One of the first things I do when I wake up on race day is check the weather. Ideally, when I look at the Doppler radar on the Weather Channel's website, I would like to see my section of the country free of clouds, free of precipitation, and with it being autumn, a crisp, cool temperature.
The temperature I got. And that was all. The morning's weather map revealed a long, ugly band of rain that looked like it would stick around all day.
Dutifully though, I made the trek to New Albany for the Ohio River Greenway 5K. The Ohio River Greenway is an ongoing project that would eventually have a paved running/biking trail along the river going from New Albany to Jeffersonville. A worthy objective. The project is progressing in bits and pieces due to red tape, different landowners, etc. But the section they have completed, which passes by the beautiful New Albany Amphitheater, looks incredible. It would be the course we were running today.
This event had an unconventional award structure; the first ten males and first ten females get a prize. There are no age group awards. As is my wont, I scope out my competition before the race to see if I have a chance of taking something home other than my bib number. To me, it didn't look good. I kept seeing guys who look like real runners as opposed to wannabe runners such as myself.
One of my fellow runners looked shockingly like pioneering punk rocker Iggy Pop. Same face, same hair, and, most importantly in terms of running ability, same physique. He was even running shirtless. Iggy Pop was, and still is, ripped:
As we made our way to the starting line, I noticed that the rain was holding off. The track was still wet, but if it held off for another 25 minutes or so, we'll be okay. The first part of the route would take us underneath the now-dormant Sherman Minton Bridge, which was recently closed under Governor's orders. This development turned Louisville's already congested traffic problem into a flat-out calamity. During the festivities before the race, the race director jokingly thanked New Albany's Mayor for closing the bridge on our behalf. Ho ho ho.
We were now finally ready to start. I found myself near the front of the pack before the whistle sounded, and I cued up my running mix on the iPhone. Normally I wouldn't listen to Coldplay while running. Nor would I while doing anything else, for that matter. My mom likes Coldplay. That should tell you all you need to know. However, this excellent unofficial remix of "Speed of Sound" by Karl G. is a notable exception. It rocks, and Coldplay should consider Karl G. working with them on other tracks.
The whistle blew, and we were off! Taking the lead was a young guy, followed by Iggy Pop, then me. The pace was sensible, and I was feeling good after the first turnaround. I felt like I could take the lead at any time, but I was content to track them. Passing back by the amphitheater however, a couple of other runners passed me and had their sights set on the lead. The cream was starting to rise to the top.
We were running upstream the river, where we would turn around one more time on the Greenway and finish back by the amphitheater. Another runner passed me, then another and another still. One of them was a young kid who was about as half as tall as me. I later learned he was a fifth grader. I felt embarrassed at the time that this little kid was kicking the crap out of me in a speed duel, but man, he could fly. He ended up finishing third overall, so most everyone else in the field had to bow down as well.
We finally made it to the second turnaround, which would be just over two miles in. I was laboring; maybe it was the rain, but I wasn't feeling as fresh as I normally would at this point. Even worse, I was beginning to agonize over possibly not winning a prize, which go to the top ten men and women. I kept counting the number of runners in front of me, and my prize cushion was getting thinner and thinner. At the turnaround, I was in ninth, but then two runners passed me on the way back to the finish. Blah. I would finish eleventh, a good distance over the twelth place runner, but still prizeless...
But as I crossed the line in 23:51, one of the racing staff handed me an Ohio River Greenway cup. I finished tenth after all! Apparently one of the runners who finished ahead of me either dropped out or didn't have a bib number, rendering him ineligible. Either way, tenth place it was:
I'll take it. I was completely gassed at the end, so I felt like I deserved something, even though my performance wasn't all that great. Hopefully I'll do better next race. But the cup I won really is nice:
Whenever I look at a race calendar to see what races are upcoming, the vast majority are categorized in one of two types; road and trail. But looking at the entry for the Rugged Maniac would reveal another category:
ADVENTURE.
Oh baby.
