Tag: 1KRC

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A Single Step • 1,000 Miles in 2018

Often we are confronted with seemingly impossible tasks.  We are left with two fundamental choices: give up, or push forward.  But how?  When we stand at the base of an apparently insurmountable mountain… how can we possibly succeed?  The answer is simple: one step at a time.  No matter how hard it seems, all you need to do is keep moving forward.  Put one foot in front of the other.  Then repeat over and over again.  When you break that massive mountain down into manageable steps, suddenly you look down and see how much ground you’ve covered.  Suddenly you look down and see a most breathtaking landscape below.  You found a way to accomplish the impossible!

Almost two and a half years ago, I was lucky to survive a serious hit and run while cycling home from work.  I got up… somehow.  I believe it was a combination of luck, instinct, and resilience.  Luck: it could have been a truck instead of a Mini Cooper, I guess it wasn’t my time to go!  Instinct:  I still can’t explain it, and don’t even remember actually being hit… but somehow I knew what was about to happen.  Somehow I ended up on the side of the road, rather than the center of it.  In that moment, I somehow knew exactly what I needed to do to stay alive, and in the fraction of a second I had – did it.  Resilience:  Despite the spinal, neurological and other injuries I suffered… I would not let myself be stopped.  I got back up.  I kept moving.  Pain and suffering meant nothing.  I could feel it… I was alive.  In due time, I knew I would heal.

Well, apparently it hasn’t been ‘due time’ yet.  Not a day goes by where I’m not in extreme pain.  My leg frequently goes numb, often losing feeling completely.  My back pain fluctuates from severe to debilitating, as do my headaches.  My ears ring, my brain feels like it’s going to explode.  I still haven’t rediscovered my sense of smell, and my vision continues to suffer.  These definitely haven’t been easy times.  My health is a disaster, and I’ve been unable to obtain proper care.

But should I give up?  Hide in my bed and cry about all I have lost?  Or should I stand strong, and fight for the life I choose to live?  For me this isn’t even a choice.  I will persevere.

So, for the past two plus years… despite the pain and suffering, despite the uncertainty and despite the seemingly endless challenges… I have done exactly what I needed to.  I have put one foot in front of the other.  Painfully, often slowly… but consistently.  From where I stand now, I look back at those challenges I’ve been facing.  I’m in awe that I’m still alive!  Honestly, it seems to defy logic that I’ve accomplished what I have, mostly on my own, while I was at my weakest.  I look back, smiling with the knowledge that where most would have folded, not only did I stand strong… I moved forward, and remained happy in doing so.  As I’ve said so many times these past few years: “I’m making epic lemonade out of a truck full of lemons!”

Last night I took a few thousand more steps.  Quicker than I ever have before, I ran 1,000 miles for the year.  I did so in a way I love: I approached that milestone with back to back half marathons for the third time in 2018 (and the first time I did so across two states).  Even though that last mile was a challenge, I did what I needed to do to keep moving forward.  And when I hit 1,000 miles, I didn’t stop… I celebrated the start of the next leg of the journey with my favorite type of running: quiet, barefoot beach miles.

At the beginning of this year, I resolved that not only would I survive… I would thrive.  So far, even thought the odds have been ‘impossible’, I’ve done exactly that,  I’ve accomplished (or come close to) some of my primary fitness goals for the year already! I’ve gotten quite good at shouldering the pain.  Despite my ongoing injuries I set a PR in the half marathon.  It’s not where I hoped to be three years ago, but considering the circumstances, I’m damn happy with that!  I’m also within striking distance of my goal of 20 half marathons for the year.  This weekend put me at 17, and I have at least one race on the calendar for the next three weekends!  I knew at the beginning of the year that circumstances might make things difficult later on… so I approached my goals like there was no tomorrow.  One of these days, there won’t be.  I’m determined to make every single day I’ve got count until then!

My life will never be the same as it was a few short years ago.  My health may never fully recover.  I may not know how I’ll make a living, where I’ll find shelter or even a meal… but I breathe easy.  I know that all I have to do is keep moving forward, one step at a time.

1,000 miles so far in 2018.  1KRC Legend Status, and many, many more beautiful miles to go.   Here’s to the next steps on an incredible journey!

