Almost No-Go

I’m writing this from home today.  I took the day off.  You see, while Tamara, Drea and I were having a fabulous time on our pilgrimage to Carlsbad (lots of girlfr’en talk on the way down, delighted with our plushy hotel room, great meal with a wry waiter at a nice Italian joint), the evil viruses were having their own road trip down my bronchial tubes.  By Saturday night, the others were exchanging knowing, pitying glances behind my back, eyes saying, “She’s really getting sick.”  It turns out the running gods weren’t pawing me, they were pounding me.

I hardly slept, because I took the fold-out bed, and if you can find one fold-out in existence that isn’t lumpy, I want to know exactly where and when you slept on it, and under what influences.  Tamara and Drea, bless their hearts, insisted I share their comfy kings, but no way in hell was I going to keep them up all night or risk infecting them.  Besides, my race was dog’s meat anyway, so what did it matter if my cat-nap was kidnapped? 

On the warmup, I knew it wouldn’t be pretty, and was on the verge of not toeing the line until I ran into the Brennands about 20 minutes before the gun.  John had a cold, too, and HE raced.  He did really well, too, taking 3rd in his AG at 22:30. Taking my cue from the Godfather of the SBAA, I went for it.  

First mile, mostly downhill, 6:47.  Not good.  At the turnaround I see my nemesis, the woman who beat me by 3 seconds for 3rd place last time I ran.  She’s way ahead, uncatchable in my condition.  Dang.  Goodbye, delusions of grandeur.  I decide if I can’t run under 7:00 the next mile (which is a long, relentless incline), I’m jogging to the finish.  7:03.  Heck, it’s only one more mile, let’s see what I can do.

Warning:  mixed metaphors ahead.

The last mile is tricky:  it’s mostly downhill, but there’s a short, brutish quarter-mile mountain at the halfway point, the Carlsbad “heartbeak hill,” then it’s a slide to the finish.  On our course cruise the day before we had picked out a bright blue building, just at the zenith, as the focal point for pain–get to the blue house, just get to the blinkin’ blue house–and I locked it into my race brain, which is always pea-sized by this point, and charged.  If I couldn’t run the race I had trained for and was capable of, I could bloody well take no prisoners along the way.  I passed one, then two women on the way up.  Blue house, blue house.  Then, the final turn!  I hear “GO MAGGIE GO GIRL!!!!!!” and can’t look but know it’s Drea and Tamara, and energized, get hungry for another body, I’ve tasted blood and must kill again (said in Bela Lugosi voice), and I take down another victim on the home stretch!  Yessss!!!

 

 

I don’t care what my time is because I blew this race before the gun went off, but it turns out not so bad considering, 21:43, a minute over what I wanted and my slowest 5K in 4 years, but good for 10th in my AG, I’ll take it.  

 

 

Drea and Tamara, who woke up early and drove with me to the old-lady early start, greet me at the finish, and then have to stand around in the increasingly hot sun until their own race starts two hours later.  I feel for them as the pavement starts heating up.  We watch Ricky run a very strong 17:15, and then it’s time for the prime-time girls, 30-39.  Drea guts out a difficult race in 18:36 and still manages 10th overall, Tamara rockets to the finish with a fat PR (damn, can she kick) of 23:54, both of these girls have grit and I’m proud to be on their team.  (Visuals and more detail on Drea’s race here.)  

Drea and Ricky take off on their cool-down, and I’m in charge of managing Tamara’s well-earned post-race giddies, which threaten to lift Carlsbad off the map with pure, glowing elation.  She can’t stop smiling and it’s infectious, and I bask in her high-beams.  We find Kim’s “beau” Rick, and together we give Kim a proper send-off.  The young-uns mixed-gender race is delayed, though, and with every minute the temp goes up a degree, it seems.  Finally they’re off, and we scream for Micah, who is around 7th or 8th.  Kim passes the railroad tracks (quarter mile) right on pace, and we navigate the crowd for a good viewing spot.  As races go, this one is a premier spectating event, because you can view your racer three times from roughly the same spot.  

Here comes the motorcade and hurrah!  The leader is Micah!  We scream ourselves silly then, and again when Kim goes by—she’s slowed a little on the second mile, but still looks strong—and again when Michah charges up the hill with a huge lead, and again when we hear his finish time announced, 14:42, and again when Kim makes her final turn.   Her mouth is contorted with purposeful pain and she knows she’ll come in close to her goal and she does, at 20:40.  More giddy-ups float us for a while, and watching the beautiful elites blister by is well worth standing around in the by-now blistering sun, but by 1 p.m. we’re crashing, and it’s time to journey home.

Highlights of the weekend:

• Watching lovely Drea perform her pre-race ritual in her pj’s
• Glimpsing a flash of Sylvia Mosqueda, tough woman, on the first leg, as she led our race (and won)
• Hearing Tamara’s colorful account of how she was NOT going to let that F*ing girl catch her, oh NO
• Watching this 14-year-old kid kicking heinie while the older male runners around him urge him on
• Hearing Rick ask, “Does this look OK?”, referring to the “girly bag” Kim made him mule around for her
• Seeing Rusty’s beautiful SBIM postcards adorn cars all over Carlsbad
• Watching the elite men and women fight to the finish…zoweeee!
• Analyzing our races in detail on the drive home, which seemed like it took one instead of four hours 

 Next up:  Tough Enough, where the Carlsbad 5 (Me, Drea, Tamara, Kim & Ricky) will meet again, this time as competitors!