3rd AG!
I ran in a little race this afternoon. It was oppressively hot. I ran OK, though not great, putting up a 20:47 for the 5K. I help coach a kids running club, and we had brought a bunch of the kids to the race to let them see what the road race scene is like. Both the head coach (a woman) and I were there, and we run pretty even in most races, so, to some degree, it was a race for bragging rights.
My son, who runs for the club, had decided not to run, and I was unable to change his mind. I left him with a running friend, who had decided not to race, but was around because her husband was racing.
Mile 1 felt pretty good, and being a small race, by then, most of the "clueless" runners had already been weeded out. I went through in about 6:10, a tad faster than was probably wise. Mile 2 started to make me suffer. I went through in just under 13:00 (or about 6:50). At around 2 1/2, the other coach came up, whining a bit. I said something like, "just hold it together." And I had the feeling she did. Slightly beyond that, another running friend came by, running easy and looking fresh. (It later came out that he'd jogged through a morning race while his girlfriend raced it.)
The trip in to the finish, where my son would be waiting was pretty uneventful the rest of the way. When I went through the chute, I turned to look for the other coach, and she was nowhere to be seen. It turned out she'd finished essentially on my shoulder and had slipped past unseen. I was disappointed with my time of 20:47. Virtually nobody at the race ran what they regarded as a good time (though as an afternoon race, held in a heat wave, neither was anyone surprised).
After the race, I jogged a mile or so with the guy who'd passed me at 2 3/4 and his girlfriend. It turned out that she won the women's race this morning. (A testimony to the power of judicious race selection.) As we were doing this, we passed a guy on the ground getting medical attention.
We were surprised that the EMT's were not actively cooling him, but most EMT's get lots of training in trauma, and virtually none in heat injury. Cooling an athlete with ice or cool water applied to the armpits and neck can drop their body temperature quickly and prevent or reduce any real damage to the athlete. We wet him down, and the EMT's said they were going to move him to the air conditioned ambulance momentarily, so we contined on our way. He didn't seem "out of it", so I'm assuming he'll be OK.
We closed out the outward leg of our jog by cheering the final 3 participants, then headed for our cars to get dry shirts. Then, I collected up my son, who promptly disappeared again, hanging around with the other kids.
In talking to the other coach, I commented that I was surprised that she didn't come by me. She said that she feels badly about passing someone who she's keyed off of for a chunk of the race, unless there's an award in the balance. I told her that my attitude is it's a race, and if you can beat someone, you do. There's value to both arguments, but she knows that if I'm behind her late in a race, she'll be wearing a target. Meantime, the bragging rights now feel a bit hollow.
The other coach's time of 20:49 was good enough to take 2nd woman, so she wound up with a nice medal. I wound up with 3rd in my age group, so I got a "bronze" medal (for those of you who aren't runners, that's what the cryptic title of this meant). It was nice to get one, because, I often run in bigger races and so frequently finish 4th or 5th (or worse) in my age group (45-49). It was especially nice to have my son there to see me get it.
This award however pales by comparison to my big running achievement of the spring - qualifying to run the Boston Marathon. I'll enjoy having this ribbon, regardless of what happens at Boston, I can now fulfill a dream. This was one OK day - that was months of solid training. Still, it felt good to "get hardware."
My son, who runs for the club, had decided not to run, and I was unable to change his mind. I left him with a running friend, who had decided not to race, but was around because her husband was racing.
Mile 1 felt pretty good, and being a small race, by then, most of the "clueless" runners had already been weeded out. I went through in about 6:10, a tad faster than was probably wise. Mile 2 started to make me suffer. I went through in just under 13:00 (or about 6:50). At around 2 1/2, the other coach came up, whining a bit. I said something like, "just hold it together." And I had the feeling she did. Slightly beyond that, another running friend came by, running easy and looking fresh. (It later came out that he'd jogged through a morning race while his girlfriend raced it.)
The trip in to the finish, where my son would be waiting was pretty uneventful the rest of the way. When I went through the chute, I turned to look for the other coach, and she was nowhere to be seen. It turned out she'd finished essentially on my shoulder and had slipped past unseen. I was disappointed with my time of 20:47. Virtually nobody at the race ran what they regarded as a good time (though as an afternoon race, held in a heat wave, neither was anyone surprised).
After the race, I jogged a mile or so with the guy who'd passed me at 2 3/4 and his girlfriend. It turned out that she won the women's race this morning. (A testimony to the power of judicious race selection.) As we were doing this, we passed a guy on the ground getting medical attention.
We were surprised that the EMT's were not actively cooling him, but most EMT's get lots of training in trauma, and virtually none in heat injury. Cooling an athlete with ice or cool water applied to the armpits and neck can drop their body temperature quickly and prevent or reduce any real damage to the athlete. We wet him down, and the EMT's said they were going to move him to the air conditioned ambulance momentarily, so we contined on our way. He didn't seem "out of it", so I'm assuming he'll be OK.
We closed out the outward leg of our jog by cheering the final 3 participants, then headed for our cars to get dry shirts. Then, I collected up my son, who promptly disappeared again, hanging around with the other kids.
In talking to the other coach, I commented that I was surprised that she didn't come by me. She said that she feels badly about passing someone who she's keyed off of for a chunk of the race, unless there's an award in the balance. I told her that my attitude is it's a race, and if you can beat someone, you do. There's value to both arguments, but she knows that if I'm behind her late in a race, she'll be wearing a target. Meantime, the bragging rights now feel a bit hollow.
The other coach's time of 20:49 was good enough to take 2nd woman, so she wound up with a nice medal. I wound up with 3rd in my age group, so I got a "bronze" medal (for those of you who aren't runners, that's what the cryptic title of this meant). It was nice to get one, because, I often run in bigger races and so frequently finish 4th or 5th (or worse) in my age group (45-49). It was especially nice to have my son there to see me get it.
This award however pales by comparison to my big running achievement of the spring - qualifying to run the Boston Marathon. I'll enjoy having this ribbon, regardless of what happens at Boston, I can now fulfill a dream. This was one OK day - that was months of solid training. Still, it felt good to "get hardware."
posted by Scooter at 10:12 PM
3 Comments:
hey, congrats, that's pretty awesome...
And yeah, it's a race, you try to do the best you can -- your coach's attitude seems weird to me.
Fun race report! And, as somebody who has been that last place runner many many times, I just want to say, on behalf of all of us, thanks for cheering in the final three!
great job on getting an AG place.
You posted a comment to my Running Barefoot blog ( read it http://runbarefoot.blogspot.com/2005/06/two-new-observations.html#comments ) Thanks for reading and commenting! However, you are just playing into the urban legend that it is illegal to be barefoot in eating establishments in NJ. did you ever notice that the "Shoes must be worn" signs are gone from everywhere? Here is the NJ legal truth:
http://www.barefooters.org/health-dept/NJ.html
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