Until today, I had never dropped out of a race. Once I had not made a cutoff, and I had several Did Not Starts to my credit, but I had never quit in a race. Until today. But let's start at the beginning.
It all begins on my couch where I have spent every free minute of the past 9 days. I come home from my new job which I loathe every day, plop down on the couch, and turn on the Olympics. When something lame like volleyball is on, I watch the events that I TeVoed. When mom finally goes to bed, I turn out the lights and go to sleep on the couch, because my insomnia has been so bad lately that I haven't been able to sleep in my own bed. I wake up late, leave the couch to go to work, and can't wait to come back home 11 hours later to sit on the couch again.Can you think of any worse programming to watch when you're burned out and supposed to be resting than the Olympics?
It's hard enough for me to sit still and take some time off when the biggest sporting event in 4 years ISN'T happening. It makes me want to drink. See, burnout and inspiration are a pretty fucked up mix. You want to get out there and tear it up and train like an animal, but at the same time you can't even seem to scrape yourself off the couch for long enough to change into pajamas, let alone go for a run, or wake up at 4:30 to go swimming.
So even though you're SUPPOSED to be resting, and this is what you've PLANNED to do, you feel guilty about it, because Dara Torres is 15 years older than you, and she still looks SO much better than you do.
... And sooner or later you are going to come to the conclusion that you are a total loser.
In fact, it feels a lot like being hung over: there are all these things that need to get done, but instead you're sitting on your couch watching TV all day eating pizza and feeling depressed. You SWEAR that this is the last time, tomorrow will be different. But tomorrow is NEVER different. So if you're going to feel this shitty anyway, why not drink?
Don't worry, I haven't. I feel shitty enough as it is, I don't need booze fucking up my life even further. And anyways, I used to feel like this before I really started hitting the bottle hard anyway. Back before I drank, I used to slash my wrists up when I felt like this. Because, yes, I really am crazy. Just, when I'm training, I tend to hide it better. And training makes me feel much more comfortable in a tank top than the alternative. Training is the only thing that makes the Crazy Claire go away.
But I can't seem to drag my ass off the couch.
So I was able to assuage my guilt a little bit, knowing that on Sunday, August 17 (today), I would go back to training. I could be as lazy and fat a blob as I wanted before then, because on August 17, IT'S ON!
Last night I watched the women's marathon. For each event Mom and I decide which athlete we are so that we have someone to rout for. I called Dina Castor. I dropped out of the marathon after only about 2 miles. Mom was Paula Radcliffe (her second choice, it turns out that Frank Shorter wasn't running the women's marathon this year). At least she finished, in what was arguably the most inspiring finish of the race: sticking it out through what was obviously a painful injury, just to prove to the British press that she wasn't a quitter. I watched Constantina Tomescu-Dita run almost twice as fast as I run a marathon, then I watched Dara Torres swim across a 50 meter pool faster than I can swim across a 25 yard pool. Then I went to bed (not the couch), and tossed and turned for hours. I got less than 4 hours' sleep before I got up at 4:00 to drive to the upper left-hand corner of Massachusetts to run a 20 mile trail race. Hopefully this would snap me out of my funk. I was tired.... This had better work...
I saw Gadfly Thom before the race and he explained that it was a new course. They were doing 2 10-mile loops this year, rather than 1 20-mile out and back to cut down on the need for volunteers. Oh yeah, and on top of the course being very hilly and covered in roots, he'd heard that today it was muddy.
... And something about river crossings?...
We started running and the first mile went well. Before the second mile was halfway done, though, my shoes were soaked. I'd managed to prance around the outside of the giant mud pits for the first mile, but eventually I aimed for a solid-looking spot, landed, and was ankle deep in shoe-sucking mud.
Crappy cameraphone. Trust me, that's all shoe-sucking mud.