For those that are unfamiliar, Rugged Maniac is a brand name for a nationwide series of adventure races that somewhat resemble an episode of Wipeout, only less cartoonish. Like Wipeout, there are numerous obstacles, but instead of gigantic red rubber balls, there are mud pits, walls, and cargo nets that each participant has to navigate. Here is a motivational promo video of theirs, and you will kind of get the idea of what the Rugged Maniac is all about:
There are many other similar races out there that have the same general structure; The Warrior Dash, Rebel Race and Tough Mudder, etc. They all market themselves as their product being a sort of "life-changing" event that can be crossed off of your bucket list. I haven't any idea which one of these was the first and who copied off of whom, but on race day none of that stuff mattered. I was ready. I had done some obstacle training that summer to prepare myself and did some scouting by watching YouTube videos and perusing the course map. I felt confident going in.
I had signed up for the Rugged Maniac way back in June, and I wouldn't be alone. Many of my friends from the Southern Indiana YMCA signed up as well, and on race day we were rolling 25 deep at Paoli Peaks, which is normally a ski resort. But there would be no bunny slopes today. I knew what I was in for, which is why I wore an old worn-out pair of Pearl Izumis and clothes I really didn't care if they got muddy, torn, or both.
We had all signed up for the early 9:00 starting wave (which go off every half-hour from 9 until 4) and with 15 minutes until the race's start, we made our way down to the line. A bad omen arose when the PA system played "Let's Get it Started" and "Raise Your Glass", two songs I detest, in an attempt to motivate everyone. Man oh man do those songs suck. So much for motivation. I would have gone with "Eye of the Tiger" myself. Everyone would have gone berserk. Another time, perhaps. Because then we were off!
Down the hill we went. Running downhill can be extremely dangerous, especially on the wet grass we had to contend with. I didn't go crazy fast and followed the general advice for running down a steep decline; arch the body back and take small steps. Finally, at the bottom of the hill we hit a patch of flat turf and I aired it out for a little bit. This would be the easiest it would get for us.
Running down a hill could only mean one thing: Having to run back up. That's exactly what we endured next, as we trudged our way up what normally would be a ski slope. I don't know if the grade of the hill was a double black diamond, but it might as well have been K2 that morning because the brisk pace we initially set on slowed considerably. I had recently finished reading Christopher McDonnell's excellent book Born To Run and I recalled a piece of advice within it in regards to tackling steep hills: "If you can't see the top, walk." I was only too happy to heed that advice.
After finally scaling the hill, we finally had some fun; an obstacle! It was the cargo net. Climb to the top, swing your leg over, and drop down. Nice and easy.
The pads we landed on were stuntman-worthy; very thick and soft. I have a tendency to sprain my ankles, but as soon as I landed off the cargo net I knew I had nothing to worry about when I had to fall later on. But then it was time to get wet...
They call it the "Drowned Rat Maniac", down a slide into a pit of water, where floating barriers could be ducked under or climbed over. 9:00 AM water is cold. It nearly took my breath away. The later time slots had it easy. After ducked my head under the first barrier, I came to my senses and climbed over the rest.
Running while completely soaked is an ordeal. What normally would be an easy obstacle like running tires was made a bit difficult while carrying around all of that extra water weight. I had enough water weight to begin with, but I digress. Next, we climbed up planks nailed between two trees about 15 feet high, then carefully climb down the other side. It reminded me of Full Metal Jacket when Private Pyle couldn't negotiate a similar obstacle and quit on his Drill Instructor. While I didn't have R. Lee Ermey insulting me mercilessly to contend with, I had to give a wide berth to the large poison ivy vine growing on the left tree. I warned the racers around me to avoid it, just in case some of them were city boys. Oh, and wearing an old pair of baseball gloves was a smart move. Trust me. They made all of the wall climbing so much easier.
Crawling through a tunnel, running while carrying a log, wading through a creek (no snapping turtles, thankfully), 10-foot walls; the obstacles kept coming. So did another set of hills. Seeing another steep hill in front of me bruised my morale. Aren't we near the end already? Of all the other Rugged Maniac videos I viewed, none of them had hills like Paoli's. It may go down as the most difficult and challenging Rugged Maniac course extant. Ironman Hawaii = Rugged Maniac Paoli.
