Race With The Devil
August 30, 2006If you’re going to race with the devil, you’ve got to be as fast as Hell!
Well, 8 kph ain’t exactly fast as Hell!, but it was the pace I managed in my! first! race!
A week ago Monday, I happened to mention to my friend K (whose name I dare not use here because she doesn’t even like having it on her racing bib—so imagine how much she’d h!a!t!e! having it splashed all over such a popular webpage as this!)(*ahem*) that I was considering making next month’s Longboat 10k on the Toronto Islands my first-ever race.
“Actually, the Crim is this weekend, and there is an 8K–it is loads of fun,” she sez. “I am doing the 10-mile, so you have a ride. It is a great first race–lots of entertainment along the way.”
“The whut? ”
The Crim. In that Jewel of Michigan, Flint.
Er… I wasn’t too sure I felt ready for a race just five days away. Hell, I hadn’t even decided one way or another on the Longboat race, and that one was still 3 weeks away at that point. As of that conversation last Monday, I had run approximately 8k once, three weeks before, when I was in Toronto—up and down the Beach boardwalk four times, with about 5 minutes’ walking in the middle—and had also run 5k non-stop just a couple days earlier. But that was it for bouts of sustained running. Other than those two flukes, I was just doing 10-and-1s every other day. The thought of trying an 8k race in 5 days’ time sent a shiver (of fear, rather than anticipation) through me.
But there was a Crim 5k race, too. So, hrm…
K said she was gonna drive over to Flint to register on Friday night. Asked if I wanted to go with her. So I said yeah, and I’d make a decision about entering a race while we were driving over there.
And so the next morning before work, I ran another non-stop 5k. Then, a coupla days later, I did it again. Just, y’know, “in case”.
Flint’s about an hour and a half from Sarnia, so I had some time to (not) think about my decision while K drove. In fact, I did a good job of (avoiding) making a decision during the drive. When we got to Flint and took the Saginaw Street exit, we found that the directions that MapQuest had given us were wonky. So we drove in and around downtown Flint, looking in vain for the hotel where registration was taking place. Thank you, MapQuest! We eventually found the hotel by pure accident. Once we’d parked the car and wound our way through the vendors hawking running gear and Sticks and some kinda bagged goop that runners (apparently) eat, I found my (unthinking) self standing at the registration table.
So. 5k or 8k?
Y’know, I never did really think about it.
8k.
‘Cause what would be the point of running the 5k? I mean, I already knew I could do that. The 8k, though, would be more of a challenge.
(At this, those of you who know me well–*cough* Frank *cough*–are wondering, “Who the hell is this person and what has she done with Carla?!”)
I paid my entrance fee, they gave me my bib, then we wound our way back out through the vendors. Incidentally, I was convinced–from what I was seeing that evening–that I would be the only runner in the pack who wasn’t wearing the “right” clothes. I didn’t have the fancy shirt and shorts made of wicking fabric, I didn’t have the $15 socks, I didn’t have the belt to hold water, unidentifiable–yet allegedly edible!–goop, and whatnot, I didn’t have the lightweight hat with the dark glare-proof underside on the brim. The only “right” clothes I had were my shoes. The rest of me would look like a rank amateur.
Which is what I am, so… I was okay with that. 
So we drove home, got a short night’s sleep and headed back to Flint at 5:30 Saturday morning.
K’s 10-mile race was at 8am. My 8k didn’t start ’til 9:30am. We got to Flint at 7am, found a good spot to park my car, then got ready… We stood beside the open hatchback and pinned our bibs on, slathered our thighs in BodyGlide (not something I’d ever contemplated doing in public before, but what the hell–nobody knew me there!), fastened our chips to our shoes, and we were ready to go. She seemed a bit dubious about my plans to carry not only a hand towel but my Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest™ eye gouger. The latter was the gesture of a sentimental fool and I don’t think I’ll explain it any further than that. Suffice to say that I had my reasons for wanting it with me, and they didn’t actually have anything to do with the fact that I was gonna be running through the streets of Flint.
We made our way over to the races’ starting line.
It was really overwhelming to me to stand out in the middle of the 10-mile crowd with K, as she waited for her race to begin. There were thousands upon thousands of runners for that race. Normally, I am on the edge of punching (well, c’mon, not really–just said for effect) when I am in a crowd like that, but it was quite different this time. I felt almost as if I were standing outside of myself–some distance from reality (further than usual, I mean)–observing. I watched some runners studiously stretching and others studiously not stretching. Some were clearly quietly psyching themselves up while others were laughing and chatting with each other. K seemed very relaxed. When the start of the race was about 10 minutes away, I gave her a hug, wished her luck, and got the hell outta the way.
And then they were off! At a pace, roughly, of a 90-year-old’s shuffle.
(Nah, don’t bother looking for me. That’s the start of the 10-mile race. I’m not in it. )
See, there were so many runners choking Saginaw Street that they couldn’t actually start running until at least a hundred meters down the road. Kind of an anticlimactic start, after all that.
