Bobby Glas

San Antonio Marathon 2001

Click on the Image Above to See Bobby  
Cross the Finish Line

After the days of eating nothing but pasta (f.y.i., do not try and carbo-load with spaghetti O's, it's not good) and drinking nothing but Gatorade and water, I was fixing to run my first marathon. I ran the San Antonio Marathon of the Americas on November 11th.

I got there and I was stressed even before the race started! I arrived, not knowing where it even started. I had to get my chip then wait in the bathroom line of doom. I had less than five minutes to find the starting line and get a spot. Long story short, I was unable to run with all of my relay-friends.

Running, or trotting, toward the starting line was intense; nothing but these short people (I have a really funny picture of the height difference) surrounding me struggling not to step on each other. It was a spectacle. It took a while to reach the start, where I was expecting everybody to speed up so the crowd would spread out. No such luck. I was stuck galloping behind the pack for the longest time, the road was too narrow to do any worthwhile passing. The whole time I was passing people I did not want to go too fast as to destroy my legs, but I was still searching for my friends, so I was torn.

It was great to see all of the people who were there to cheer on friends and family who were running, it was a big boost. I passed a bunch of people I knew that I did not know were running, so that was pretty cool. The course took us by all of these cool sites. We saw the Alamo, the Tower of the Americas, the Alamodome, and all of the awesome buildings downtown.

My legs were feeling surprisingly good and that most likely led to me running too fast. I forgot my watch, so I was running blind. The halfway point was not what I thought it would be. I was thinking it would be a point of great joy, but no, it was the start of much despair. I saw look who had finished the first half, that was cool, then the race started toward the dark side. This is where I learned that I hate relay runners. They all start fast for the sole reason of defeating my willpower. That was annoying. They had it so easy, but there was nothing I could do about it.

I was weak to the charms of the Gatorade/Powerade that I was being offered. After mile 15 I started all of this Gatorade drinking jazz, which I thought was bad, but I felt fine. I think I hit the wall around mile 19, which is where I confronted all of my friends who were running the relay. My hatred grew, which made me continue on. The mile markers and water stations must have been placed by someone who has something wrong with them or are unusually evil. There is no way that they were in any way spaced in even intervals, there is just no way.

Probably the coolest person or thing I encountered was Roger Soler. I had passed him earlier in the race, which was really cool, but he passed me back and we ran together from around mile 15 to mile 23. It was awesome! There I was, a 19-year old scrub freshman from UT running his first marathon, I got to run with a 3-time marathon champion! For those of you who don't know who Roger Soler is, he won the SA Marathon three times back in his prime. He also is the owner of the SA and Corpus Christi equivalent of RunTex. He eventually passed me, but that was fine by me, his pace was a little too much.

I hit the wall, but not too hard. The thing that really killed me were people who had inaccurate information. Over the last four miles of the race I swear people were telling me the most bizarre estimates of the remaining distance. I kept getting excited when I would take turns, only to find another long street I had to go down. I finally reached the last half mile, I was so hyped, I just wanted to get this thing over with so I can get to my basketball intramurals. I picked up my pace and I felt comfortable. I passed this 20-something girl without having to speed up. She obviously didn't like this, but that didn't matter because I noticed she was a relay runner! She starts to speed up and pass me with like 400 meters left! What nerve! I actually heard people complimenting on her kick! What the heck is that about. She obviously hadn't run in too many races, because she kicked way too early. It was funny, there was like 200 meters left and I took her to school. I was not about to be shown up by some relay runner in front of the hundreds of people watching; not after all my preparation. No thanks. I sprinted the remaining distance almost tying Roger Soler, he beat me by less than a second, which is really awesome to me. I almost beat a former marathon champ. I almost passed out at the finish line, but it all was worth it

I am glad to be one of the few people who can call themselves marathon runners. I finished first in the 19 and under division with a time of 3:40.53. I had a great time, and I am glad I did it. Thanks to the team for helping me and giving me tips, it help a lot.

Bobby Glas