Boilermaker: Racing 15km On My Bottom

Author: Face Wallace

(Edited by J.Piel)

For a former RunK2J member who was forced out of running by a disability, a wheelchair was far more than a way for me to continue working. It was a clumsy way to join races, and even though it was still very limited when it came to speed, distance, and the ability to really compete, I enjoyed lining up in the starting corral, (eventually) crossing the finish line, and pushing my boundaries.

It seemed too good to be true when Kanako – a two-time Ironman and proud RunK2J member – told me about the Boilermaker 15k race, which gives one person in a regular manual wheelchair the opportunity to win a racing wheelchair. Many apply each year for that opportunity, and only one is selected as “The Challenger”. That person must complete the notoriously hilly course within 2 hours and 15 minutes in order to win the chair.

Expectations for the Challenger

I applied with a bio explaining my level of disability, my experience with adaptive sports, and my reasons for wanting to complete the Sitrin Wheelchair Challenge at the Boilermaker event. Within weeks, I received the incredible news that I’d been chosen as the 2024 Challenger.

Beyond writing a compelling application, there are gentle expectations of the Challenger: Speaking at the sponsor reception on the Thursday before the race; interviews with the media; and hours of smiling, waving, and shaking hands at the Expo and around the neighbourhood. I even signed a volunteer’s shirt, putting my name along those of some of the elites from around the world who were expected to end up on the podium in the various divisions.

I did my best to put together some words for the banquet that would express my gratitude toward the sponsoring medical company and also help justify my selection over younger applicants who would have had more time than I will to take advantage of a new racing career.

The speech went well, so I should have slept a satisfied sleep that night for a job well done. Instead, I stayed awake in bed until morning, thinking about that hill on Valley View Road.

No Chance in Hill

Although I’d been training on hills in the neighbourhood, I kept hearing about the daunting slopes we’d be fighting in Utica. In particular, the steep hill just outside Valley View Golf Course was said to be the biggest obstacle for a wheelchair. One online review called it a 7-degree incline that was half a mile long. That might have been an exaggeration, but many seemed to agree that they had never faced a hill like that one on any other course.

I wasn’t sure there was anything like that in the Ottawa area, but Kanako took me to a hill in Manotick she said might be steep and long enough to help me measure my readiness for Valley View Road. It wasn’t steep enough to ease my worries, nor was it all that long, but I hoped it would be enough to help me get ready for the real thing.

I packed up my wheelchair after breakfast and headed to the golf course. Sure enough, Valley View Road was steep, and it was long. To make matters worse, that big hill comes right after some rolling hills on Pleasant Street (har, har), and right before lots of elevation on the actual golf course. The good news was that although it is indeed half a mile long, it’s actually a little over four degrees and no more than five degrees at its steepest, and that was something I’ve done over and over and over during training. The difficulty would be doing it along with the hilly mileage both before and after that climb.

Starting to Feel the Pressure

On Friday afternoon and Saturday morning at the race expo, I shook hands and posed for pictures with countless strangers who wished me well. A small number weren’t even part of the race and had simply come to the expo with their kids, checking out the festivities and hoping to meet the guy who’d been on the local news. I was beginning to realize that the most important expectation for this Challenger was to not let down the community that was clearly pulling for me.

The Race

I strapped a camera to my helmet and set up a site that would allow me to stream the race for friends back home. The setup would make me look a little ridiculous, but I very much wanted to share the experience.

When race day came, wheelchair racers from Mexico, Spain, America, the UK, South Africa, Egypt, and even Canada lined up for the 7:45am start. Most were young and all were fit, so it wasn’t just the camera on my head that made me look out of place. 🙂

There were a fair number of people at the starting line, but the crowd fell short of what I’d been led to expect for the Boilermaker. For the finish line at the Boston Marathon, there are people 20-deep on either side of the road, and the stories people had been telling made me expect just as much.

The rolling hills began right away, and the racing wheelchairs made quick work of them. In just a minute or two, I had lost sight of them. With a 15-minute head start on the runners, I had the road all to myself.

But not really. Family after family lined the first mile despite the early hour, and they were all shouting out encouragement. A few even shouted out my name, which was in font size 12 on my bib and surely not visible from the side of the road. One man with a guitar and a massive speaker sang “America the Beautiful,” and at least three signs in that first stretch already referred to the post-race beer waiting for us. I peeked back over my shoulder from time to time to see if the elites were coming, but this part felt just like my solo training sessions (with less traffic).

That was the quietest and least entertaining part of the race.

First, the elites flew past, along with the police and media escorts. Soon after, the massive crowd of runners caught up with me. And by then, there were more and more people shouting excitedly from the side of the road.

Just when things were getting exciting, I lost my internet connection, and my feed was broken. I pulled over to the side, reconnected, and got the video going again. It was so early in the race and it wasn’t clear yet if I’d make it within the time limit, so it seemed more than a little risky to be poking at my phone instead of racing down the road.

The pause cost about a minute, and I pushed hard to try and make up some of that loss.

A Supportive Running Community

During races in Ottawa, there are occasionally runners on the course who share friendly encouragement. The race simply wasn’t long enough for me to get used to the sheer volume of support in Utica. I’d been told to expect the community to be out in force and that the wheelchair challenge was a big thing, but I’d forgotten that the community was also running in the race. By the time we got to the base of Valley View hill, hundreds of runners had patted me on the shoulder or said something nice as they passed by. On the downhill portions, runners shouted to the people ahead to clear the middle for the wheelchair, and most did so, quickly and without complaint.

Race organizers had said the support would carry me along to the finish line… I needed it, because oh my word, that hill had been much easier on Friday, when I hadn’t already worked up and down some smaller hills. On foot, even the steepest hill is overcome one foot at a time, and I just needed to remember that it’s no different in a wheelchair. Push, push, push, one at a time.

