1st 2011 Race!

Tomorrow morning I will run my 1st race of 2011. I am oddly eager, though I have not been out on the roads this week at all. I feel an eagerness sort of like what my dogs show at the door when they think they are going to get a walk outside. This is different: Late last year, I ran my first races since high school - and I was abysmal even way back then in the 20th century. In 2010, I was a bit scared about the first 5k - would I even be able to finish? Not being humiliated was a big deal in that first September re-entry - a deliberately chosen small event. Then the next one in October I took more seriously from a time/pacing point of view - and improved by a few seconds or a minute. The 3d and last was the big Thanksgiving Day race on the Sprint campus, and it was not chip timed which I did not realize until too late to independently keep track.

The fact is, I am not a fast runner. I am certainly not a strong or fast starter. I never thought of myself as a competent athlete, though I loved stories about real ones as a kid. (Maybe it is a little pathetic that, at this late stage of life, I think maybe I can still become one. That is fine with me. Ha.) In fact, I have mostly run and ridden bikes through life because I simply have never had the physical coordination, strength, or grace to do the team sports well. (Sadly, I tried.) So, my late 2009-2010 running restart began as a decent way to be healthy. Then it became a happy way to be out of doors in the big world I like so much, without having to do yard work. I love and thrive on the beauty, freedom, ecstacy, stretch, sweat, interesting people I have met in the process, and all of that. Ohm yeah, also the improvement in health and weight that generated the whole experiment in the first place.

But, I notice something odd just prior to this race. I want to do really well. I want to run faster than any of my prior chip times by at least 5 minutes. I actually want to win. Or place. Even if only in my advanced age group. I knew something was up on some recent road runs when I had the insane urge to race the passing automobiles! (The insanity - held in check - felt good.) I am focused in a different way this time with my "routine" tomorrow from the moment I rise to when I finish. Not just to prevent embarrassment.

Probably just an indulgent bit of baby boomer navel gazing, but I am interested in this phenomenon. I can hardly wait. (My wife mentioned this morning that I might be obsessed.) My bar for humiliation has risen I guess; but I will get over it. Meantime, let the race begin.