And it happened again, and again, and again. I was slipping all over the course. Everyone was. With mud caked all over our shoes, and some of the rockiest, rootiest, most technical trails I have ever run on, we were taking the slippery mud to places that were not covered in slippery mud before.And that was when you could FIND the trail. A dozen of us went off course in the second mile. Around the 6th mile we went off course again and climbed a mountain that did not need climbing. The single-track trail was extremely overgrown in many places (the few places not covered in shoe-sucking mud pits), and even if you could distinguish the trail from the rest of the underbrush, you couldn't always see what kind of terrain was under it. I would be surprised if there was a whole minute that went by where I didn't trip or slip. The winner of the race said that he fell down a total of 7 times. We must have had to climb over 100 fallen trees in the 10-mile loop. I knew it was just a matter of time before my toe caught on one of them and I bit it.
There was a 4-mile race going on at the same time, and when we reached the turn-off sometime in the third mile and I considered taking a left rather than a right, I knew that I was not going to finish this race. I did eventually take the left to follow the long course, but I already knew my heart wasn't in it.
"Godforsaken" was a word that one man used to describe the course. But it wasn't really anything too, too bad. It's not like it was impossible. Very hard, but finishable. My heart just wasn't in it. I knew I could finish, if I wanted to. I just really, really, really didn't want to.
Luckily, since everyone kept getting lost, the field never had a chance to spread out much. I always had people around me. I mentioned that I planned to drop out to a couple of the guys slipping through a mud pit with me, and they tried to convince me otherwise. "No, really, you don't understand," I said. "I just really, really DON'T WANT to finish."
Have you ever felt a nagging injury and known that this time, if you push through it, you'll be out for the season? That's how my brain felt. It was time to call it quits. Problem was, I still had about 7 miles to go.
At about mile 7 an invisible trail lead up a mountain. At first it was steep, then it became a wall. There were a couple of times when I stood next to a course marker tied to a branch looking in all directions trying to figure out where in this vertical rock face they really expected me to go?! There was a point near the top when I was scrambling up the rock on all fours that I actually started to get dizzy. I hadn't eaten anything since I got out of the car, and hadn't really paid much attention to my hydration. For whatever reason, I felt bad and for a moment I thought of just sitting down where I was. Someone else could figure out how to get me off this damned mountain, but I wasn't moving another step.
But I kept going, and the view was worth it.
I just didn't feel like I had to see it again on a second loop.
As I was running down the hill (once I COULD run again, still swinging around tree trunks to steady myself whenever possible), I heard someone crashing through the woods behind me. "Just let me know when you want to come around," I yelled.
"Alright," he said in an Indian accent. I knew exactly who it was. It's not like there were dozens of Indian guys lined up at the start. When he came around, I don't know what possessed me to follow him and start up a conversation. He was running much faster than I was, and up until now I hadn't much felt like talking to anyone.
I'm a bit hard of hearing, and with him in front of me and speaking with an accent, I only caught about half of what was said, but I ran after him anyways. Fast. The truth is, I felt okay and was probably running better than I had at any other point in the race. I just really, REALLY didn't want to do a second loop of this bullshit. I told him as much. He said that he was quitting after the first loop too. Maybe that's why I decided to talk to him, because he wasn't trying to urge me on. Some people need to mind their own business.
Somehow we got to talking about cycling. I told him about the time I rode in the Adirondacks and it was so hilly I wound up crying by the time I got back to my car. "Your endurance must be really good to ride over 100 miles," he said.
"It's a heck of a lot easier than running a marathon," I said. Then we talked about running, about how I hate running, about how he loves running.
"So what kind of distances do you run?" he asked. "Do you run trail or road more?"
I didn't know how to answer him. "I guess I usually run on road," I said. "But I'm trying to become an ultrarunner this fall... and learn how to run fast at the same time." Then a lightbulb went off. "I don't know why I do it," I said. "I hate running. I really do. And I'm no good at it at all. I just can't seem to get any better. But cycling I like. And I'm good at it."
"Well, you can always become a better runner if you really work at it," he said. I've heard that one before, I thought.
At that moment it dawned on me that maybe I really didn't care enough to work at it. Why bother, if I hate it so much? I mean, really, who did I think I was fooling?
We pulled up on another group of runners. Sri (which was his name) dashed on ahead, but I was too lazy to keep up the effort to keep up with him. We were in another muddy patch, and I preferred to pick my footing more carefully.
