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The first Sunday of November is an annual love letter to New York.
It takes the form of the New York City Marathon, which has crisscrossed the five boroughs since 1976, when about 2,000 people had started and just over 1,500 finished.
This year, this love letter was written by 50,000 runners, 12,000 volunteers and more than one million spectators on the 26.2 mile course.
Like all good letters of love, it begins with an outrageous statement: a gun fires and speakers whistle the "New York, New York" of Frank Sinatra as runners cross the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge from Staten Island to Brooklyn.
There are spectators – young and old, runners and non-runners, locals and tourists – who show up to see people doing something and encouraging them on their way. Signs in English, Spanish, Italian, Chinese, and French provide encouragement, inspirational messages, and occasional reminders: "DO NOT POOP." (Noted.)
The day is filled with joy in a city that always needs more. The early metro operators announce the train stations with an addendum: "And good luck to all the runners today!"
Runners jostle with the shared language of nervous laughter on Staten Island and pull themselves with compbadion and courage into the Bronx. Spectators dance along the course and distribute water, tissues and occasional beer. N.Y.P.D. Officers ring bells and reach out to those in need.
The fastest humans are finished around noon. All others walk eight hours or more, crossing the finish line to Tavern on the Green.
To live the day of the marathon in New York, it is to see what a great city race is capable of generating: joy, sorrow, misery, triumph and nirvana. Here is what it looks like.
The police were on the course in the Bronx before the start of the race.
The riders took the ferry from Staten Island to the start of the Staten Island Marathon.
Florida runners relaxed on rafts at Staten Island before the start of the race.
Manuela Schär from Switzerland ran to Brooklyn. Schär has won three major marathons this year. Andy von Salis applauded and waved the Swiss flag in Brooklyn.
Wheelchair riders in Brooklyn.
Elite women crossed the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge.
Spectators lined up on the course in Brooklyn. A fan with a political message in Brooklyn.
Shura Kitata and the elite men crossed Brooklyn.
Daniel Romanchuk won the men's wheelchair division.
The runners crossed the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge.
Mary Keitany ran alone in the front of the women's race for a good part of the course.
Sylvie Marie, from France, was a spectator in Brooklyn.
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