Rockin’ Hard in the Big Easy

I’ve got a rich, complex, and not altogether positive relationship with New Orleans. My first visit to the French Quarter was in the late 1970s [some of you will have to ask you parents about the late 1970s] I was in the Army Band, I was young, and I was an idiot. And—you guessed it—there was alcohol involved. To be really honest, there was a LOT of alcohol involved. That’s the only way to explain why I poured a bucket of ice into my roommate’s bed and how he slept in it without noticing.

I visited New Orleans a number of times after that. I grew to enjoy to food, the music, and the spirit of the French Quarter. More than anything I grew to enjoy the people. It’s called the Big Easy for a reason. There’s a style and attitude there that is unique to New Orleans.

The occasion for this visit was the inaugural Rock ‘n’ Roll Mardi Gras Marathon and Half Marathon. The Rock ‘n’ Roll marathon series rolled into the Big Easy and showed a city that knows how to party how the greatest party in running is done. We came, we saw, we ran, and we partied.

Race morning dawned cool and clear. Standing up on the announcer’s stand, looking out at nearly 18,000 runners and walkers, I desperately wanted to hand the microphone to someone else and jump in. I’m big on half marathons these days and running a half in New Orleans would have been the perfect next chapter in my story of the Big Easy.

You can read someone else on the Competitor.com site about the race at the front end. The half marathon, in particular, had sensational performances in the men’s and women’s races. For what it’s worth, I was still at the start line when the first half marathon finisher crossed the finish line!

As the RnR series expands to include more cities, the danger was that the experience would somehow be diluted. Nothing could be further from the truth. As I meet more and more participants who have done multiple RnR events I’ve come to see that the more of these that we do, the better it’s going to be. It’s like the circus. It’s the greatest show on earth and it’s coming to a city near you.

Just a quick follow-up on my back issue. Dr. Lewis Maharam, our beloved RockDoc, managed to beat and bang on my hips and pelvis back into place. The official diagnoses is a displaced sacroiliac joint. I managed to run a little bit on it on Saturday and Monday. I’m going to try today to put a little more distance on it. We’re not finished with this story, but it looks like it’s going to have a happy ending.

Waddle on,

John “the Penguin” Bingham, Competitor Magazine columnist Author, The Courage to Start, No Need for Speed, Marathoning for Mortals and Running for Mortals.

The miracle isn’t that I finished. The miracle is that I had the courage to start.

Have a question for John? E-mail it to thepenguin@johnbingham.com.