The rain from Thursday and Friday finally comes to an end by Saturday morning. Things cool off, leaving damp brick streets and asphalt roads. Fallen leaves litter the ground. I position myself between the 8 and 9 minute/mile signs and wait for the race to start. A sound of an air horn begins it.

The majority of the roads twist and turn, beginning with the traditional bottleneck within the first half mile. You’re constantly looking ahead to see which way the road turns as the course winds through these neighborhoods. Small pools of water congregate at the street corners.

I decide to leave my Garmin Forerunner at home and realize that GPS watches are becoming more commonplace. I hear a myriad of watch beeping around me, turn a corner and lo and behold mile marker 4 displays a time of 32 minutes on it.

I latch onto a brunette lady with blue top and black shorts within the first half mile of the start and manage to keep up with her; however, she disappears around mile five (e.g. she leaves me in the dust). I tell myself, “1.2 miles left,” as runners form a two single-file lines in the center of the street.

There’s the typical surge of people sprinting into the finish line, but I just hold my pace. They announcer says my name as I approach the finish line.

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I try to convince her that she should try Orlando’s half marathon in December, but it is to no avail; it is an impossibility.

“You’ll feel good after running a 10K, you’ll want to run it again,” I say, trying to merge a 10K into a half marathon reality.

It’s of no use.

People behind me talk talk about the guy who wrote Ultramarathon Man. I hear a lady say, “That guy ate a whole pizza while he was running.”

I stop to take a walk break, and the pace group disappears into the distance. I spend another seven minutes catching back up to them.

Spectators waiting near a traffic light cheer me on, telling me that I’m on track for finishing this marathon in 4 hours and 30 minutes. “Only four more miles left! You can do it!”

The pace group appears to be picking up speed (or I’m slowing down). They run through the water stops. One person holds the pace sign and seem to pass it to another pacer every so often. I focus on a man in an orange tank top who is currently carrying the sign. One last time, I stop and take a walk break and they fade away into the distance.

I’ll run the last three minutes straight. This is shorter than my normal running routes.

In about ten or fifteen minutes, I catch up to them. An man with a blue shirt holds the sign.

Despite my legs being sore, I feel darn good as I approach the finish. The red digital clock displays 4:31 and the seconds tick upward.

I have zero complaints about this race. It was awesome to take part in the final running of their marathon.

On the opposite side of the road, a patrol car leads in a lone Kenyan running towards the finish. Damn, I’m not even half-way yet.

Things have been going well since leaving Davis Islands to the middle of Bayshore, but my left knee is a little sore and I begin to slow down. I should have taken Tylenol before the race; oh well. I begin to slow down. I tell myself to snap out of it and speed back up.

A guy to my left asks how much more we have to do.

“We just go down there and come back.” The word “there” is rather an optimistic word. It could be down to the high-rise buildings in the distance, or more accurately, it’s too far away to see.

“It’s a straight shot?” he asks.

“Uhh… they make us run around a park.”

There are two pairs of active timing mats. Stepping over each emits a hushed beep.

Someone hands out packets of chocolate Gu at a water station; it serves as a temporary pick-me-up.

After Bayshore the route heads southwest towards the air force base. Like the northern edge of the course, I see groups of people running towards me, heading back into downtown. One group carries a sign with a 3:20 finish time on it. Someone off on the side of the road tells the returning group that mile 22 is at the next light.

As I stop to take another walk break, I overhear some bystanders contemplating about running a marathon.

“I don’t know how they do it. I’ve hiked 26 miles in the mountains once, but it took me 24 hours to do.”

The entrance to the park that borders the northern edge of the base is covered in orange peels. Someone apologizes that they ran out of oranges. A mime with a permanent smile silently waves and a man on stilts regains balance as a gust of wind buffets his long red pants. (I forgot to mention there were was a man juggling sticks of fire at Davis Islands followed with another playing an accordion.)

Along the southern edge of the park, a woman runs out of the bushes and rejoins the running group.

Ahead I think a see another small white sign bobbing in the air.

On a completely unrelated note, I learn that the crash on the interstate caused a back-up for about a mile.

The 5:00 finish pace group manages to get in front of me. Runners group around the lady holding the sign overhead. I get ahead of them, take a walk break and they in turn get ahead of me. It proves challenging passing them as the group begins expanding to cover the width of the street. I eventually get and stay ahead of them.

The sun makes an appearance and things begin to warm up. I take off my long sleeved shirt and tie it around my waist, leaving me in my tank-top, and I continue to run around the upscale neighborhood of the islands. As I exit the islands, the finisher for the half-marathon charges towards the finish line to my left.

A lady with a megaphone gives directions of a pivotal turn to take. This is followed with multiple signs in the middle of the road. Half marathoners go to the left. Full marathoners go to the right.

Right.

The course takes us through downtown Tampa. Tall buildings provide a shady and windy corridor, making things cold. A man dressed in a Superman outfit, complete with a red cape, runs by in the opposite direction.

“He’s flying!” someone exclaims.

I see a good number of people running in the opposite direction. I have no gauge of how fast they are running or how much longer I have to run until a reach the northern end of the course. After crossing enough bridges and seeing enough of the Hillsborough River, I reach a turn-around point and begin heading back into downtown.

“No, this is your race, go ahead,” I hear someone say.

Another replies, “We’ll do this together.”

As I re-enter downtown, I see some pedestrians waiting for a gap in the runners to cross the road. Children ask their parents what we are doing. Sometimes I overhear the word marathon other times I hear the word 26 miles.

The course brushes against a section of town named Hyde Park. Asphalt turns to brick. Ahead, I see another group of people one of which is carrying a white sign at the top of a wooden stick which reads 4:45.

Now, I’m one of those crazy people taking part in the final running of the full marathon (just more towards the middle of the pack), dubbed the “Final Voyage.” I’ve done their 15K and half-marathon, but never the full.

Getting There

Planning to arrive early has its advantages. I realize that forgot by water belt a mile and a half from home. After retrieving it from the kitchen counter and as I approach the Bearss exit (in Tampa people cannot spell street names) on Interstate 275, I see the following message cyan message illuminated on their overhead sign: “Crash. Must exit at Floribraska Ave.” Three patrol cars block the Interstate a mile or two from the downtown exit, and I exit the interstate onto another misspelled street.

“I need your navigation assistance,” I say.

My dads sleepily asks, “Huh?”

I explain, “There was a crash on the interstate and their forcing people off.” My cell phone beeps with a low battery warning; it does that nowadays after one minute of use.

He asks, “Where are you at?”

Stopped at the intersection, I say, “I’m turning onto Nebraska Ave now.”

“That will take you into downtown.”

That’s confirmed by the tall buildings towering to the right of me.

Again, I make a short pilgrimage from the Fort Brooke parking garage to the convention center.

The Start

Over five thousand people squeeze into a road sandwiched between a high-rise condo and a grocery store. I hear a woman’s voice sign the star spangled banner as a full moon sets in the distance. A man speaks for several minutes, all of which is inaudible, positioned between the 5:00 and 4:45 finish time pace groups. This is followed by a loud clamor of a clanging cowbell and everyone begins walking forward.

“We are now two minutes into the race,” the announcer says, counting up second by second. “2 o’ 5. 2 o’ 6. 2 o’ 7.”

I cross the starting line, beginning my sixth marathon.