm for me at this race. What mattered most was that I still had fun!
Finish!
A fter collecting my finisher medal, I continued down the finisher chute. I took out my grocery bag to help carry all of the goodies that they were passing out. Even though it had gotten warm, I still took a mylar blanket as I'll be sure to need it at one of my colder races in the future. I also stopped for all of the photo ops as I had prepaid for them during registration.
Finisher medal
Close up of finisher medal
Post race goodies
Finisher photo
After getting my gear bag, I headed for the exit. Unfortunately, it was a complete logjam. Despite all of the emails and announcements for spectators to not clog the exit, that's what everyone was doing, waiting for their friends or family members. Eventually, I followed the people ahead of me that were finally able to push and swim their way through that sea of humanity. I headed back to my car to drop off everything. I then headed back out to the final stretch to do a little bit of spectating. It wasn't until about the mile 26 marker where I finally found an opening for me to get up to the course railing. I noticed that the crowd control was pretty bad at this point. Spectators were crowding the course to the point where they were creating a chokepoint for the runners.
Spectating
Mitch!
Deo!
Maricris!
Marathon Maniac
Amador!
It was almost 2 pm, so I decided to head back into the mall to get something to eat. This time, I went to the food court to check out Massis Kabob - The Original Kabobery. Lately, my decision for eating anywhere was dependent by the restaurant's participation in the AAdvantage Dining Program. I placed my order on their mobile app for their #16 Chelo Kabob Barg. It came with Shirazi Salad and rice. By opening a new account, I was given a free side item. I used it to get their garlic fries. I believe the food was cooked to order, so there was a little bit of a wait. Once I got my food, I had to find a vacant spot. That was some good post marathon food! The portion size was pretty big, so I had to take the fries home.
Massis Kabob in the food court
#16 Chelo Kabob Barg and garlic fries
After I was done eating, I went to get in line to get my medal engraved. However, after only a few minutes of waiting, the vendor that had been contracted to do the engraving just started packing up their equipment. At no point were we ever told that they were only going to be there for a finite amount of time. Not cool. I then checked on the parking lot situation. It looked to still be backed up, so I went back out to spectate some more. Now, it was the true back-of-packers coming through to the finish line. Some of them were deep in the pain cave and you could see the emotions on their faces as they knew that they were going to finish the marathon today! What a display of grit and determination! I stayed until a pack of Elvi and Marilyn came through which was almost 3:30 pm. There was still a lot of traffic, but it was nowhere near as bad as if was compared to last year.
Elvi and Marilyn
Monday 3/17
After putting in a half day of work from home, I got ready and drove down to Disneyland for a half day at the park. Per the usual, I pulled into the Toy Story Parking Lot. This might had been my first time parking in the Bullseye section.
Toy Story Parking Lot
After being dropped off and getting through security screening, I headed to the Disneyland Park entrance. I started here because I wanted to check out the Alice in Wonderland Magic Key Photo. First things first, I took a selfie with my LA Marathon finisher medal in front of the Sleeping Beauty Castle.
Sleeping Beauty Castle
After getting my selfie, I started heading over to Tomorrowland. The Star Wars Launch Bay was about to open at 2 pm, so that's where I went and was first in line to meet Vader. They had changed things up a bit. We actually went in the side normally for the Star View Station Member Lounge for Disney Vacation Club members. Perhaps, they will start having photo opportunities with other Star Wars characters again.
Star Wars Launch Bay
Getting a lecture from Darth Vader :)
I then headed over to the Alice in Wonderland ride to check out the Magic Key PhotoPass Magic Shot. At first, I thought they were giving out paintbrushes for Magic Key Holders, but it was a prop for the photo. It was in celebration of Women's History Month. This particular photo was honoring legendary Disney artist, Mary Blair.
Alice in Wonderland
Then it was off to Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge to get in line for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. For once the ride did not go down while I was in line.
I then headed back to Tomorrowland to go on Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters. Well, that was horrible. First the left gun was not very responsive. I couldn't tell if I was hitting the target. So I eventually, switched over to the right gun. It wasn't that much better. There was a pretty cool house from the movie UP.
Then I made my way to the exit to hop over to Disney California Adventure Park. I came here for two things. First was the Disney Visa Cardmember Exclusive Photo Experience. From 3 pm - 6 pm was the Heroic Encounters. I've only ever met Captain America. However, I have been told that Spider-man is also one of the heroes. It was drizzling a bit as I started heading over to Pixar Pier for the second attraction, Toy Story Midway Mania. I was actually doing pretty well, but the game glitched out during the last game, Woody's round-up and mine carts.
Lightning McQueen
After exiting the park, I headed across the street to get dinner at Tony Roma's. Once again it was because they were participating in the AAdvantage dining program. Although it seemed pretty packed and busy, they were able to seat me at a booth with a very minimal wait. I ordered an iced tea and the NY Strip Steak. The steak was actually not bad. However, the iced tea tasted weird, so I never got a refill.
Iced tea
NY Strip Steak
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