Ode to Warrior Woman

It's just the time of the year. With the shortest day of the year only 5 days away no one's training and no one's posting. If you're like me you've been flicking through your usual blogs, usually not finding anything new, and the rest of the posts seem to start with an apology for being MIA or not having anything interesting to write about. Ho hum.

So what's a bored blogger to do? Find new and exciting blogs to read, of course! I promised that I would do a write-up for anyone who donated to my AIDS LifeCycle fund raising page, and being the super supporter that she is, Warrior Woman was the first to rock up. Not only that, Warrior Woman was also the only person to cough up when I asked people to support Bob Almighty's ALS fund raiser. Clearly, Warior Woman has one big heart (or one loose wallet, I'm not sure).

Why I Love Having Her Around My Blog

• Remember when I ran that marathon that I hadn't trained for? Remember how everyone thought I was nuts? You know what Warrior Woman did? She went out on a rainy day in London and ran the last 10k with me! This wasn't my idea. She told me that she was going to do it, asked me what time I thought I was going to be around the 20 mile mark, and dragged her arse off the couch on a Sunday afternoon to run the last 6.2 miles of my marathon with me of her own accord. Really, it doesn't get much cooler than that.
• She dishes it out in her comments better than anyone else. And if there's one comment I enjoy, it's the witty insult. In response to this image (left) she told me, "it looks like half of you is heading back home while the other half pushes on resolutely". When I complained about being attacked by dogs she told me to quit being a ninny, and when I didn't get her weird British slang, she emailed me a 200-word explanation of what a "big girl shirt" is. And after I called her a pussy in one of my very first comments ever on her blog (way to make a good impression, Claire), she takes every opportunity she can to tell me to suck it up, pussy.
• She is queen of the gadgets and internet doo-dads. She has helped me more than once with software for banners and getting the photos from my last marathon so that I can enjoy gems like this (right) for free. And how do I repay her? Sending her music that damn near gives her a heart attack mid-race (she knows what I'm talking about).

Why You Should Check out Her Blog

Warrior Woman's page isn't a blog, really, it's like a database! Here are some very good reasons to read her blog and read it often and look at all her sidebars:

• She's the biggest gadget geek I know, and reviews all her toys on her page. And these aren't things like socks and race belts. We're talking Polar heartrate monitors and Garmin GPS systems. She has links to training books and training sites organized by sport.
  
• She has links to more blogs than you could read in a lifetime (you have to scroll to the bottom of the page to see them) organized by continent and sport. It's practically a social networking site!
  
• 
• Homegirl's got balls! She commutes to work by running, runs while hung over after a romantic night with Stella, and she had the cojones to post a video of herself on the internet running in Kangaroo Jumps (left)
• She has lost over ONE HUNDRED POUNDS in the past 6 years. One hundred pounds!
  
• It's worth it just to read the funny English words that she uses for things. She opened her message of support on my fund raising page with the word "Blimey". Blimey! Really! I didn't know anyone but snootish cartoon characters said "blimey". However, her funny language in no way detracts from the fact that she is a very entertaining writer.
  
• She shows up at races nearly every weekend for no rewards other than a t-shirt (you can see photos of her collection by clicking on her sidebar), and sometimes the added bonus of the company of the sweep van. If you think that I have stories, you should read some of hers... Which brings us to our next section:

Posts to Get Your Feet Wet

1. The single best story I have read on a blog, ever. No exaggeration.
2. Have you ever lined up at the starting line for a race, only to realize that you have to pee... bad? You'll love this one, I promise.
3. To find out the story behind the stupid shoes (above) read this one.
4. And click this one to see the video of the stupid shoes
5. Read about Warrior Woman's first ever half marathon here. Then leave a message congratulating her.
   
6. And finally, if you don't believe me that she's one tough cookie, read about how she ran through giant shoe-sucking mud patches and waist deep puddles for 8 miles in near-freezing temperatures a couple of weeks ago. Look at the photo after the finish and tell me if YOU believe that she just ran 8 miles through mud and puddles.

Next up, Mindy! (Sorry if it takes me several days, Mindy, this research takes longer than I thought).

What next?!

