Tag: racing

I am deceased

Nothing more unnerving than being a thing.
-Dorothea Lasky, Milk

My first attempt at a longer trail race…was an experience. Not quite unnerving, but felt very much like I didn’t want to be a body. I ran the Hyner Trail Half Marathon yesterday. Quite a few people gave me useful, practical advice beforehand about the course and the climbs, yet the real time experience left me feeling deceased by mile 5. It was a 14 mile race—those last 9 miles were straight guts / wondering if I was a ghost.

I had a little pity party on Strava, so I’d rather focus on additional pieces of the race that struck me in a positive way:

  • PA Trail Dogs put on such a fun race—from clear communication about how to get to the start in a remote area to delightful folks at the aid stations. I am keeping tabs of more races they host throughout the year. The group maintains Central PA trails, and at the adult races, they use proceeds to fund trail races for kids.
  • Pennsylvania trail runners absolutely crush descents. I was told to watch for this before the race, and then every time I saw it happen as I was passed, I would tell the runner they were incredible.
  • Bless the aid stations. I took a spill on a root of a flat section about a half mile before the mile 8 aid station. Correct, I didn’t fall on a technical section. I paused to try to decide if I should just call it an 8 mile training run. I had pickle juice, ginger ale, and then one of the volunteers looked at me while I was sipping coke and said “want some Fireball?” I added some in my soda. This is not a road race, kids.
  • It was not the final climb (so many steep climbs, I misunderstood the elevation chart and expected more rolling hills, my bad), but there was a climb again after the mile 11 aid station. As I stared at the ascent, the speaker at the station started playing “Come Out and Play.” The rage of The Offspring came when I needed it. I did not exactly charge up the hill in my state, but it was a decent effort.
  • A man was playing a banjo and drinking from a growler around mile 12— other runners acknowledged him so I know I wasn’t hallucinating. I told him he was doing it right, we had a brief laugh.
  • I have such a good time with my brother. I was talking about Wineglass and how I never want to hear a race is net downhill ever again, so after I finished Hyner he was like “Well, this race was net downhill. The finish is below the start line.” LOL I had a good laugh in my frustrated post-race mood.
  • Lighter shoes are not always better. I definitely wore the wrong shoes. No, a different shoe wouldn’t take me from a 14 minute-mile struggle descent on switchbacks to an 8 minute-mile send-it, but my toes were not protected enough in my beloved Adidas Terrex Speed Ultra. I thought “race” and brought them, but I should have brought my Altras (I don’t know the model because I bought them so long ago, they are basically Hummers for my feet). My toes were tenderized by all the slamming downhill early in the race. They needed more protection on the descents.

I’ve already debriefed a bit with my coach, and I’m excited to add more long trail efforts to my training and to hit more races. I love the controlled chaos of trail running, and the camaraderie after. I’ll take a few days off, then be back out there logging longer miles for bigger goals, and having a good time with the Faster Bastards Oberhills crew.

Books I’m thinking about / recently read:

  • Milk  by Dorothea Lasky
  • The 2000s Made Me Gay by Grace Perry
  • I’m So Fine by Khadijah Queen

Stay sweaty and glittery. Black Lives Matter.

Not To Be Dramatic

Have you ever been so sure you’ve done something, that when you come to the realization you did not do it, your world rattles?

I had planned a long weekend in Philadelphia with my favorite communities: writers and runners. AWP was back, and Sunday the Love Run had a celebratory half marathon through the city. Everything I could dream of, right?

The first few days in Philadelphia filled my soul: connecting with new and old writer friends, finally experiencing the punk-rock Tirefire Reading series, writing in the garden of the Rodin museum.

Things started to fall apart at packet pickup Friday afternoon. I was so excited to show my girlfriend the running community, to show her the ridiculous things we do to get hyped. As I tried to locate my bib number, my name was not showing up. So weird, I thought. It must be a glitch, I thought.

Then I considered—I was receiving promotional emails, but did I get a bib number reminder email? As the realization washed over me, I searched my email receipts for registration. I generally register when it first opens (can’t miss those discounts), so it had to be there. Right? It wasn’t. I ask Athlete Information if they have registration today. Nope. It completely closed on Wednesday.

Fighting tears in the convention center hallway (is it even a writing conference if you don’t cry in the convention center?), I’m panic texting my coach and another run friend. What should I do? What are the options? Extremely stubborn, I didn’t want to miss out on a race weekend I prepared for. We find that the B&A Trail Half Marathon still has spots. I text the AWP 2 Hype 2 House 2 Queer chat that I’m leaving that night. I get home, try to calm down and relax with my cats. I’m prepared physically, why should a little stress derail me? I started infusing humor as fast as I could, texting my coach, I should have opened this with I’ve made a huge mistake.

