A Good Run

What is a "good run"? For me, my best runs have been ones where at some point, usually in the middle, I've felt a sense of "wow, I am going faster than I think I should be but this feels good, can I keep this up?" and then somehow managed to finish the run strong. I suppose it's kind of a breakthrough feeling. Maybe like a kid first learning to ride a bike then after 10 seconds realizing he hasn't fallen and is actually comfortable. Until he turns his head to proclaim his amazement to someone else and falls, of course. But that's the idea, reaching a new plateau. Fortunately with running there are plenty of plateaus. You can ALWAYS run a faster pace.

But recently my running enjoyment has been absent. To be honest, as a triathlete my training runs feel less like adventures to new plateaus and more like, well training. Or, "necessary work so I don't die on the run after a good ride/swim." Especially this year I've had even less enthusiasm since I've had some knee/shin splint issues. This feeling has been well balanced by the greater spirit of "adventure" I feel with a long, hilly bike ride or conquering a new lake, but I do sort of miss the satisfaction of pure running.

And since I'm not racing in Wildflower, I really just need to stay in shape enough to be a training captain. Enter WF Practice weekend, Saturday afternoon. I'd finished the "nasty" long course ride the day before, my buddy swimming and aid station duties earlier that morning, and had my "THAT'S IT" beers. The only motivation I had for doing the run was as training for Nepal trekking. I was nervous, I remembered how brutal it was last year at WF and that I'd call on my legs to run and they wouldn't. I also hadn't run over 8 miles this year. So at around 2 pm I figured, what the hell, I'm just gonna go do this so I don't have to worry about it tomorrow. I got geared up and started leaving camp when I ran into Coach Richard.

Richard made a comment somewhat along the lines of "Okay, you can run if you want, I mean you are staff and know the course, but I'm not sure that's the best idea right now..." All things considered, not to mention that Michelle was air evacuated to a hospital for rattle snake venom, it was a good idea not to run, and that was just enough doubt in my mind to postpone it. And dare I confess I didn't want to be seen suffering on the run!

Sunday morning, run begins. Taking it NICE and slow. Thinking to myself if I wanted to call it a day after 7 or 8 miles that'd be fine. First 2 miles, REALLY slow. Shutting down the ego entirely. Saving energy. Then the "middle of nowhere along the lake" portion of the run remembering the heart rate shooting up to 180 and feeling nauseous from last year's race. Not so much this run, actually felt okay. Then came "the hill." Arggh. The bike course has names for hills, "beach, lynch, nasty, soul-crusher" but the run is anonymously brutal. Hell, I couldn't even HIKE this hill in the race, I had to stop and gather energy a few times. I'd met up with Toor at the time and we more or less realized we were destined to handle the run together. He, an eager WF/long course first timer enthusiastic and pushing the hills, me a jaded "not sure why I'm doing this" vet. Okay, I'm not THAT old. But yeah. No point in attacking the hills, so we walked. After the brutal hills, I thought yeah, that's probably all I can do today, maybe I'll walk to camp.

But the trail running after that was actually fine. Almost brought back one of my favorite crew runs, the valley run. I was definitely warmed up by then! So spirits were already a little higher. Met up with Julie and Ralph along that section. And I believe that was the beginning of the "Matt in 30 years" jokes from Ralph. Lame.... but yeah they did take my mind off fatigue. Then we approached the pit.

I was actually feeling a bit like a "captain" that day. To me that means someone who can participate and encourage/coach at the same time. I'm a far cry from the Tri Team's experienced captains, but I did get a sense of purpose from being able to do the run AND point out some directions at places. And TRY to encourage people to run the pit (a one mile descent then immediate back up one mile ascent), knowing what a psychological and training boost it would prove race day.

We went down and up the pit. Julie was smart, she decided she wouldn't stop at the bottom. She knew sometimes you have to keep going. Toor, Guru (who had joined up) and I followed suit and pushed back up. It was a little bit of an "unspoken contract" I think.... at least for me. I was getting tired, but I didn't want to stop while the four of us were running together. I'd decided what the hell, let's do all 13 miles. And you don't want to stop when running in a group.... for 2 reasons. 1) If one person stops, that might break everyone's focus just a bit. "If he stopped, I guess I don't need to keep running." Or.... 2) If one person stops, that might INCREASE someone's focus. "He stopped, what a wimp. I'm so much stronger." This is what running in groups is all about!

And then something weird happened. We all realized we were running in step, at the exact same cadence! Left, right, left, right, left, right. There has to have been some study done concluding that this will naturally happen in a group of running after a given time. But... it's awesome! Now..... why am I learning these "teamwork" lessons in an individual sport like triathlon, when I wanted to beat my teammates on training runs in the ultimate team sport, crew. A different "Person" perhaps? A new definition of a "good run"?