This winter has been about overcoming adversity, and until now I think I've been doing a pretty good job. Daylight savings rolled around and I learned to run in the dark after work and modified my routs to where there were more street lights. I bought a headlamp, and when that one was defective I even went back into Harvard Square (where there is never any parking, ever) to replace it. It got cold and I put on layers and toughened up. Then it snowed, and I learned how to run on the snow. When the snow turned to ice I began running in the road and risked life and limb running on patches of black ice.

Then it was above freezing for one day, just long enough for the snow to melt and get in one run on real, honest-to-god sidewalk. And now THIS BULLSHIT:
... some eight horrible inches of awful snow! And it's supposed to snow twice more before the weekend's out. What ever happened to global warming?!

This week's poll

First of all, let me apologize for my spelling error last week. As Angry pointed out, polls are for politicians, poles are for firemen and strippers. That's an error I won't be making again!

The results of last week's pole were overwhelming, with 50% of people saying, "Hellz no! The shirt is for AFTER the finish line, even if you have to run the race topless." I'm of this school, but we'll get back to this later.
One person believes that if he/she pays the money then he or she should be able to do whatever he/she wants with the shirt, including but not limited to wearing it before the race, during the race, and if s/he doesn't finish the race (I guess we won't be able to take his word on whether he finishes his ironman in 3 months either, then).
Two people said "Who cares, it never fits me anyway". This was my second choice answer, but it seems like more and more races let you reserve your shirt size ahead of time these days, and that makes me happy. Other people came up with suggested uses of oversized t-shirt: pajamas, laundry days, rags, and (my contribution) gym towels.
And finally, 25% of voters said that it didn't bother them when a rookie/newbie made this embarrassing mistake, but they know better than to do something like that. It's like showing up to a road cycling race wheeling a cruiser and wearing soccer shorts.

For more on t-shirt etiquette, see this list that Mindy sent a link to. Over the course of the week I've come up with a new t-shirt dilemma, though. My AIDS LifeCycle package came in the mail this week, and inside was a t-shirt. Seventy-five percent of us agree that it would be uncouth to don this shirt before the event. That is, if it were a race, but the LifeCycle is more about fundraising than racing. For example, there are no DQs if you get picked up in the sweep van one day or several days, and there is no ranking. On the other hand, for me the main challenge of this event will be to RAISE more than $2,500 for the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, and missing a chance to be a walking billboard seems like a waste. Also, it seems like the perfect shirt to wear in my picture on my fundraising page. So the bonus question of the week is: Is it alright to wear a shirt for a fundraising event for the purpose of raising funds for said event, even if one has not finished aforementioned event yet? (I now have a link to my fund raising page on my sidebar, by the way (right above the poll). Please consider making a donation to participant #2275 - ME! I realize that the holidays are a hard time to find extra cash, but every little bit counts, and you can always come back later and make a bigger donation when your credit cards have recovered from the holiday season. Anyone who donates before Christmas will get a special write-up in my blog.)

This week's question came from one of my deepest, darkest fears that has not happened to me yet, but I'm sure will happen someday:
This week is supposed to be one of the biggest long group rides in your training program. You wake up on the morning of the ride to find that you have no clean cycling shorts! What do you do?
A) Go back to bed. Screw that, obviously it wasn't meant to be. You'll make it up next week... if you feel like it.
B) Ride in the least foul-smelling shorts in your hamper. At least you didn't pee in them the last time you wore them... you think.
C) Wash the shorts and go out and do the ride by yourself this afternoon when they're clean. Triathlons aren't about group riding anyway.
D) Wash the shorts by hand in the shower and go out in wet spandex trying to ignore the squelching in your chamois. Hey, they'll dry out, and you're going to have a wet at the beginning of the bike in any triathlon anyhow.
E) Do the ride in running shorts. This sport is not for the faint of heart or the faint of crotch!

Stood Up!

