Database uncovers entrant running 50th race while turning 50

When someone told me a guy would run his 50th marathon on his 50th birthday here Sunday, I had to find him.

But I knew nothing about him except his birthday must be Dec. 13, 1965. Turns out it wasn’t as hard to track him down as I thought, thanks to the friendly volunteers in the timers tent.

The H0nolulu Marathon has a really good database, so we took a shot at identifying him via DOB. Two names came up. One a woman, so we figured we’d found our man — especially when we noticed his bib number: 5050.

His name is Rene Schoen, a tax lawyer from The Netherlands. I just had to trust he was among the 87 percent of Dutch people who speak English. Now, three-plus hours into the race, I also hoped he wasn’t really fast and had already received his medal and his malassadas and left the premises.

The marathon’s database also allows anyone to track the entrants as they traverse the course. This is useful if you’re going to meet a friend at the finish line and want to know when to be there.

It’s also helpful if you want to see what a celebrity looks like after running 26.2 miles, or if like me, you want to say “Happy Birthday ” to some guy you’ve never met from The Netherlands.

Fortunately, he was fast, but not too fast. Schoen was still on the course, and via the technology of the chip on his shoe, I learned he had hit the 30K mark two hours, thirty-nine minutes and three seconds into the race. Since it was almost 8 a.m., my timing might be perfect, and I headed to the finish line.

I waited.

And waited.

And waited some more.

Eventually I figured he must have slipped by me somehow. After 30 kilometers, about 7 1/2 miles remain. If he stayed on pace he should be done.

But then I remembered how much harder those last few klicks are than the rest. It’s hot, there are hills, and you are getting to the point of stress that no human is supposed to endure. Even if you trained well, there’s a good chance that with every step you feel like your body will break into pieces.

Finally, nearly an hour after I got to the finish line, here comes Mr. 5050.

When I introduce myself he smiles. He apologizes for keeping me waiting, in near-perfect English. He seems OK, much better than most people just a few moments after the finish.

“Where I come from in Holland is very flat,” he says. “No hills like here.”

Also, Schoen had just run a 65K race back home two weeks ago.

“I was forced to. Or this would’ve been marathon 49, not 50.”

When I ask about his bib number he says it was his second choice.

“I asked for No. 50, but they said they only give that to the fast runners.”

He’s not that slow … he ran 3:50:56 here Sunday, and went as fast as 3:03 in Amsterdam a few years ago.

“I was trying for one minute under three hours. But when you run fast you get a lot of injuries.”

Schoen celebrated the 5-0 at the home of Five-0 because he told himself he would a long time ago.

“When I started running 20 years ago I saw the (Honolulu finisher’s) medal. I promised myself before my 50th birthday I was going to get one,” he says.

He left his wife, Simone, son Emile and daughter Merel home.

“(Merel is) not very happy right now. She wanted to come, but I told her she had to go to school.”

Some of Schoen’s 50 marathons are actually ultra marathons, and his next race is a 120K in April, along the coast line of his native country. It starts in the early evening and ends around sunrise.

But the most important run of the year for him — even more than his 26.2 mile birthday jaunt through Honolulu on Sunday for which he waited 20 years — is a little 10K near his home in The Netherlands in two weeks.

“My son, he has diabetes,” Schoen says. “Running is good for him, it helps control his blood sugar. We will run our last run of the year together.”

Reach Dave Reardon at dreardon@staradvertiser.com or 529-4783. His blog is at Hawaiiwarriorworld.com/quick-reads.