Today was the day of the ten mile race I’ve been training for over the last couple of months. To say that it did not go the way I had hoped is an understatement. In fact, it would have been a complete disaster if it were not for the fact that Becky is a truly wonderful friend. She helped turn the day in to an adventure, rather than a nightmare.

We got off to a rocky start almost immediately. You see, in order to be close to the race and not have to get up at 4 am, we had gotten a hotel room in Crystal City. Becky actually found us a good deal in a nice hotel, so we drove down there last night, went out to dinner, and then watched Enchanted on pay per view before turning in early. After some fiddling with the ridiculously complicated clock radio, I set the alarm for six. This morning it went off, and I got up and started getting ready. A couple of minutes later, Becky pointed out that her phone said it was only 5 am. Yep, the clock was an hour fast. We later determined that this was not my fault. It turns out that today is the day that we would normally have moved the clocks forward one hour, and the over-engineered clock radio had reset itself forward.

But, we figured it out and both got a little extra dozing time in before it was really 6 am. When we got outside to walk to the Metro, we realized it was pouring. Luckily, that faded to mostly drizzle pretty quickly. We got over to the start of the race start fine, and then waited around, freezing and wet for while, but in pretty good spirits. The first three miles went well. We passed the 5K mark feeling fine. And then my knee started to hurt. And not just hurt, but HURT. One of the things I’ve learned as I’ve been running is that various body parts will get sore or achy along the way, but if you just keep going, they usually sort themselves out. Not this time. With every step I ran, my knee hurt more. I finally gave up and started walking. Becky and I came up with a plan – walk from mile five to mile six, and then try running again. And so we did, but when we got to mile six, my knee hurt even more when I tried to run. I could tell right then that I was screwed. It is only thanks to Becky and her kindness of spirit and generosity that I didn’t have a total meltdown/temper tantrum right there. We worked so hard, and we’d already done six miles in the freezing cold windy rain, and we weren’t going to finish on time.

But we pressed on. At mile seven, a nasty blue jacketed lady yelled at us, saying we weren’t going to make the cut off time at our pace, and we’d better get on the bus and get off the course. At that point, we still had 45+ minutes left, for crying out loud. All of the other volunteers who we encountered were unflaggingly positive and supportive, yelling “great job” even as I limped on by, but that lady just sucked. Somewhere around eight miles, my knee started hurting even when I walked fast. It was at this point that I realized not bending my knee was the way to go. We kept on going, me stiff legged and freezing, Becky cheerful and freezing. The police came by and said that everyone who hadn’t finished yet had to move on to the sidewalk, so we did. That last mile was a long, painful, wet, cold slog. All around us they were dismantling the race barricades and picking up volunteers in busses. My internal monolog for the last 1200 meters (I know this because they had signs up at 1200, 800 and 400 meters from the finish line) mostly went like this “Ow, step, ow, step, ow, step.” They were taking apart the finish line when we got there, but we did get there. 2 hours, 29 minutes, 31 seconds. Not the time I hoped for, but I’m really proud that we made it to the end. I could have quit, but I didn’t. Part of me didn’t want to give blue jacketed lady the satisfaction, but part of me just plain wanted to finish. Yes, I’m disappointed by my performance, but I did the best I could do today.

Now I just have to figure out what the hell is wrong with my knee. Bending hurts, but the most painful thing is straightening it after bending. Well, ok the most painful was jolting it by running, but I’m not doing that now. I’m just sitting on the couch.

In summary, just let me say THANKS, BECKY! You rock! In spite of everything, I had a great time today, and that was all because of you. (And even though you said I don’t have to be, I’m sorry).

Posted by Bad Penguin at April 6, 2008 9:56 PM