Today I drove up to Derry, NH (40 minutes north) to do a long run with a guy I met at the Busa Bushwhack, a 9 mile trail race I did in November. I spoke to "New Friend" Thom for awhile both before and after the race and he couldn't stop talking about the Boston Prep 16 Miler in Derry, NH in January. Somehow he'd come to the conclusion that I was not only going to do this race, but train for it with him. "New Friend" Thom lived on the course, and he continued to pester me over email to come up and run the course with him. For about 20 emails I waffled and made excuses until I suggested that Angry come up with me. I figured I could kill 3 birds with 1 stone: keep my promise of running the Derry course with "New Friend" Thom, spend some time with Angry, and have Angry protect me from sketchy guys who invite you to another state to run alone in isolated areas in the dead of winter. (Let's be fair, nothing about Thom was sketchy, but the situation put me a bit on edge). I said something in the email about wondering how we would all keep together given our different paces. Thom seemed to be offended that I suggested I bring Angry along and wrote, "I'm not worried about pace, I'm not going to ditch you. Listen, if you don't want to come, just say so". Well, if there's any way of convincing me of doing something, then call me out on my lies. I'll do anything not to be called a liar when I'm lying. "I'll be in Derry on Saturday morning at 7:50," I promised.

I was feeling imposed on by "New Friend" Thom for his friendliness, and when I realized that the office Christmas party was the night before our run I got even more miffed (because clearly, this was his fault). When they didn't have any acceptable vegetarian options at the Christmas party and all I had for dinner was asparagus, again this was Thom's fault. What an imposition! And when I missed the 9:40 train and had to wait another hour I began thinking, How dare he! And when my mom woke me up by calling me from within the house at midnight to see if I was home, this was clearly all Thom's fault.

But, stubborn as hell and true to my word, I got up at 6:00 anyway and drove up to Derry. Thom hadn't mentioned a meeting place, so I'd written 2 days before and said I'd just show up wherever the race's directions led to unless he told me otherwise. "New Friend" Thom did not write back to tell me anything different, so I pulled into a vacant elementary school parking lot at a few minutes before the meeting time. And in that parking lot I stayed, all by myself, for another 20 minutes. I'd been stood up! Now I've been ditched before when I can't keep up, but STOOD UP?! And by someone that I'd exchanged no fewer than TWENTY emails with! After everything he'd put me through yesterday with the trains and the asparagus?! This was too much! What the fuck?!

I wished I were a guy so I could pee FUCK YOU in the snow, maybe that would make me feel better. Furious and with a bladder that was already about to burst I turned around and went back home. The roads were nearly deserted (it was still a god-awful early hour of the morning) and I zoned out, wallowing in my frustration and trying to dream up a long run rout in the snow for when I got home. I was in the left lane, and just happened to look to my right and THERE WAS A NEW HAMPSHIRE STATE TROOPER GLARING AT ME! Not only that, the cop was yelling something and making exaggerated hand gestures, but his flashers weren't on so I'm not sure what he was doing. I looked quickly at my speedometer, but I was going under the speed limit. I looked around, and there were no places to get into the next lane, so I couldn't imagine that he was angry because I was traveling in the passing lane. I was wearing headphones, but he didn't know they were on and I had my lie all set for if he asked me. (No way, officer, I just forgot to pull them out of my ears before I started driving. I've been listening to the radio, sir). I was even wearing my seatbelt, but he was still over there making gestures and yelling something through his closed window. I gave him a whaaat? face, slowed down and moved over a lane. Then he passed me, pulled onto the median strip, and crossed to the other side. And then 2 seconds later I was back in Massachusetts. I was actually disappointed he didn't pull me over, 1) because I was curious about what the hell he was yelling at me for, and 2) because I was already feeling righteous and looking for a fight.


I got home without incident, and went out for a long-ish run (13.3 miles). The run itself was rather uneventful. I was only attacked by 1 dog. I didn't slip on any ice or get threatened by any more cops. I had no Shot Blocks or Sport Beans, but I used the poor man's alternative, orange slices, which seemed to do a pretty good job at offsetting my skimpy dinner the night before. I ran low on Gatorade, but bought more. My iPod batteries held out. I got home and my butt was killing me, but I had no other real aches and pains. And the best part: I maintained a pace of UNDER 9:30 per mile, THROUGH SNOW (some of which was deeper than in the picture)! That's good for me since my fair weather long run pace tends to hover closer to 10:00/mile. So I feel better now.

Running on the Snow

I never thought I'd catch myself saying this, but today I was dying to run. Yeah, yeah, I know. If I get one more "we've drawn Claire over to the dark side" comment, its bearer will be banned from my sidebar for good*. The fact is, I hadn't run in a week and I was absolutely, positively itching to run.
*For those of you who missed the reference, until recently I HATED running and took every opportunity I could get to shout it from rooftops.

