Epic

“You’re gonna die.” When you hear those words, you know a run is going to be epic. Sure it’s an exaggeration, but really it means that a person (or people in this case) think that you are absolutely crazy, and/or stupid, for going out and running. Now, I’ve had epics before – a 20 miler in a downpour comes to mind – but I’ve never run when it was 4 degrees and snowing. Sure I was cold, sure I was wet, but I wouldn’t have changed things one bit.

It’s these epic runs that really make you stop thinking about running and start thinking about, well, anything and everything else. The conditions are so extreme that it distracts you from paying attention to every foot strike, every breath, or even your time. Today my mind wandered. First, I saw another set of footprints in the snow. “Are these somehow mine?” I thought to myself. Then of course, “Maybe I can catch up to whoever it is.” However, eventually they veered off the road to the snow-less shoulder and then disappeared.

Desperately glancing around for the lost tracks, I looked up and saw a fox watching me from up the road. Now, rarely do you ever see a fox, and am unable to remember the last time I’ve seen one, or for that matter if I have ever even at all. This does seem odd to me that although growing up on a farm and usually seeing multitudes of wildlife, my memory file seems to be blank in the fox category. In any case, my fox friend disappeared as well, running into the woods hopefully to be seen another day.

Wanderings often turn into perseverance to finish out a run strong. Still, I didn’t think of every little technical aspect of the run, I just gave it all I had. It becomes a battle against the weather. Each gust of wind, each eyeful of snowflakes just made me hunker down more and just go. Sure the weather threw a few good blows with snow covered ice patches, but I ultimately came out the victor. I ran my best 3 mile time since picking up running again and had a blast doing it.

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volley'd & thunder'd;
Storm'd at with shot and shell,
Boldly they rode and well,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell
Rode the six hundred.

- "The Charge of the Light Brigade," Alfred, Lord Tennyson

You Don’t Need a Weatherman to Know Which Way the Wind Blows

Those sorry sorry souls. Every night I drive past them. Dozens of runners at the YMCA running on treadmills, going nowhere. They just remain there in one place the whole time. Sure they have the treadmills all lined up by the window so it seems like they’re running outside, but really come on. They’re just a bunch of lab rats on their little spinning wheels. Really, they should just be flushed. You’ve spent how much money on a gym membership just to run by a window, pretending you’re outside? (Especially for a window view of the beltline highways!)You could have spent the same amount of money or less on some cold weather running gear, maybe a light or two, and hell maybe even still had the cash for Wii Fit if you needed some extra entertainment. What’s so wrong with exercising outdoors anymore?!

Is it snowing? I think I’ll go for a run. Rain? Hmm, a run might be nice. Sub-zero temperatures? Fancy that, a warming scamper around the block will warm things right up. Just stop complaining, stop making excuses, stop thinking and GO!

I’ve already run through just about everything this winter and it’s more than a week till Christmas. Last week we had seven inches of snow, today it was negative degree wind-chills. Rough weather sure, but nothing that layering, donning a face mask, and wearing some wool socks doesn’t fix. Plus, the difficult miles I put in now will only make the miles easier come marathon in May.

Oh, did I mention any of that yet? So yes, I’m planning on doing the Madison Marathon at the end of May. First off, I’m about thirty pounds overweight and second off I haven’t done a marathon since fall of ’06. Basically a marathon was way beyond due. I’m just going to run it to get back into a exercise schedule again and, as I’ve said to a few people, to make friends with running again. I’d like to finish under four hours but if I don’t I’m not going to hate myself.

I’m also playing with the idea of doing the Twin Cities Marathon in October as well. Any cycling passion has been seriously dulled by a daily beating of it at work. Just like I used a bike-less semester in DC a few years back to accomplish the goal of simply finishing a marathon, I’ll use this to qualify – or to see how close I can get to qualifying – for the Boston Marathon. Now, the qualifying time for my age group is 3:10. Right now that’s incredibly fast. Of course, I don’t think it’ll be this next year, possibly not even the next. However, I want to see for myself if 3:10 is impossibly fast. I don’t know, and I won’t know, until I try and push myself to go for it.

“Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.”
- Will Rogers