Not to brag or be dramatic, but the half marathon was the worst I have ever felt in a race. Perhaps because of the stress of the previous 48 hours, perhaps because I’ve been struggling with my ferritin and thyroid levels, perhaps because imbalances from years of chronic pain decided to flare in my back—everything was NOT GOOD.

The race didn’t begin that way. I started cruising around 7:45 pace. I was going for it, knowing all my workouts and long runs indicated this would be an easy start to push from there. My plan was to start pushing to bring it down to the 7:30s after the first third. I took my first gel around mile 4.5 and said bye to my friend, she was folding a workout into the race.

I wasn’t feeling bouncy or fresh, but I still felt like I could hold strong for the second half as I approached the turnaround. From years as a swimmer and past races, I knew I didn’t have to feel perfect to be able to dig deep. Around mile 8, my body started to rebel in all the ways: nausea, tightness in my back to the point that I could not drive my legs. All in all, NOT GOOD. Still, I know these things can pass.

I took my last gel around mile 8.5. I gave myself another pep talk. One bad mile wasn’t going to stop me. As I continued, things got worse. Total body pain. Nausea. Heaving. Why couldn’t I at least vomit and get it over with? That’s when I started to panic. The last time I felt this terrible in a race, it was before my first surgery in 2018. This was not a time to relive medical trauma! I turned up my music, asked Ashnikko to give me strength.

I was either slowing down to heave as I ran, or I was stopping to heave along the side of the B&A Trail. With only a few miles to go, I passed some of the Faster Bastards cheering. I told myself to dig deep and felt a surge of adrenaline as I passed them. I can salvage this, I thought.

Shortly after I was off the trail again. They jogged by and asked if I was okay. I said, no, but I’m going to finish. I heave-run-walked my way to the finish, keeping it together enough to cheer on runners passing me, to say hi to people I have only interacted with online.

A consistent training block

My final time was around an 8:30 pace, despite some 10 minute miles in there. While I am frustrated, I am so proud of this consistent training block. I stayed mentally strong in workouts. I felt relaxed in long runs. Despite dabbling in running for over a decade, I keep reminding myself that I haven’t truly been able to consistently run until being cleared for sport in August 2020 after my hysterectomy and second excision surgery. I’ve finally had a chance to build. After some rest, I’ll spend the spring and summer finding new limits on the roads and trails with the community. This is a hobby I love, even when it sucks. There are going to be challenging races along the way. Yesterday, I loved seeing friends reach their goals, knowing I will be in that place again.

A note because the pandemic isn’t over: I took a rapid test last night, I’ll take one later in the week, and I’ll wear my mask if there are places I must go.

Books I’m thinking about / recently read:

  • Other Girls to Burn by Caroline Crew
  • Unprotected by Billy Porter
  • My Life as a Villainess by Laura Lippman

Stay sweaty and glittery. Black Lives Matter.

“I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.”

Sylvia Plath has been swirling my head since writing group. An essay I brought to workshop was giving off Mad Girl’s Love Song vibes, and I am okay with that. I finally choked out some literary prose about chronic illness. I am a mad girl.

Speaking of choking—I didn’t post a blog last month, nor did I submit writing. Both are monthly goals I set for myself. However, those goals are to hold me accountable to consistent writing and revising. Instead of submitting, I spent a weekend in West Virginia, heavily revising and dumping out a few thousand words of the first draft of the above mentioned essay that made it to workshop. The piece finally feels like a breakthrough in prose writing.

I am better at seeing the process steps in writing. It’s like the memes that go around running Instagram—the bits of the iceberg you don’t see before the success. I can say I’m happy with a few thousand words in January. I also excavated a ton of old writing for a revision of my full-length poetry manuscript.

After I run, it’s like I immediately forget everything I’ve accomplished. A little over a week ago, I had a killer workout with my coach in relatively difficult conditions—20 degrees and wind. I ran 2 x 12 minutes comfortably faster than goal half marathon pace within a twelve mile run. Two days later, I was writing panicked recaps in my training log about how tired I was. Of course I was tired. I had a big workout and my body was recovering.

This week, we preemptively planned a day off after a moderate effort at the Baltimore Road Runner’s Club Cupid’s Crush. It was absolute joy through Druid Hill Park. I find joy in sprinting up hills—it must be the dopamine. I highly recommend runners in the DMV area put BRRC races on their calendar. Everyone from other runners to race volunteers encouraged each other in the small race.

Bright morning light reflected on patches of melting ice as we powered up and down the hills. We whispered you got this to each other as our lungs fought. I’ve missed these intimate gatherings. I’m signed up for the BRRC Super Bowl Trail Race this Sunday—maybe I’ll get my act together and post a timely race recap of my first trail race.

Books I’m thinking about / recently read:

Sylvia Plath Sylvia Plath Sylvia Plath Sylvia Plath

Stay sweaty and glittery. Black Lives Matter.