During the climb, Coach Judy – the J in Run K2J – slowed down to chat, and she looked enthusiastic about the pace I was keeping. She pointed out that we were nearly all the way up the hill, and reminded me that the second half of the race was a breeze compared to the first.

Suddenly, the chair lurched as an overly helpful runner decided to give me a hand up the incline. We pushed forward two feet before I even knew what was happening, and it was another two feet before I could grab my rims and force the chair to a standstill. It felt rude to ask the young man to stop pushing and I felt a little guilty as I saw his charming smile fade a little, but I was pretty sure that it would be a big no-no for the Challenger to receive help along the way.

We got to the top and Judy sped off. There was lots more elevation inside the golf course, but the emotional lift from being past The Hill made every push seem a little easier.

It’s All Downhill From Here

There is a steep drop to exit the golf course, and the midpoint of the Boilermaker is about 500m past that. In all my study of the course, it seemed that if I could get out of the course at 8:15am, I would still have a decent chance to finish on time. The best case scenario would be to hit the exit at 8:45am, just one hour into the race.

I left the golf course at 8:47, just two minutes off what I had calculated to be the very best I could possibly hope for. I had done nearly 50% in 1:02, and I had 1:13 to complete what was largely the downhill and flat portion of the course. That was when I finally relaxed and began enjoying the day. Everyone else seemed to feel the same way, and we were all chatting and joking. So much so that I missed the Utica Zoo! I wasn’t disappointed enough to turn around and go back to see what animals were at the side of the road, but it was close.

We went through a couple of quiet areas and dozens of nasty potholes in one rectangular addition to the course to add mileage, but we all trucked along cheerfully… Until we got to another long downhill, and I checked my feed: Dead.

Radio Silence Until the End

I checked the cables and played with the camera, but it was completely dead. GoPro cameras are notorious for overheating and running out of battery, but I had expected my crazy setup to solve both of those issues. The external battery had enough juice to run the camera for hours, but the internal battery had gone so flat that I couldn’t get it to even flicker awake for a moment.

Seeing me stopped at the side of the road, a series of runners asked if they could help, and when race officials began to approach, I realized that I was keeping others from doing what they needed to do. Even though it meant that those watching my feed wouldn’t be able to see the end of the race and wouldn’t even know if I made it to the finish line on time, I had to get moving.

(Later, I would discover that the USB ports on the Energizer battery pack can be a little finicky about the precise angle at which the cable attaches. I’d never noticed that issue before, and I had even tested it several times with the wheelchair. On that day, unluckily, the angle of the cable just didn’t work. Arg.)

After the long delay, I wanted to FLY down that hill. I aimed for the least-populated parts of the road and picked up speed. I took out the whistle I’d brought along for safety reasons, and began alerting runners ahead that something reminiscent of the giant boulder chasing Indiana Jones was threatening their safety.

Runners were great about moving aside and getting others to clear a path. Before long, I was hurtling along at a decidedly unsafe 26.8km/h, leaning precariously backward in order to keep the front casters from shimmying. It was – by far – the fastest I’d ever gone in my wheelchair, and I appreciated everyone who was clearing a path. The bottom of the hill was coming, and I would quickly return to a safer and disappointing speed.

Suddenly, I spotted one runner with AirPods who was particularly stubborn about keeping his place in the middle of the road. He repeatedly waved off the others who were pointing back at the bright orange missile bearing down on him. There was enough space to either side of him, as long as he didn’t suddenly change direction.

He did.

First, he shifted a little to the right, so I smoothly steered left, and then he suddenly staggered wildly left, right into my path.

There are no brakes on my wheelchair; all I have are my hands on rubberized pushrims. I closed my palms on the rims as tightly as possible, and I slowed quickly. Even with that, I had to swerve at the last second to avoid a collision. It was so close to disaster that I could hear the music from his earbuds over the noise from my own bluetooth speaker. Somebody screamed. It might have been me.

I wanted to shout angrily as I straightened out and coasted forward again, but I was intensely aware of burning in both hands. The heat from the friction had gone through the extra layers of padding in the gloves. It seemed like a sure thing that both gloves were filled with the smell of bacon frying in the pan.

By then we were down to the last mile, and maybe a little more. I moved over to the side and slowed down so I could high-five all the kids who had their hands reaching out onto the course. That slowed progress to a crawl, but the crowds were impressive, and I wanted to take it all in. There are only 64,000 people living in Utica. With 12,000 participants, 2000 volunteers, and all the spectators, I wondered about the significant percentage of the city that must have come out for the event. Amazing. It felt important to show some appreciation and interact with those folks, especially the young’uns, and I felt I could do so since I had so much extra time.

Moments later, the finish line was in sight, and I peeked up at the tower to see if they had a clear view of me on the final stretch. Sure enough, a voice from the speaker boomed out my name and that I was completing the Sitrin wheelchair challenge.

The 15,000-person party was chaotic, and I was grateful when Judy found me and led the way to the rest of the K2J crew. I was able to share the exciting news that I’d won a racing wheelchair, as well as the less exciting news that I would need to wait three months for it. 🙂

The race director commented in an article that it seemed that the Boilermaker had finally come back to resemble its pre-COVID version. The newsclip is embedded in the article, and under a still-shot of me, bold letters state that BOILERMAKER 2024 VIEWED AS SUCCESS. I’m sure they weren’t linking me directly to that success, but I like to think that at least one person might make that connection. 😀

It’s a great race, and when 30-40% of a city gets involved in an event, it’s definitely worth the trip! I hope to see you there next year, when I’ll be in my new racing wheelchair – painted in the orange and purple RunK2J colours – and a GoPro strapped even more securely to my helmet.