Sunday night a snow storm blew in dumping a couple of inches of snow before the real cold temperatures came through, freezing everything in place. Since Saturday the temperatures have barely crested around freezing before plunging back down into the windy, blustery low twenties. I won't focus on the effect that this is having on my sub-tropical sensibilities, and will focus on the effect that this has on the snow. Trampled-down chunks of snow on the sidewalks melt briefly and then turn to ice. What little run-off there is from melting snow turns to black ice. The midday temperatures that hover around freezing make the snow hunker down a little farther, then the colder temperatures make it freeze into its more compact formation. It's not really like ice, it's just really compact snow that makes a lot of noise and supports your weight when you walk on top of it. All this ice and snow everywhere makes for really crappy running conditions and an even more grouchy Claire. So today I came home hellbent on running in the dark and the ice and the snow, I didn't care how many times I fell on my ass. I was running, dammit!

The temperature was in the high 20's and gear included long underwear (or figure skating tights if we're going to get technical about it), long running pants, a wicking fabric tanktop, a cotton t-shirt (from a race I finished by the way), a cotton long-sleeved t-shirt (from a race I finished), a garden variety cotton sweatshirt, gloves, and my Sox beanie. The sidewalks were too icy to run on so I decided to head for the middle school track hoping that the dark color would have attracted more sun and the snow would have melted. It was a cute idea, but it was wishful thinking. I ran in the street with the cars to avoid the dark and icy sidewalks for the half mile to the track. When I got there was greeted with a white ring where the track used to be surrounded by more white where the soccer field used to be. Well... running in the snow will be better than running on ice, I reasoned and plodded across the snow-covered grass to the track.

And when I set foot on the track and started running, I wasn't running in the snow, running on the snow. It was so hard-packed from the thawing and re-freezing that my feet only left 1/4 inch marks in the surface and I was running on top of the snow.

There was a lone path of frozen footprints from someone who had walked a single lap several days ago, and then their tracks had frozen into ice, and for the first couple of laps those were the only footprints I saw, not my own. I liked these lone footprints because it meant that I was doing something that no one else braved doing. The footprints kept me company until I stepped too close to one, slipped into of it, and nearly twisted my ankle. All by myself I followed those footprints round and round the track 16 times.

After about 10 laps my toes had pulverized much of the hardened snow, which just made running harder. It went from feeling like I was running on gravel to feeling like I was running on sand. The crumbling surface was murder on my hamstrings and glutes which had to push that much harder to get me off the ground. And I was running painfully slowly, but I was running dammit! It was 27* out, the ground was covered in ice and snow, and I was STILL out there running. You have to appreciate exactly how much I hate winter weather, but here I was, with no threats, no one egging me on, no animals chasing me, running anyway. And right there in front of me I had proof that I was the first person to brave running on this track this week: one lonely path of footprints. I felt like a superhero! I felt like Jesus walking on water, only that I was probably putting in a lot more effort than The Man Himself.

On my last lap I permitted myself a corny moment that I'm going to share even if it makes you groan. I looked at the single path of frozen footprints, thought about that sappy poem about the footprints that ends with God saying "That's where I was carrying you". Ain't nobody carrying me tonight, I thought. I did this all by myself! Girl power!

I love it when it all comes together in such a way that you're so happy that you think it's a good idea to quote God and the Spice Girls all in one paragraph.

New poll

The results are in from the poll "how lame was No Wetsuit Girl"?

A) Not so bad, there are stupider blogger names out there... 2 people, 20%
B) SOOOO embarrassing, why do you think I always refer to you by your real name... 1 person, 10%
C) I know where it came from. I say, BAD ASS... 6 people, 60%
D) I don't know, I don't really care... 1 person, 10%

To those of you who answered A, thank you for your honesty. You're the only people I really believe (except that jerk who picked D). To the people who picked B... well I'm the person who picked B, so I'll just keep my opinions to myself. To the people who picked C, stop sucking up. And to the person who picked D, Jerk, why'd you even vote then?!

