In it for the long run

Fear

Sat. Aug. 14

Long run: 14 miles,* 2:28:31

This run took me to and around the three-mile high school loop on Belmont Plateau, and back to the start at Lloyd Hall, then along Kelly Drive to the two-mile mark, and again back to the start. I tried to work the pace a bit harder after passing Lloyd Hall. Didn’t do too badly until the last mile, when I felt I was coming unglued, had to walk/jog/walk/jog…Tried some strides just to get me back sooner. I wanted to be done at that point. It hurt. I was feeling wasted. We were to do a 2 hr. 15 min. run, and when we got to Lloyd Hall, I’d reached 1:44, so in reality, I’d have done better to turn around at 1.5 miles. But I wanted to complete 14 miles—since the schedule said 14-16 miles. (Yes, I’m obsessive, next question?) I wanted to “be as good as the others,” I think. But as I neared the end of the run, the last 100 or so yards, I began hyperventilating, and when I stopped, the hyperventilating continued, until Dave had me take “belly breaths.” After a few minutes or so, I began to feel better, and we all took off for breakfast at Little Pete’s where challah French toast with strawberries and syrup and plentiful black coffee eased the re-entry into the “real world.”

*Actually, there’s a fifteenth mile, because earlier I’d missed the trolley to 69th Street, so I ran to the terminal, about a mile. But I’m not sure that really counts.

***

I thought of a story that Marc had told, months ago. He said, “When I sign up to do an Ironman, I like the fear of not knowing. I like not knowing if I’ve trained well enough to finish. I like not knowing if my bicycle will break down. It’s the not knowing that makes it interesting. Who would want to know? Life is like that. I’m in my mid-fifties, and when I look back, I realize that despite all the doubts and the not knowing, things work out.”

--Dean Ottati, The Runner and the Path, p. 256

As I started up Flagpole Hill for the first mile of the cross-country portion of the Saturday long run, I felt it. When I begin races, I feel it. When I start long runs, long races, and especially marathons, I feel it. The what-if’s. What if it hurts? What if I can’t finish? What if my coach thinks I should give up running and try, say, Olympic sleeping?

In the last marathon I attempted, a calf pain began gnawing at my leg early in the race and would not subside. I would alternate running, jogging, limping—and finally, at around 15-16 miles, I decided I’d had enough. That was not a marathon I was destined to finish, not unless I was willing to put up with a chronic injury. I stepped out of the race, worked my running club’s water stop for a while, then discovered just how much harder it was to limp/walk back to the start than it had been to run from the Art Museum to that point in the race. I developed hypothermia, needed an IV in the med tent. Mike laid down the law the following Tuesday about not getting right to the start again and getting warm. It was not one of my better marathon experiences.

It was the second of my marathons to involve hypothermia, and the third that involved time in the med tent. I have (variously) developed a side stitch, knee pain, a blister, and the down-deep pain of hitting the wall at 21 miles.

So my fears have some basis in experience. Things can go wrong, it can hurt, months of training can be undermined by a crucial mistake on race day. But what if I didn’t try?

I once entered an open water swim—having never tried one before—and was second-to-last. I started that race with the definite sense that I’d made a mistake to enter. I had barely reached the starting line after swimming almost a quarter mile, and the gun went off, upon which everyone quickly disappeared into the distance. But since I’d already committed to the race, I was going to finish it unless an official told me to stop. Eventually, I fell into a rhythm, began enjoying simply being there, the warm sun, the cool water against my skin, my crawl stroke getting a little more efficient as I loosened up, even managing to pass someone (who soon passed me, but at that point, I didn’t worry). It was a glorious day, an experience I was glad not to miss. No one will recruit me for the Olympic swimming team, but to be there, to try something new, to risk a little: I was grateful for the courage not to pass that up. Afterward, I relaxed in the restaurant with the other swimmers, wearing my one and only t-shirt obtained from an open water swim. I am proud to have earned that t-shirt.

Sometimes I forget, in my fear, to embrace the moment, where I am. My mind races ahead to what can happen, and I sometimes almost forget to notice what is happening: the mockingbirds flying across the trail in front of me; the valuable conversation time with Rebecca, my team-mate, as we keep each other going; the choppiness of the river. I sometimes think, “I can’t wait to finish this stretch!” I want it to be done so I will know I’ve safely made it through. But sometimes the uncertainties, even the fears, need to be embraced, learned from, and this is why I race.

Maybe it’s also how I need to live, remembering David Wagoner’s lines from his poem, “Lost”:

Wherever you are is called Here,

And you must treat it as a powerful stranger.

Eventually, Here is the way home, and is home.

posted by DPMcManus @ 7:54 AM