First Marathon Sponsorship Letter
Dear Sponsor,
I’m sitting in my office the day after my San Francisco Marathon, and all I can think about is how blessed I am to be part of such a nice group of people with the Leukemia Society. And to have all the devoted friends and family who supported me emotionally and financially in this race.
The Team In Training for the Leukemia Society went as a group with a common goal, that was to raise money for leukemia, and of course, we all had our own personal goals as well. A lot of us just wanted to finish the race, and others were looking to set new Personal Records.
This of course, as most of you know, was my first marathon. I really didn’t know what to expect. We had been told during our training that the course was a relatively flat course. Um, not so much —
Our race started out on the Golden Gate Bridge. Since I had not run a marathon before and had no idea what my finish time would be, I decided to start with a special group that would be starting early, so that they would not close down the racecourse before we were finished.
We started at 7 a.m., the regular race started at 8 a.m. since this group was a much smaller group, I was able to run across the Golden Gate Bridge basically by myself. Two men started out a little faster and were ahead of me while the rest of the group fell behind.
As I ran over this magnificent bridge and took a second to ingest the magic of the moment, I knew this would be an experience of a lifetime, probably never to happen again. As I looked out I could see Alcatraz sitting in the water, with many ships and boats sailing through the harbor. I felt privileged indeed to have the bridge partly closed just so we could run across.
The course continued over the bridge and down onto the waterfront, it continued on through the Palace of Fine Arts. When I got to this point and entered the Palace Arch into the solitude of the garden, the architectural beauty was overwhelming. In contrast to the awesome beauty — lay homeless people still asleep in whatever means they found to cover themselves. I thought it ironic that inside of the next hour their peaceful domain would be overcome with 3200 runners trying to make their way along this narrow path
Leaving the solitude of the palace, I continued along Bay Street and back down to the marina, as I looked out I noticed I was adjacent to Alcatraz now and heading to Fort Mason Hill.
The course zigzagged its way to Columbus Street then headed into the city. The first vivid memory I have of this area is when I came out of Fisherman’s Wharf running into the Financial District and then onto the Hills of China Town — Crisscrossing back and forth uphill to Embarcadero turning inland. By this time it was approximately 8:30 a.m. and I knew the professional runners had started and would be catching me soon. As I ran down Mariposa I could hear the Television Helicopter gaining on me in the background., and the thunder of the crowd behind. Within the next half hour, they caught me on Mississippi. The roar of the energy enveloped me as they blew past like I was standing still. I stayed to the right of the roadway so as not to have any collisions with the television vehicles, bicycles and all the entourage that follows a professional race. I meandered on to 17th street, then 14th where the first female professional runner caught me and passed in a blaze of short jet-black hair. That’s all I could remember of the body that whizzed past. By the time I got to Haight Street most of the front runners had past and the majority of the serious novice runners were upon me now.
We began to tackle the straight uphill battle to the park. As I climbed these hills — rooting crowds stood on the sidewalks and hung from their apartment windows to cheer us on. This is where I saw my first hand-held sign rooting the Leukemia Society runners on.
After a while of pushing on this uphill grade, I did not notice the crowd as much. I had to put my head down and concentrate on the pavement leaning into the hill telling myself “don’t push too hard, relax you still have a long way to go.”
Once in a while, I would have to look up ahead to see where I was going, as I looked up all I could see in the blue sky ahead was a stream of runners as far as the eye could see climbing up, up to the sky above. As I finally came to the top where the runners would turn right and disappear, a small crowd stood cheering our mountainous accomplishment.
I had read in many of my training books, as a runner comes to the top of a hill, or to a curve in the road, always push a little harder and then level out back out, it would always be a source of accomplishment and a mental move against your opponent. Here was my moment I pushed into the curve giving it all the strength I could muster as I rounded the corner, with the cheering crowd — I finished the bend —
and looked up to see what appeared to be the mirror image of the first hill — I had just climbed — With a stream of runners, running up- up- to heaven, whereas at that moment heaven started to sound pretty good.
Jim, my husband, and the rest of the team’s spouses were to be together in a group to cheer us on, Waiting for us at Mile 16. As they came into view, I knew I was going to finish this race. I had done the hills and only the park lay ahead. Jim was surprised to see so early still appearing to be full of energy.
As I made the corner past our supporters I saw the first of many psychologically devastating signs.
Mile 15 — What happened? I was perplexed. Our spouses had told us they would meet us at mile 16, a mile had just been added to my race.
As I entered the park I believed the worst was over. Jim and I had driven through this park last summer. I knew it to be fairly level. This was at approximately mile 15 and a half. The front runners now came around a corner heading back in the direction from which they had come. I thought to myself, “it must be close to the end.” I should have known, it was almost over for them but it had just begun for me.
I took the slow up and down gradual grades of JFK drive, slower and slower, by this time my knees were starting to ache and I was getting a sharp pain in my hip. JFK drive took me back out, out, out, back to the ocean. Whereupon a lady from the San Francisco chapter of the Leukemia Society fell in stride. She seemed to be a gracious woman who knew the area and wanted to share with a fellow Leukemia in Training member the next part of the course. She told me we would be rounding to Sunset Blvd in a few miles and to watch the signs they were in alphabetical order. We would make the turn-around to head back at the letter T.
Well — as I ran that straight Hill, it stretched Block for Block, J block, k block, L block –M block-N-O-P-Q-R-S block —
did someone say there were two T Blocks?
I cursed that woman and her kindness…
As we turned onto T street we made a U-turn to head back from where we had come,
it started again, S block, R block, Q block, P —
We came back through a part of the park, I recognized to be the place where I had seen the front runners pass at least an hour or so before. I continued my ascent to Kezar Stadium, the finish line., or so I thought. With every winding turn came another little hill up and down I went, winding and winding around. At one point someone yelled from the crowd, “hang-on, looking good, only 3 miles to go.”
Well, I thought three miles wouldn’t be too far — I thought I could handle that — so on I pushed. Until I saw the sign — The dreaded sign — mile 23.
That meant I still had three-point two miles to go — I was hoping to see a sign for the stadium entrance. Not yet, I would have to go on. Who said this was a fairly flat course? I asked myself for the thousandth time…
As I got closer to the almighty stadium, I began to imagine my finish, I hobbled along favoring my left knee, remembering what the coach had said, don’t limp or hobble you will not make it. So try as I might, I figured it safer to walk. As I compelled myself to go on, I passed yet another, Leukemia in Training handheld sign. The woman with her young child on hip — upon seeing my Leukemia Team in Training T-shirt, raised the sign out toward me, and yelled Thank you, Thank you — I felt overwhelmed with pride and tears came to my eyes. Not for the rest of the race would I question why I was there.
The last hill was the hill to the entrance — I had seen the sign, Kesar stadium and knew it was going to happen. I turned my last corner saw the attendant guiding the runners into the narrow taped-off path leading into the stadium — I began to run. I was going to run the last lap if it killed me.
As I entered the stadium there stood my husband, camera in hand. So proud — I ran past him and down onto the track, my knee pain disappeared as I picked up the pace. The crowd was cheering with the announcer’s voice booming over the intercom system — reverberating through the hollows of the stadium, pushing the people coming onto the track to come in under the 30-minute mark for that hour.
I began to sprint. Pushing with newfound energy to break that 30-minute mark, of what hour I had no idea but it was something to reach for one last time, and I did.
Sincerely,
San Francisco Marathon 1993 Finisher for the Leukemia Society Team in Training
Monica Broussard
