Peace, Love, and… We Understand that the Race Is Tomorrow
The Continental Airlines International Friendship Run is like a lap of the Indianapolis 500 under the caution flag. Today at 8:30 a.m., about 19,500 international runners—almost all of them entered in tomorrow’s ING New York City Marathon—gathered at United Nations Plaza, heard rousing speeches, lined up behind their countries’ flags across First Avenue, and waited, with a forest of cameras trained on them, for the starting horn.
It sounded—and they jogged. Two open convertibles set a stately pace; in the cars sat NYRR President and CEO Mary Wittenberg and her predecessor, Allan Steinfeld, who had just been given the 2009 Abebe Bikila Award for his outstanding contribution to the sport of distance running. The two faced back, toward a phalanx of flagbearers who stayed in loose formation as the procession reached 42nd Street and turned west. Runners near the cars handed their cameras to Wittenberg, who obliged by photographing them. Past Grand Central Station the runners flooded, eliciting many versions of “I thought it was tomorrow!” from bystanders.
It is tomorrow, luckily. The Friendship Runners had only 4K to travel, in 63-degree air and 94-percent humidity. (Tomorrow’s forecast is for cooler and drier weather.) Today’s participants, many combining the event’s pageantry with a Halloween spirit (a jogging Eiffel Tower, a team of Yankees, several President Obamas), filled Sixth Avenue between 42nd Street and Central Park. From there, they got a preview of tomorrow’s finish: 59th Street to Columbus Circle, into the park, and the final leg to Tavern on the Green.
As the leaders made that last turn, they couldn’t help themselves: They took off. For the last 600 meters, the West Drive was filled with athletes rehearsing their marathon finish—but smiling, not straining. The flags of France, Korea, Switzerland, Mexico, Germany, Italy, and Great Britain showed in front as the exhilarated throng came in sight of the huge overhead banner…and jogged to a stop at tables full of apples, bagels, and water bottles. There was no finish line.
A vast contingent of orange-clad Dutch runners congregated and sang. A Brazilian group had run with percussion instruments, which they now played in rhythm with the Dutch. The long parade contracted briefly to a happy mob, who then began to spread out into the city again, to wait one more day before running more than 10 times as far.
Steinfeld, the humblest of honorees, had expressed disbelief when he’d been announced as the Bikila Award winner earlier in the week. Today, despite his long-acknowledged worldwide influence on marathon organization and leadership, he remained unassuming. Looking out at the thousands of runners from around the globe, brought to New York by an event whose magnitude he helped make possible, he said, “This award is for runners who promote the sport at the highest level, and everyone here is a testament to that. So, this award is really for you.”
