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The Second in the series took me to Albuquerque and the Duke City Marathon.

Monday afternoon, six days before the race, I walked into a backpack, and broke the "ring" toe on my left foot.

Purple and swolen, I taped and iced, and tried to stay off of it. By friday, the swelling had gone down a bit, but I still couldn't get my foot in a shoe

I ordered a pair of crutches from amazon, and had them sent to the Doubletree in Albuquerque. I figured if I couldn't run it, I'd use the crutches from the start, or hide them on the course or give them to a supporter...

Flight out was uneventful, though early.

I got to the Hotel, grabbed my amazon package, and hobbled out to catch a cab to packet pickup, 10 miles away at the Islata casino.

Bruce Talawyma came out, and said he had asked the front desk to call a shuttle. And we started chatting, and shareed a cab to packet pickup. He's a retired Bureau of indian affairs Health Care worker, and farmer, living on the Hopi Reservation in Arizona.

He's an assistant with their high school XC team, a team that has won their state title 26 years in a row. He was only running the half, and I wish we could have done this one together

I went to go carbo load at a local Italian restaurant about a half mile away, and started crutching toward it. I guy ran over to me and asked if I was still running the marathon, and how long it take me. I told him best case, 5 hours, worst case, 7, beacsue I needed to be out of the hotel and headed to the airport.

He introduced himself as the owner of the Start/Finish area and said, in Jesse Waters Style, "My name is ... This is my world," and offerered me an early start with a bike/atv lead at 6AM.

I got up early and iced, and at 6AM, I put on my shoe. Tight, but no pain, so I oped for the normal start

In the 50s, I kept my throw away sweats, hat and gloves on.

The first couple of miles I limped, stiff, but no pain. I lost the sweatshirt at 2, the pants at 3

I didn't take along my "interval timing" watch, and that was a mistake. I ended up running the first 10 or 11 with breaks at mile for a minute.

I held a sub 10 thru the turn around, a 2:12

They had a baloon launch on the course that was amazing. Nice course, could be very fast (if you were aclimated)

I started feeling the altitude at 14 or so, and the heat at 16.

First twinge of pain from my foot at 18

Lots of stopping after that, as my splits when to 14 MM

At 20, the 4:45 group passed me.

Some of the water stops maned by young Marines, ran out of water.

Very sore and cramping, I pulled it in at 5:13