I have run the Bethel Half Marathon four times, and it holds a special place in my heart. It was my first half marathon (1998) and my PR half marathon (1999 - 1:44:02). It is also the place where the thought first occurred to me that I might be capable, if I trained properly and slowed my pace down accordingly, to run a marathon, which I went on to do in December of 1999. This year was the 25th annual Bethel Half, and we learned that it was the oldest continuous half marathon in North Carolina and the third oldest in the southeast.
After the rains had passed through on Thursday, Friday dawned cool and breezy, the first day it really felt like fall. We left early and had a picnic lunch, stopping at Barber Orchard to pick up some fresh apples.
We were staying for two nights at the Waynesville Country Club, and our room was quiet and convenient, only 12 minutes from the race start. From our balcony we could watch golfers out on the course playing that game of skill that somebody once described as a good walk spoiled.
A group of auto enthusiasts, all of them driving classic Mercedes convertibles from the mid-50s to early 60s, was also staying at the country club, and it reminded us of our Mini trip in 2016, except that these classic cars were in the $100,000 range. That murky green one in the foreground bears the appropriate license tag "Pea Soup."
We love going to races in a way that is difficult to describe to non-runners. Why would anybody in his or her right mind want to set the alarm for 5:00 a.m., miss the sumptuous breakfast buffet offered by Waynesville Counry Club (which we, however, did enjoy on Sunday morning), and voluntarily run as fast as we can for mile upon mile, up hill and down hill, in all kinds of weather, early in the morning or after midnight? But competing in races, challenging ourselves in this special way, has taken us as far afield as Boston and Richmond and Kiawah Island, and we treasure the memories of pre-race pasta dinners and post-race celebratory dinners and those miles and miles of feeling absolutely alive, of digging deep in those late miles, and that unparalleled feeling of achievement in crossing another finish line.
So we went through the time-honored rituals once again, eating simple pasta as Boccelli's Italian Restaurant and remembering the pasta dinners we have had sitting across the table from celebrities like John Bingham, getting to bed early, laying out our clothes for the morning, and sleeping fitfully. Of all the races we have run, the conditions were nearly perfect this morning: fog breaking away as the sun rose higher, temperatures in the 40s with a light breeze. My 5-K race started five minutes after Martha's race, farther down the road, so we were able to watch all of the half marathoners run past. "Go Martha!" I shouted as she flashed a smile. A pinto horse in the corral across the road from our start became very excited, jumping at a metal gate, then turning and running in a big circle and approaching the gate again; we thought he might escape the half marathoners as an unlikely race bandit.
My race was uneventful, after all. There were only 40 or so of us, and I finished toward the back in a time of 35:42, two minutes faster than last weekend, and I was encouraged that there was no pain in my knee at all; I was even able to pull the final hill in mile three, pass a young woman who had been playing leap-frog with me for the entire race, and finally put her away as we crossed the finish line.
Martha had planned to run 10:30 miles, so after my race I walked up to the road where she would be passing by (the course is a figure eight), and was surprised to see her approaching much earlier than I had expected.
She had a smile on her face and looked strong! And she had completed the first seven miles in just under 70 minutes by my reckoning. I later learned as we reviewed our split times (another ritual, usually enjoyed over dinner after the race) that her first mile had been 9:17. That stubborn pain in her hip began to affect her in the last three miles, though, and slowed her down just a bit. But I was again excited to see her coming around the track to the finish line, finishing strong, and way ahead of schedule.
Her finish time was 2:17:26, the fastest of the three half marathons she has run this year. I am so proud of her! Good enough for fourth place in her age group. A good day in Bethel.
As for me, I had waited to hear my name at the awards ceremony, only to be surprised by taking first place. But there was a perfectly good explanation for this: I was the only man in my age group.
So another chapter is filed away in our race journals, another weekend of wonderful memories, of lunch at Sweet Onion, wandering slowly up and down Main Street where a crafts fair was set up, listening to a little bluegrass band, watching some energetic cloggers, and marveling at the Montreat Scottish Pipes and Drums, a dozen men and women twirling their drumsticks and wailing their bagpipes joyously into the bright blue sky.
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