So then I had an hour and a half to occupy myself before my race started. I wandered around, mostly just people-watching and not thinking about running 8k.
When 9am approached, I headed for the spot where I’d been standing with K. There weren’t nearly the numbers for the 8k as there had been for the 10-mile. Between eight and nine hundred, I think. I didn’t feel nervous. I just wanted to get going.
Then… I do.
I give my talisman a kiss for luck. And then the race starts, and we are able to run from the git-go, since there aren’t the numbers that the 10-mile had.
The course begins on a red brick stretch of Saginaw Street crowded with spectators, then crosses the river and hangs a left at a corner where a group of drummers has set up and is pounding us a rhythm for running. That’s when I see it: the hill.
“Hey, I didn’t know there were gonna be hills.” Some consternation wrinkles my brow.
But I get up and over it without a problem and am pleased with myself until I notice how the road seems to be rising ahead of me again… Higher this time.
“WTF.” Frowny face.
Oy vey, this one is a little harder. At the top, frat boys stand at the roadside and offer Krispy Kreme doughnuts, mmmmmm. But, you recall, my hands are full. So I pass ‘em by. There is a nice long down-slope that makes the climb worth it. I try not to think about doughnuts. It is difficult. No dinner last night and no breakfast today—you’re prolly not s’posed to do this sorta thing on an empty stomach, but that’s just how it all shook out this time. I will survive, as Gloria Gaynor sez.
At the bottom of the hill, there is a church group serenading us with hymns. They have bright eyes and hungry smiles with lotsa teeth. It is kinda creepy, really. I run a little faster.
Then over the river again and past another frat house where they are yelling something about beer. I don’t see any offered…
Around a corner and OMFG, there is a huuuuuge MOFO hill ahead of me. I am starting to have dark thoughts about K. She didn’t mention anything about hills.
I am surrounded by people who’ve slowed to a walk as we climb this hill. I refuse to do that. This is my! first! race! and I’ll be damned if I’m gonna walk any bit of it! I know I’m allowed to, but I don’t wanna. It’s the principle of the thing. I can take walking breaks in some future race, but not this one.
Whew, I am barely conscious by the time I hit the summit and am grateful to the locals who are standing at the curbs, spraying us with their garden hoses. There are lots of locals who’ve set up lawn chairs in clumps along the entire route, and they all cheer us on. Some of ‘em even have set up their own water stations. It’s really very heartening and it returns a smile to my face and distracts me from my dark and violent thoughts toward K.
On this back stretch of the course, there is one hill after another after another, and I am wondering how it is that I didn’t think to ask her about this sorta thing… But it occurs to me that if I’d been smart enough to ask about it and found out there were all these hills, I wouldn’t be out here running. I’d've certainly chickened out if I’d known. So it’s just as well that I didn’t ask. You know what they say about ignorance. Unlike Flint, Sarnia is very flat. The only hills around Sarnia are overpasses. So to say that I was unprepared for Flint’s hills is a bit of an understatement. It makes my decision to not walk at any point in my! first! race! more difficult to achieve, but I keep telling myself that it’ll also make my completion of the race more meaningful to me.
I must not think bad thoughts. I must not think bad thoughts.
- X, “I Must Not Think Bad Thoughts”, from the album More Fun In The New World
The locals start assuring us we are on the (so-called) final stretch far too early. I keep thinking that I will see downtown (ie. the finish) around each bend in the road. But it is never there. For about a half a mile, spectator after spectator assures us that there is “only” a mile left. WTF–am I running in place?? At the last two scheduled water stations on the course, I decide I can slow down enough (well, it’s all relative, right?) to get a drink. I don’t slow all the way down to a walk, though (because that would be against my principles for this race, remember), so I manage to get more water on me than in me. Still, it’s refreshing. Dodging the thousands of empty, discarded cups on the roadway is another matter. I decide to just trample the fuckers because twisting an ankle while trying to avoid one in my weak-kneed condition would be an absurd injury, wouldn’t it?
At last, I can see the final turn. And when I do see it, I instinctively push harder. I check my watch, and it looks like I am closing in on one hour. I round the corner and, oooh, there are lotsa people watching. Including K, who, as it turns out, finished her 10-mile at approximately the same time I started my 8k. She calls my name and waves, then joins me for half a block–asking if I want to kill her yet.
Bless my heart, I do not answer honestly.
She says she will meet me at our pre-arranged spot and then lets me cross the finish line of my! first! race! on my own…
And I gotta tellya–it felt fuggin’ great. I thought back to my first attempt at running a few weeks before–when I could barely manage to run for 30 seconds at a time–and my sense of accomplishment was rather grand. It took me (a long!) 1:00:21 to finish those 8k, but I finished ‘em. Without stopping. Even on the hills. My legs felt like rubber when I finally slowed to a walk, but they’d earned it.
K got a gold medal for her 10-mile accomplishment. I got a moist towelette and a clap on the back.
Well, that and something to blog about.