"How you doing?" asked a woman who had heard me talk about pulling out before.
"You know... running," I said.
"How you feeling?"
"Fine, I guess," I said.
"Why don't you come along for the second loop?"
"Not a chance," I said.
"Aw, come on, you can do it!" said a chick that I had long ago decided was the hottest chick on the trail.
"I know I can. Just because you CAN do something, doesn't always mean you should."
"You can walk it. Come on, don't quit. Keep going with us!" I have done much stranger things to talk to a girl than simply running an extra 10 miles through the mud. But not today.
"You know, I really don't feel bad about it. I know I could keep going, I just really, really don't want to. I'd rather quit this race today than keep going and burn out so badly I quit running altogether." I didn't know if that last sentence was true or not.
When I got to the end I went up to the men with the bulletin board full of numbers and I said, "I'm done."
"You're not going to run anymore?"
"Nope."
"Why don't you just sit here for a little while and have a snack and see if in a little while..."
"Nope, I'm done. I don't want to run anymore. I'm not going to change my mind."
"Is everything okay?" They looked concerned. I have a feeling a lot of runners had been complaining about the course.
"Yeah. I'm fine. I just am not really in the mood to run today. If the course were just difficult, or if it were just the mud, I'd be all in. Today's just not the day."
"Okay then," they said. And they let me be.
My shoes looked much worse than this before, but we ran through a knee-deep river shortly before the finish, so they were cleaned off a bit.
Not the greatest picture my shitty camera phone has ever taken. Apparently the back of my shirt looked pretty bad too, but I didn't want to see what my butt ACTUALLY looks like in a pair of skin-tight shorts, so I asked him to just take a picture of my legs.In the car on the way home I had 3 hours to think. To say that I regretted my decision would be false, but I did beat up on myself quite a bit for quitting ANYTHING that I set out to do, even if it turns out that I didn't want to do it. The thought of doing about ten more long trail races this fall made me even more upset. What was I thinking?
Why am I even TRYING to run 50 miles? I hate running, and I suck at it. Riding my bike, on the other hand, I LOVE doing that. And after nearly 10 straight days of watching the best athletes in the world, all I could think about was, Why am I wasting time doing something that I hate, that I'm no good at, when I've found something that I love, and I AM good at? I can be a shitty runner when I'm older, why don't I just concentrate on what I'm good at now?
When I thought about it really hard, I decided that I was NOT in the best cycling shape I felt like I could be in, because I'd been concentrating so hard on trying to not be such a shitty runner. Then a thought that had been cooking in the back of my mind for awhile bubbled to the surface:
Why don't you quit this triathlon bullshit already, and just do what you love?
The jury's still out on the answer to that question.
I have disallowed comments because within 12 hours of posting I already had 2 comments that fit into the categories below. I don't want to hear the following:
A) Don't be so hard on yourself. You need time to recover. Take more time off than just 2 weeks. (Screw you, I need this).
B) Noooooo! This is your dream. Don't get discouraged! You can do it! (If you say this, maybe you need to check yourself. Is it MY dream or YOURS? When exactly have you heard me say it was my dream?)
C) Don't worry. We all have bad days. (While you're REALLY thinking, Weakling! I TOTALLY would have finished that race!)
D) You are NOT a shitty runner! And something else to the tune of "Group hugs all around!"
E) No suggestions that I will someday beat Karen Smyers at the time trial. YOU people made that up, not me!
I have disallowed comments because within 12 hours of posting I already had 2 comments that fit into the categories below. I don't want to hear the following:
A) Don't be so hard on yourself. You need time to recover. Take more time off than just 2 weeks. (Screw you, I need this).
B) Noooooo! This is your dream. Don't get discouraged! You can do it! (If you say this, maybe you need to check yourself. Is it MY dream or YOURS? When exactly have you heard me say it was my dream?)
C) Don't worry. We all have bad days. (While you're REALLY thinking, Weakling! I TOTALLY would have finished that race!)
D) You are NOT a shitty runner! And something else to the tune of "Group hugs all around!"
E) No suggestions that I will someday beat Karen Smyers at the time trial. YOU people made that up, not me!
