I Run 5,000,000 Millimeters Uphill!

It’s really all Sladed’s fault. He has been such a sports machine that he’s shamed me into getting off my butt and pushing myself athletically. He’s made me want to try to keep up and got my competitive juices flowing. It’s been a long time since I did anything requiring even a remote amount of athletic skill, so it has been feeling right to something about it.

About 10 days ago I returned to the office from an extended trip in which I did very little exercise and snuck too many Kit Kat bars out of the hotel vending machine. Sladed told me there was a 5K run in Solana Beach and, like an idiot not wanting to be shown up by the Adonis-legged Sladed, I said, “sure, I’ll run in that.” I had run three miles – almost a 5K – on a treadmill before so I thought I could do it and not totally embarrass myself.

Then Ber tells me she is running the America’s Finest City half marathon and told me there was also a 5K race as well. She demanded I run in the AFC 5K because, well, she’s a princess and the Ber always gets what she wants, so I signed up for the AFC 5K. Of course the Ber’s race was a 6:45 a.m. start and Sladed’s was at 9:15 a.m. This combined two things I hate: getting up early and getting up early to exercise.

Anyway, I was secretly hoping something would happen that would prevent me from running, like the loss of a limb or painful dental surgery. A few days after signing up, I had an abruptly-scheduled trip to Moscow that would not return me in time to run the event so it looked like I was out of the race. Too bad. But, just as quickly, my trip was called off and I was back in the run again.

Unfortunately my only additional training was running one practice 5K and a two mile run around my neighborhood a few days before the race. I certainly knew that I could do a run/walk and finish the race, but I wanted to do the best I could under my current physical conditioning – somewhere between critical and cadaver.

I woke up at 5:30 to get to the race start, but listened to Mrs. Laz’s advice in pinning my bib number on my back, slowing down my important mental prep time. Of course it was wrong. As all great runners know it goes on the front. I had to make a quick adjustment after we saw 5,000 runners with their bib number pinned on their front. That error in lost time and concentration probably added five minutes to my race time.

At the start of the race, they require that only those given a bib number 1-150 be at the start and everyone else should start at their leisure. You're given a little computer chip that fits in your shoe and marks the time you begin the race and when you finish, so you could literally leave 20 minutes after the official start and it will not affect your actual running time. I started about two minutes after the others had left and wish I didn’t. I got caught up in those who planned to walk the 5k and had to wind my way around people walking and chatting and basically blocking access to the course. It would have been better for me to have left a minute earlier or five minutes later, but it’s something I will learn for next time.

Some key things about this race and the course: the course is all uphill. I know that may sound impossible, but it’s true. You have to run to a peak of about 6,000 feet above sea level and then deal with the altitude. Then you run up a similar mountain peak and find yourself at 12,000 feet with no oxygen tanks! To get back down to sea level, there is no gradual decline. You have to chip away at the glacier and jump from huge heights before rolling down sheer cliffs, avoiding death as best you can. It may be the toughest course in the world!

Needless to say I didn’t win, in part to Mrs. Laz’s error and underestimating the heights of the mountain peaks in Balboa Park. Perhaps my lack of training, physical conditioning, extra weight and non-athletic running style played a small roll.

I was in what most analysts would call the “chase group,” some 15-19 minutes behind the "winners." We were a hearty bunch of walkers, parents pushing strollers, the elderly, kids under 10, the overweight and one homeless guy, although I think he joined the race when he heard the rattle of change in the pocket of the runner in front of me. We were a proud and tight-knit group, striving mightily to the finish line.

I admit I was tired throughout the race, but when I turned the final corner and could see the Hall of Champions (aka, the “Bird’s Nest") where once a portrait of Sladed hung on the wall, I knew I was near the end. Since it was my first official 5K, I did my personal best of 34 minutes, 34 seconds, which works out to an 11:08 mile. I finished 817th out of 1,580 and came in 17th in my 50-54 age group (out of 26).

About an hour and a half later (and ten miles longer) The Ber came running by to finish her half marathon and all of us; Mrs. Laz, The Boy, The Girl and I, were all able to cheer for her completing her first run at that distance.

I was happy to be out running and competing and would like to run more, but I am afraid joining Ber in the half marathon will be long way down the road if it ever happens. My immediate goal is to run another, and decidedly more flat, 5K and see how I do and, hopefully, work my way up to a 10K. The ravages of age and general laziness will dictate if I ever double up on today’s run.