But there it was, the finish! All that lay between was a fire jump and a mud pit to crawl through. Compared to the hills? Easy breezy. The fire jump was just a small and over-hyped hurdle, and the worst thing about the mud was dealing with more cold water. Hello shrinkage! Oh, and watch out for that barbed wire!
Then, 37 minutes and 14 seconds after it all began, I completed the course without a scratch on me, but completely worn out.
Think you can tell?
I am happy to report that everybody in our group completed the course and nobody was seriously injured. This was truly a physical test, I could have not run the course again that day even if I wanted to. My quads were in sheer agony for the next 4-5 days.
Out of the 99 people in our time slot, I finished 15th, and 162nd out of 711 male finishers. Which isn't bad, considering I'm not in optimum shape. Maybe someday.
I would like to close out this entry by paying tribute to my amazing friends that ran with me that morning. Especially my best friend Jeannette, who took some of the pictures of me in action, and Deana Carl, who talked me into doing the race in the first place. Even though she crashed into my shoulder flying down the slide:
I look like Lee Harvey Oswald when he got shot.
What a crew we had. I would go to war with them any time, any place. I feel privileged to have been a part of it all. Let's do it again next year!
Photos by Jeannette Torrez, Sandy Phillips, and Angie Tate.
Kristi blew her whistle. The race was on, and I took off. Around the first turn of the track, I led the way. It was the first time I ever led a competitive race at any stage. Nobody else went with me. I was the rabbit, the pacesetter.
I crossed the eventual finish line for the first time and I thought of what happens in the Kentucky Derby frequently. Some longshot of a horse with no endurance in his pedigree would bust out of the gate like a rocket and lead the field under the wire for the first quarter-mile but would run out of gas somewhere down the backstretch, having most or all of the field pass him in the process. Would this be me? Would I be out of energy and barely be jogging at the finish? Maybe I should slow down...
But I didn't. I kept at my possibly suicide pace as we headed out of the stadium and began the cross-country portion of the race. The course took us along a fence row adjacent to a golf course. I actually had to run around a golfer who sliced his drive out of bounds and was on our side of the fence looking for his ball. He probably didn't expect to see 25-30 folks running at him while he was searching in vain for his wayward Titleist Pro V1.
As I continued down the fence row, I actually noticed the scenery. It was beautiful; rustic wooden fences, golden grass, I really did feel like a horse running in his field at a Versailles farm. There were no mile markers, at least none that I saw, but I still had the lead when I estimated we had gone one mile. I didn't even bother to look back; I would undoubtedly be passed in short order by one of those other guys. I could say that I led the first mile of a 5K, and anything else would be gravy to me. I was starting to feel tired. Such is the way of the rabbit...
I saw one of the race volunteers point to to the path that would begin the trail portion of the contest. It was then that I took a right turn into the woods that I decided to take a quick peek over my right shoulder and see what sort of margin I had on the field. I was floored; I had a sizable lead on the guy in second place, who was still on the back fence row.
This I did not expect. As I entered the woods, the ridiculous thought of me actually winning the race outright crept into my mind for the first time. It was then that I first felt the pressure of the race leader. I flew through the woods with my heart pounding feverishly from that pressure. I felt like Harrison Ford in The Fugitive being chased through the wilderness by a troop of dog-wielding U.S. Marshals.
Fortunately by then, the next song in my running mix came on, "James Brown is Dead" by L.A. Style. Released way back in 1991, it is widely considered the first ever "hardcore techno" track. Back in the day I used to listen to this on my Walkman while I cut grass. Very fast, very hard, it's like an audio adrenaline rush and never fails to get me going during a run:
I kept trudging through the woods, keeping a close eye on the red arrows Kristi spray-painted on the trail that showed the way. Bad time for a wrong turn. The woods then gave way to another field, the soccer field Kristi mentioned before. I must be going the right way. Then, up a hill, I noticed two women sitting down at a table covered with cups. The water stop! I must be around the halfway point of the race. They stood up when they saw me; they knew that when the first runner emerged, their work would begin. I chugged a small cup of ice-cold water, they told me where to go next, and I looked behind me again to where the rest of the runners would be. I saw no one.