Okay, next weeks question comes from a conversation Cranky and I had while I was in New York. I learned before I even signed up for my first race that you should not wear a t-shirt until you've finished a race. In Europe, unless your number was printed directly on the t-shirt, the shirt usually wasn't even handed to you until the finish line. But I seem to see more and more people racing IN their race t-shirts or (gasp) even wearing the t-shirt around the expo the day before. So the question is:

Is it okay to wear your race t-shirt while you're racing?
A) No way, the t-shirt is for putting on after, and only after the finish line. It is the only thing you can wear when it is no longer appropriate to wear the finishing medal everywhere you go. No finish line, no shirt, end of story.
B) I paid the money, I'll wear the t-shirt whenever I damn well please. Who cares if I haven't actually completed the race yet. Get over it!
C) Who cares? It never fits me anyway. Why do they only order XXXL shirts for an athletic event in the first place?
D) It's okay for other people, but I would never be caught dead committing a newbie faux pas like that myself. REAL athletes come prepared for an event and don't wear just any old thing that someone just handed them out of a garbage bag 20 minutes ago.

3:21

"What's 3:21?" you ask. Is it Cranky's marathon PR time? Nope. Is it a reference to Peter 3:21, the line that states that baptism is necessary for salvation? Nope, not that either (that was a google thing, I don't know that off the top of my head, don't worry!). Is it a reference to J.S. Bach, Matthew Broderick, or Rosie O'Donnell's birthday? No. It's my time in the race I did today. And we're not talking hours here. Three minutes and twenty-one seconds. Yep. Speedy, that's me.

The weather reports have been yelling menacing threats of a cold weekend for days, so when I saw an event on coolrunning.com called Wind up the Westin, a 26-story stair climb down in Providence, RI it seemed like a good way to get out of the weather, and also "work on hills". Running UP is always a problem for me: train your weakness, right?
So I got up and drove an hour down to Providence. I had absolutely no idea what I was getting into, and when I walked into the five-star Westin hotel with its $9.00 parking and giant Christmas tree in the huge marble lobby I thought I'd gone to the wrong place and almost walked out. But then I saw people sitting at a long table with little envelopes and safety pins and I figured I was in the right place. I walked up to the table, which was decorated on every available surface with American Lung Association logos.
"Name?" said a woman in her 60s with an accent that could have been from Maine or southern England.
"Claire. I'm not registered yet." Then a thought occurred to me, what if there was no race day registration? "Can I still register?"
"Sure!" she gave me 2 sheets of paper. "Just fill these out honey, and it's a minimum $35.00 donation." Gulp. I was holding $40 in my hand, and really hoping that this would cover parking as well. I started filling out the form:
Name: Claire Badass Last name: Oh crap, I always do that. Well leave it blank, then
Team: Me!
Funds raised:
"Ummm, what do I put under Funds Raised?" I asked.
"Oh, they were going to make the minimum donation $65, but then they didn't say it on the web site, so they decided to lower it. So you only have to pay $35."
"Ummm, okay, so do I put $35 there?" I asked.
"No, leave it blank." Ummmm, oh kaaaay.
I want to take the challenge and do it twice _Yes _No
"Can I do it twice?!" I asked the volunteer lady excitedly in my best ohpleaseohpleaseohplease voice.
"No you can't," she said unequivocally. Then she looked at the sheet I was filling out. "OH! You don't have to fill out THAT one!" she said, and snatched it away from me. I filled out the entry form and she pushed the waiver over to me. "And now you need to sign the waiver. You can throw up, but nothing else." I signed it and went off to look like I knew what I was doing for the hour or so until my start time.