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Frozen Stiff • First Call Half Marathon, Waukesha, WI, USA

I knew I was in for some colder weather when I flew north this weekend.  I just didn’t know how much Mother Nature was going to be out to punish me.  Since the forecast looked reasonable when I left, I packed some cold gear.  Not nearly enough!  The weather was actually pretty moderate until race day.   Then when I woke up on race morning it was cold and extremely windy with a wintry mix of precipitation threatening (as the forecast had predicted once I arrived up north).  I jogged my five mile warmup to the race venue dreading the weather to come.  Nearly five miles in and I still didn’t feel warmed up!  I arrived just in time for a huge gust of wind to start throwing things around.  It was going to be an interesting day!  Welcome to Wisconsin… sincerely, Mother Nature!

The rain and snow started shortly after.  Unsurprising lots of runners just stayed home in their beds, so there were fewer runners than anticipated.  Maybe they were the smart ones?  Thats not my style: I welcome a good challenge.  Sometimes it just requires shifting the gameplay or adjusting the goals a bit.   But in the end, I’ll always find my way to the finish line.

While I originally thought that the First Call Half Marathon might be a moderately fast race for me, today was anything but.  I figured the chilly Wisconsin weather would be close to optimal for performance, and with a course billed as ‘faster than flat’ it sounded like exactly what I needed to get in another sub 90 half without pushing myself too hard.  With the miles I’ve been running this year, and my lingering injuries it would be foolish to try to PR each race.  This sounded like a good opportunity…  Until I read the race day forecast.  More appropriate ended up being a goal just to finish, especially considering my total lack of familiarity with this type of weather.  Someone remind me please how I used to do this during High School Indoor Track Season in CT?!  Dahhhhhhhh!

So instead of stripping down to my race shorts and OneRun singlet then running hard to keep warm, I wore as many layers as I brought with me.  While the rain and snow had stopped just a bit before start time, I wasn’t confident of my ability to handle this weather in racing attire.  Sure enough, I was still chilly when those winds gusted, and the running gloves I have were not nearly enough to keep my fingers warm.  Dressed in a bit more than I originally planned, I started out at what I thought was a reasonable pace.  But I was frozen stiff, and it went downhill from there.  Even in the second mile, my back flared up badly.  It’s been quite a long time since it was this painful, and I wasn’t going to push it.  I’m not sure if the excessive back pain was from the cold, the fact that circumstances forced me to sleep on bed instead of the floor earlier this week, stress, general fluctuations or something else, but wow was it rough today.  The Holy Grail of the Boston Marathon is barely two weeks away.  I won’t risk that under any circumstances.  This became a ‘suffer through it’ and just finish race.  My miles slowed progressively throughout the first half of the race.  Yet I would not stop.  

The course itself was indeed a fast one.  Out and back on a paved trail, with only two U-turns.  Other than that it was straight with just gentle twists of the trail and very minor elevation changes.  There were plenty of water stops complete with sports drink and even gels at one station (passed twice).  There were plenty of race staff out at the few and lightly trafficked road crossings to ensure that racers weren’t interrupted on their run.  Mile markers were at every mile, and even though some of them had been flattened by the wind, you still knew it was there.  Perhaps if the weather had been a bit more accommodating this would have been the fast race I originally thought it was going to be.  Locals need not worry; they get another chance later in the season.  It’s a bit of a trek for me though.

Post race I joined everyone else huddled under the shelter hiding from the brutally cold wind.  While the fruit and other race food I’m used to were certainly welcome… today I was extremely grateful for hot chocolate.  Kudos to the team from Silver Circle for a great event despite some very challenging weather, and it was a pleasure to meet a handful of my extended running family up in Wisconsin for a couple milestones!  Although lucky number 13 half marathon wasn’t so lucky today, I still had a great experience, and passed the 800 mile marker for the year.  I’m disappointed I didn’t win an age group award like I’d originally hoped, or even run anywhere near my ability level but such is life.  I heard many good reviews of Silver Circle’s Trail Assail Race Series.  Who knows, perhaps my path will lead me back out this way at some point.