The pressure of leading didn't go away when I realized that I left my competition out of sight. A lot could happen; I could step in a hole and sprain my ankle, which I have done numerous times. Fortunately for me, I have such a competitive nature that any pre-race thoughts of "what if I get hurt" go completely away when the bell rings. All I think from then on about is running fast, injuries be damned.
I made it to the road portion and noticed that the path was marked by arrows made with colored chalk, the same kind that kids would make hopscotch squares with. I circled my way around a neighboring school's parking lot and then suddenly realized that I didn't know whether to turn left or right out of the parking lot. There were no race volunteers around, there was nobody around at all. I began to run right, without a lot of conviction, but after 10 seconds or so my internal GPS took over and I turned around and headed left. Did I make that wrong turn I so dreaded? I turned out that I didn't, because after turning back left, I soon saw more colored chalk arrows pointing me up the road. I was relieved that I was homeward bound, but would my slight detour cost me the race? I looked back. I was still alone.
It was then apparent to me that I was going to win the race. All I had to do was hang on and avoid any speeding cars, wild dogs, or lightning bolts. The pressure was starting to fade away and I began to relax. While running, I noticed that in the same colored chalk that made the road arrows were motivational messages; "You're doing great!" "Almost there!" "What hill?" Coming back up to the football stadium I noticed an ambulance parked on the street; an ambulance on standby is required for any running race. I ran by it, giving the "thumbs-up" to the EMT sitting in the driver's seat indicating that his assistance wouldn't be needed, no matter how tired I may have looked.
The final stages of the race would take me around the football stadium, along another section of fence, and back on the track where the race began, through the same gate we left some twenty minutes ago. Running on that track alone made me feel like I was finishing the Olympic marathon. I crossed the original start line and then Kristi met me on the final turn."You're almost there!" It was then a straight shot to the orange cones that marked the finish line. In front of a small throng of race supporters, I crossed the finish line with a new personal best time of 21:01.
I got a nice round of applause, but when I heard my race time, I was a bit disappointed. If I didn't take that wrong turn and didn't take it easy at the finish, I would have run the race in something like 20:20 or so, which would have put me close to my ultimate goal of a sub-20 minute 5K. Winning races outright wasn't a goal of mine because the thought of me actually winning one seemed completely outlandish. In every race I have entered, the winner has always been either:
A: A rail-thin, 140-pound ringer from a college track team, or
B: Wesley Korir.
Pudgy 36-year-olds aren't supposed to win any sort of running race, even if the field is small and the distance short. What I did that day may have been the fluke to end all flukes. I wouldn't doubt that comparatively modest running time may be the slowest winning time of any non-obstacle 5K in recorded history. Nevertheless, a win is a win. I felt great about my accomplishment, and took in some refreshments after the race:
I don't even like watermelon. But it tasted so sweet.
Approximately three and a half minutes after I finished, the second place runner crossed the line. He told me that he was, by his estimation, thirty seconds behind me, but he took a wrong turn in the woods during the trail portion and that was pretty much all she wrote. Incredible. The thing that I thought would be the worst possible misstep to happen to me instead happened to my closest competitor. It really was my day.
The rest of the runners and walkers trickled their way to the finish line and then the awards ceremony was conducted by Kristi. She called my name as the overall winner, a medal was placed around my neck, and then we all went home.
This really is an unconventional way to start this blog, with a win in the first race I write about. I want to tell stories in the vein of an ordinary everyday running enthusiast slowly clawing his way to respectability. But here, I win right off the bat. Not too good as far as character development goes. In the movies, the plucky underdog has to endure various trials, tribulations, and close seconds before breaking through with the run of a lifetime, nipping his rival at the wire by a nanosecond, and walking away holding the hand of the girl of his dreams. Roll credits.
But this is real life, not some movie. Besides, if I didn't pull off my win that day, I might not have been compelled to begin this blog in the first place. And so it goes. Heck, I might not win another race as long as I live. I might as well document it as best I can.