And then I saw her: the reason I will be doing more races in the Providence area this coming year. I fell in love instantly. And, as I do when I fall in love at first sight, I started wishing I could disappear and gawking when I thought she wasn't looking. Go over and talk to her, silly, I told myself. NO! I can't do that! I gasped, and began to blush. Aw, come on, she's by herself. It won't be weird if you talk to her, people do it all the time at things like this, I taunted myself. Noooooo, she looks like she knows what she's doing. She's probably one of those people who doesn't like to talk to anyone at races. What if she doesn't even say anything and just turns away? Then there'll be nowhere to hide. And it went on like this for awhile as I probably gaped at her the whole time. Then a group of people from a third-rate college cross country team went up to Her and asked Her to take their picture. Oh my god! They're talking to her! I gasped to myself. She smiled as she focused the camera and I fell even more in love. Come ooooooon, this is how you meet people! the brave me encouraged, and I went to stand near her. I kind of stood a couple of feet away and looked really interested in the ceiling for a minute or two before I got up the nerve to say something. "You look like you actually did some specific training for this," I said and immediately wanted the earth to swallow me.
"Nah. I mean, I run and stuff, but nothing like this." She had a Boston accent. Normally I don't like that, but it was cute on her.
"It just seemed like you had your game face on," I managed to blurt out, somewhat coolly I hope. Then I noticed her wedding ring, damn. Definitely gay, but probably a resident of Massachusetts. Oh well, people get divorced all the time. She talked about her pre-race routine for a few minutes. Pretty soon, though, I had convinced myself that nothing I could say could possibly be cool and couldn't make myself say anything else. Being silent because you're afraid of saying something stupid in front of someone you like isn't a great way to kill a conversation though, and after a long, awkward pause I darted for the bathroom to die of embarrassment. I'm definitely coming back to Rhode Island every chance I get!

Despite there being fewer than 50 participants, the usual suspects were still there:

• fresh-out-of-college speed demon with his girlfriend there playing the faithful sidekick
  
• the wiry, middle-aged compulsive jogger in a running singlet
  
• the gaggle of chicks with the boob jobs and ass tight pants wearing matching bandanas
• the college-aged recreational runner who hasn't quite figured out that running fashion is not exactly the same as what girls are wearing on the University of Rhode Island elliptical machines (this one, despite weighing only about 110 lb, had her stretch pants jammed all the way in to her whole butt crack leaving nothing but her tan lines up to the imagination)
• someone's kid wearing soccer shorts and the race t-shirt
  
• and the aging, overweight soccer mom crammed into an outfit that's way too small for her. She wore a getup that one would think was from an early '80s Jane Fonda video complete with headband, only upon closer inspection you notice that these are fabrics that weren't invented until the late 90s. Where do these women shop, really? If this woman had an ounce of muscle on her body, she hid it well, and yet there she was, all decked out with that look, like she was part of the "in" crowed. I am in shape, this is my scene, her body language said, while her body screamed the opposite..

Despite being small and indoors, it looked just like a running event.

I thought that this was a running thing. Apparently not. Apparently stair climbing is a sport in and of itself, or that's what the MC told us anyway in the pre-race meeting. And a very intense sport at that. Not only was there a water stop on the 14th floor and another at the top, but they also had a trash barrel on every second floor just in case you got sick; not one, but two volun... no, OFFICIALS on every floor in case there was a problem, and two doctors on duty. He explained the etiquette and jargon of stair climbing to us (to pass, say "inside" and the slower person will step to the outside of the stairwell), and reminded us to pace ourselves. Time would be kept by setting us off one at a time on the minute, #1 at 10:01, #2 at 10:02 and so on, and our finishing time would be recorded at the top.

I was number 35, She was number 6. I figured that I probably wouldn't see much of Her after the event started, since I'd probably leave before she came down, and then she'd be gone by the time I got back. The only statistics I knew about stair climbing was that it took the fire fighters an hour and a half to get to the 106th floor of the World Trade Center. Divide by 4 and take away a bit because we're not carrying gear, and I figured on a 10 minute finish, 8 for the winners. But then, right before #6 left numbers 1 and 3 (the MC) were already back in the lobby! As people starting coming out of the elevators seemingly right after they'd left I leaned over to the guy next to me, "I drove an hour to run for 3 minutes?!"

When it was Gina Fondette's turn I saw her posing for a picture right at the "starting line" (part of the pattern on the rug) during her 1:00 wait. The love of my life was taking the picture, I was twitterpated watching how supportive she was being to Gina Fondette. "Way to go! You can do it! This is YOURs!" she cheered. I melted. See, I'm not a nice person, so I'm really attracted to nice people. When it was my turn, all I could think about was whether I had an underwear line on my butt, which was now facing the woman of my dreams. The lady responsible for setting people off tapped my shoulder and whispered my count-down, "5...4...3...2...1...go!" and I bolted out of there as fast as I could to get my fashion emergency out of Princess Charming's line of vision.

