Dubé Attacks DC Marathon
Inaugural race in the Nation's Capital draws ACIDFast Racing's lead rider into stiff competition

Near-perfect race conditions met the over 4000 runners who set out to compete for top bragging rights in the first-ever Washington, DC Marathon www.washingtondcmarathon.com. Starting on the Memorial Bridge over the Potomac River, near Arlington Cemetery, competitors set out to punish the 26.2 mile course at 7 am on this particular cool and cloudy Sunday morning. Security was high after the events of September 11, but was a welcome assurance to the runners. M. Philip Dubé, MD, lead rider for the internationally renowned motorcycle racing team ACIDFast Racing, was keyed and primed for action.

"I spent many long, hard hours of training through the dismal Indiana winter to prepare for this," remarked the intense, yet irascible, racer-researcher. "Just look at me in that picture. I swear I recognize that fricking building in the background from somewhere. That wasn't from the race though, they had some kinda anthrax scare and everyone just took off down the road. I was ready."

The day started out well for Dubé, once again believed to be the sole race entrant competing while wearing an official Ducati Corse racing hat. "Yeah, and I had a wicked good dump in the porta-potty right about 20 minutes before the race started," noted the comedic, yet cubical, clinician-athlete. "My goal was a 3:40 marathon. That was 8 min 24 seconds a mile. My training predicted I should be able to do this. Lord knows I put the effort in. I thought I had all the bases covered. I knew the keys to success would be tapering and carbo-loading. So instead of waiting till the week before the race to do it, I started about 3 months earlier."

The opening stages appeared to go well. "Everything was perfect. My shoes were perfect, my socks were perfect, my ACIDFast Racing 100% VISA Sport Fabric by Millikin running shirt www.acidfast.com/embroid.htm was perfect, it was 40 degrees F, mostly cloudy, not too crowded, I was well-rested, no nagging injuries, I didn't have to take a leak, nothing was wrong," puzzled the robust, yet rabular, competitor. "My first half of the race was right on schedule, 1:49 at the halfway point, running extremely consistently. But then things began to unravel for me."

"Minimal cramps in my thigh adductors led to big cramps. Eventually I figured out if I just let the cramps happen, they would change from this episodic grabbing charley-horse sensation, into a continuous, intense, excruciating, burning sensation that felt like my legs had turned to wood and were being squeezed in a vise," noted the venerable, yet voluminous, patron-of-the-arts. "Once I figured that out, I could keep going." Unfortunately, he had to back off dramatically from the planned pace in order to continue. Ten-minute miles became the norm. "Whenever I was walking, like after a water stop, the crowd would bring me back to my senses and rally me back into action. There was this one dude who was particularly helpful. I was at something like mile 20."

"He yells at a bunch of us, 'PEOPLE! Don't you know that PAIN is nothing more than the sensation that you experience as WEAKNESS is leaving the body?'. He was standing to the side, I think he was drinking a wine cooler or something. Son-of-a-bitch, I think, I've just run 20 miles and have 6 more to go, but I am gonna hafta kick his freaking ass. I grab my last Double-Caffeine-Tangerine Power-Gel and bite off the top, and try to squirt the thing in his face. But I was too weak to pull it off. So I just kept going. I guess I musta had a shitload of weakness leaving my body by that point. Suddenly, I wished I was in Indianapolis, just running along with that guy playing the fricking bagpipes standing over on the side of the road."

"I just kept going. I saw my 3:40 goal become a sick joke, then my 3:45 and 3:50 backup goals became nothing more than stool circling in the toilet. But I got in just under 4 hours on the clock, and 3:58:50 by the chip," conceded the irreverent, yet irrelevant, healer-educator. "It was my 2nd marathon, and 42 minutes quicker than my first. I had wanted to go an hour faster. Many tell me I should be proud I finished. But the cat who won the Boston Marathon this year was only in his 2^nd marathon EVER. Others told me, hey, you're old, you can't expect to win. But the guy who WON the DC Marathon was a year older than me fur crissakes. Second place? That's only first loser. I think Vince Lumbardo said that. Or maybe it was Guy Lumbardo. Still others said to me, 'hey, you're too hard on yourself'. But I said to them, I hardly know you, I don't want to talk about hard ons with you."

Dubé finished 1280th of 3754 finishers in the race, including 980th of 2330 men, and 144th of 323 men in the 40-44 age group. "At least the winner isn't twice as fast as me anymore. I suppose that means progress, not perfection." He is scheduled to return to action in the 26th annual Indianapolis Mini-Marathon www.500festival.com/mini_marathon/index.cfm to be held May 4th, 2002 . To read the full 2001 Indianapolis Mini-Marathon Race Report, visit the  website at www.acidfast.com/indymini01.htm.
 

RACE REPORTER