I thought I would go slightly back in time to the last race I ran before I decided to start this blog. What happened that day was extraordinary to me and proved that, if you try hard and have a little bit of luck, there's no telling what could happen. You just never know.
I won't lie. Winning prizes in athletic endeavors really appeals to me. In a previous stage of my life, I played 15 years of competitive slow-pitch softball. I was fortunate enough to play on some championship-winning teams, and over the years, I amassed a sizable collection of gaudy "League Champion" t-shirts and cheaply made trophies that may get $5 tops if I decided to trade them all in at the scrap metal shop. Nevertheless, they meant a lot to me, after all, I didn't buy them, I won them with a little bit of my passable softball ability and a whole lot of having more talented teammates!
The same goes for running, only the dynamics are different. With the exception of gigantic races like the Louisville Triple Crown of running, there are no such thing as running "teams". You are out there racing for you and only you, and with someone with modest running ability like me, prizes are hard to come by. If you're a runner who is the the equivalent of a backup outfielder in softball, you will be going home empty-handed 99 times out of 100. Sad but true.
This includes age group awards; most races award prizes to the top two or three runners in a five or ten year window. In 2010, I ran in five or six races and won zero awards. I was also shut out of the first two races of 2011. Then, on July 9, I turned in a perfectly lackluster performance in a 4-mile trail race in Clarksville, IN. I finished in 36th place overall, but managed to get 3rd place in my age group. I took home a Mizuno tech shirt and a bottle coozie for my effort; the first awards I ever won for running.
It all came down to luck; most of the guys who finished ahead of me were in their teens or early 20's. I don't know how many others were in my 35-39 age group, but I suspect I could have been 3rd out of 4, or even 3rd out of 3. But due to my luck and my age, I hauled away some loot while the 4th place finisher in the 20-25 group, who undoubtedly beat my time by 5 minutes plus, got squadouche. C'est la vie.
Of course, the opposite is true. Your luck could be bad as well. When I set my 5K personal best time of 22:15, I finished in 16th place overall, but only 6th in my age group. I ran the race of my life that day but had the misfortune of being in an age group that was completely stacked. I got nothing for that race, but it made me hungrier...maybe if I ran a race like that again against softer competition, then my proverbial trophy case wouldn't be empty any more.
Which is why my ears pricked up when I ran into my friend Kristi Whitehill at Ivy Tech Community College in Sellersburg, where I am a student. Kristi taught the first class I ever took there, COMM 102, and I always liked her style; she seemed like a fellow free spirit. She was also a running nut, and mentioned to me that she was actually putting on a 5K that Saturday. I told Kristi I was actually planning on running the Fleet Feet Fiesta 3-miler in Cherokee Park that night, but she wouldn't hear of it. She kept on trying to get me to come out for her small Spirit Run race in Buckner, KY, way out in Oldham County, which would help raise money for her daughter's volleyball team. She told me there would only be about 40 people there and that the top three finishers in their age groups would get a medal.
That made me change my plans. My chances of winning something in Kristi's race were far better than my chances in Cherokee Park, where I personally knew elite runners who would compete in it. That, and I wouldn't have to wait until 8:00 pm to run. Easy decision.
When I walked up to Kristi on Saturday morning, she seemed surprised that I would drive out all that way from Indiana just to do a 5K. Her persuasion on me paid off. We were in the Oldham County High School football stadium and we would begin and end the race on the 1/4 mile track surrounding the gridiron. It was there that I got my first look at the course:
It was actually very challenging. The race would take place over four different surfaces: track, cross-country, trail, and pavement. And from the map provided, the course looked very winding and twisting. I just hoped the course was well marked so wrong turns would be avoided. Kristi assured me that she spray painted markers everywhere around the course.
It was getting very close to race time, so I began to check out my competition. The vast majority of the participants were high school girls; I didn't know if this was the volleyball team that would inherit the race proceeds or the local cross-country squad. Either way, they all seemed to be in great athletic shape. There were not a lot of guys. I counted five others; two of them were walkers and the other three seemed to be serious runners. They were all in much better athletic shape than I; a couple of them wore heart monitors on their wrists. "Oh well" I thought, maybe I could finish 3rd or 4th overall and get 2nd in my age group, if I was lucky. I would be happy with that.