By the third floor my legs were starting to burn. By the 5th floor I was gasping for air and was walking the pivot steps on the landing. On the 6th floor the volunteer said, "but you're not even breathing hard!" I was panting. By the 10th floor my legs felt heavy, but I'd found a rhythm. Pat, pat, pat on my toes up 8 steps and then take two big gulps of air as I turned around to run up the next flight. By the 15th floor my lungs were burning. On the 18th floor I caught up with the woman in front of me as well as an elderly woman in jeans, a t-shirt, and a fanny pack. The elderly woman was walking slowly and wheezing and gasping for air. On the 19th floor the volunteers were chanting (* means clap) "* * *** **** Nineteen! * * *** **** Nineteen and a Half!" (to the tune of * * *** **** Dog Show!). At the 20th floor the guy behind me caught me. And then, just as I was beginning to wonder if I was going to have to walk, there was the last flight of stairs with a piece of red tape on the lip of the top step to mark the finish line. 3 minutes and 21 seconds after it started, my day's workout was over.


I was gasping for air, as was everybody else at the top: the lady in front of me, the guy behind me (who had switched places relative to me by the last flight of stairs), and Gina Fondette. We all rode down in the elevator together commenting on how our lungs were burning. "Yeah, I had bronchitis last week and I was laid up in bed last Monday, but I came and finished anyway," said Gina Fondette. "It really says a lot that I was able to finish!" What exactly does it say? I wondered, but kept my mouth shut.

Back in the lobby my girlfriend was still there, eating a yogurt. I didn't quite catch her eye on the way to the food table, so I slowed my pace and blatantly stared at a spot about 2 feet from her shoulder to get her attention. "Hey, how'd you do?" she asked. Ummmm, I have no idea how I did. What's good in a 26-floor stair climb?
"Well, I got there," I said and coughed.

While I was picking through the food table Gina Fondette, who was standing next to the wall a few feet away started coughing uncontrollably. Hoping that my future wife would notice I asked her, "Are you alright? Can I get you some..." I looked at the water bottle she was holding in her hand, "...tea?" I finished meekly. Gina Fondette proceded to tell me once again that she'd been sick all week and wasn't it amazing that she finished at all. "I had to take quite a long break at that rest stop on the 14th floor, but I made it," she said, arrogantly. I still didn't know what I was supposed to be impressed about, but I acted impressed and said, "I haven't even been sick and I'm coughing. I think there was something about the air up there." This seemed to satisfy her, and I inched away before she could keep telling me about her cough.

I'd left my things behind the volunteers' table and as I was walking back up to get them the woman from Maine or Southern England and another one who had been very nice to me when I was signing up pointed at me and cheered, "There she is!" I felt special until I turned around and saw that it was the elderly woman with the fanny pack and asthma who had finally arrived at the top and then been allowed to WALK back down since she was the last one to get there anyway.
"I did it!" she said. She had a typical cute old lady voice. "I heard that there's another man here and he's in his 70s. I'm 75. I WANT TO BE THE OLDEST!" she said like a petulant child. They assured her that she was, in fact, the oldest and the volunteers gathered around her to congratulate her. "Oh, were you the one up there at the rest stop on the 14th floor? Where I took my shirt off?" she asked a sixteen-year-old thuggish looking boy who was grinning at her.
"Yes I was, you must have been very hot!" I looked on in horror, trying not to imagine this raisin of a woman topless until I realized that she was wearing a tank top and had probably been wearing a long-sleeved shirt over that.

Right before I was about to go out the door, the MC (who I noticed was wearing bike shorts; what kind of sport is stair climbing if it doesn't even have its own kind of shorts?!) came out with the time sheet. Everyone crowded around including my girlfriend. An older man, who must have been the 70-year-old runner-up for the Old Fogy Award asked my girlfriend, "Can you see it? Was I the very last one?" She read him his time patiently. I pretended I couldn't find my time just to stand near her and watch her help this man a little more. I looked at her number to find out her name, Christine. "Was I the last one though?" the man whined.
"Yep, ummmmm, wait," she said, scanning the results. "No, no I don't... wait... um..." in the end he wasn't, and he didn't look so worried anymore. To be honest, the man didn't look so 70 either, he looked more like 50.

I didn't get her number or anything, but I did get a goodbye. I was coughing for the rest of the day from the stale, dry air in the stairs, but that's okay, I'm in love.