Kristi called us all to the starting line, which was on the track behind the high jump pit. The total number of participants was lower that her projected 40; maybe 25 on the low end and 30 on the high. It didn't matter though, as I estimated that 90% of the field looked to be better athletes than I. My doughy body couldn't compete with any of them cosmetically, but this wasn't a wet t-shirt contest, it was a 5K. Could my training regimen of circuit training and Turbo Kick give me the legs to compete today?
Kristi went over the layout of the race course, and it sounded like driving directions you would get out in the country from some hillbilly, "Run along the fence row by the golf course, take a left, go through the woods, come out by the soccer fields, take another left..." Wow. I'm glad I actually looked at the map a little bit, or I could really get lost.
She began her countdown, "We start in two minutes." I readied the running mix I made on my iPhone of pumping techno tracks that would be my soundtrack today. Techno music actually makes me run faster, and it drowns out my heavy breathing at the end of a race that would ordinarily remind me that I was getting exhausted. "One minute." I stepped over the starting line to clear a couple of pebbles off of the course. You never can be too careful. "Thirty seconds." I pressed "play" on my iPhone and started my running music. "Fire" by Ferry Corsten would guide me through the first mile or so:
Kristi then counted down from 10 seconds. I got into my crouching position, right leg in front, and, as I nervously do before every race start, wiggle my fingers as if I were performing a manic piano solo. "Three, two, one..."
Way back in 6th grade, (maybe it was 7th, it was a long time ago) I would run home from the bus stop every day. Literally, the moment my feet went from bus step to pavement, I would take off and run full bore for about 1/4 of a mile and not stop until I reached the safety of my doorstep. One time a classmate asked me why I did that day after day and I answered, "I like to run!"
Years and years later, I still like to run. A lot has happened in my life since middle school: I have gone through various stages of employment (and unemployment), I avoided higher learning and then embraced it, and I morphed into different body types, from skinny to fat to skinny again to my current Husky-But-Still-in-Pretty-Good-Shape uh, shape. Yet, surviving all of the peaks and valleys of my life has been my jones for running.
Running is the purest form of human competition. There are no balls, sticks, or any other sort of ancillary equipment. All you have is your body and the game is to propel it as fast as you can go for a predetermined distance. Nothing is more basic than that. Or more difficult.
The distance of choice for me is the 5K, or the 5000 meters, equivalent to 3.1 miles. Sprints are over with too fast, marathons are ridiculously long and require massive amounts of training just to be able to complete one. But 5K's can be done by practically anyone and the race is over within 20 to 30 minutes. The rest of the day is not spent recuperating. A 5K is, to me, the perfect distance; endurance is important, but the emphasis is on speed. People who run long-distance races call themselves distance addicts: "How far can I go?" But I am a speed addict. How fast can I go?
Another passion of mine is writing, so combining that with running has resulted in this blog. I first want to say that this will not like other running blogs I have seen. A lot of runners are narcissistic jerks and all they write about is how they killed a 110-mile trail run in Tasmania, their new pair of Vibram Five Fingers, or how they haven't eaten food with gluten in five years. Dean Karnazes I am not.
As the blog title states, I am an average person in every aspect of my life, especially when it comes to running. I have an average body (I'm being kind to myself there) and thus, my race times will be average. My times have gotten better since I started running competitively a year and a half ago; my personal best is over five minutes faster than my first 5K.
Which brings me to my main running goal: to run a sub-20 minute 5K. A modest goal to be sure, but it is something that I am working on feverishly. A 19:59 or better is my Holy Grail. And I am getting close.
You will hear about that, if it ever occurs, on this blog. Mostly though, I will write about each race I run, post what my time was, and have race photos, other observations, etc. I have many races coming up in the Louisville area, so there will be blog updates fairly frequently. It should be fun to write, and I hope it will be fun for you to read.
