Before Christmas break,
I received a facebook message from my friend Quinn. It was sent to a few people and included a
link to the “Hypothermic Half Marathon.”
She was asking if anyone would be willing to run it with her. The weather was still beautiful outside and I
didn’t want her to run it by herself, so Chad and I agreed to sign up. A few other friends did, too, and we decided
we would go on runs together to train.
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| I'm the last person that I ever would have expected to have a running number...but here I was, number 555 |
On the last day to
register for the event and still get the cheaper price, Chad and I officially
signed up. You would think the words “Half
Marathon” would deter us. I have never
really liked running (I went out for volleyball in middle and high school because
the court is so small, I figured it would be the sport with the least running
involved. Spoiler alert: That was
completely false.) and I usually tried to avoid it. Running, for me, was always simply a means to
an end, and I couldn’t believe that we were officially going to run just to
run.
I returned to our
facebook conversation immediately after signing up to give everyone the news
and remind them it was the last day for the cheapest price. As it turned out, everyone had thought it
over and changed their minds about running the race…but they were proud of us
for signing up! And just like that, Chad
and I were registered to run a half marathon in the middle of the Canadian
winter.
We were optimistic about
training. There were eight weeks between
the day we registered and the race itself, and, even though every training plan
I could find online required at least twice that time, we were confident that
we could work up from being winded and exhausted after running one mile to
successfully completing a 13.1 mile race in the bitter cold.
Our training intentions
were good, but they didn’t really play out.
We would often say, “We should go for a jog today!” and get preoccupied
with other things (that mostly involved sitting). We found a few old workout videos from the ‘80s
that we could do inside, but we only tried them once. I would ask Chad to walk with me to school
and we counted that as training. As soon
as we knew it, though, it was race day and we had only gone on one 10K walk, a
few leisurely walks to school and back, and two short runs around our
neighborhood. We were doomed.
The week leading up to
the race was absolutely freezing, with consistent wind-chill temperatures
around -20o Fahrenheit. We
got lucky for the day of the race, though, because God surprised us with a
beautifully sunny 10o day and little wind.
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| There was a lot to pack, and I was terrified of forgetting something |
We woke up groggily;
still full of way too many pierogis from the Ukrainian supper the night
before. Our heat of the race didn’t
begin until 1:00 pm, so we were able to sleep in a little and have a relaxing
morning getting ready. Even though we
were still stuffed, we forced ourselves to share an egg sandwich. We were about to run 13 miles, after all, and
our bodies probably needed a little fuel.
I also drank a lot of water while I packed.
Though it was warmer
than the preceding days, that Sunday was still pretty cold. I started packing on the layers: a thick pair
of tights, two pairs of long socks, a long-sleeved Under Armor top that was my
brother’s from middle school football, and a sweatshirt. By the suggestion of a reminder e-mail I
received a few days before the race, I packed sunglasses. I drink a lot of water, so all of this (plus
my health insurance card…just in case) got packed into my CamelBack.
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| I made sure to wear plenty of layers! |
We were getting a
little antsy just sitting around the apartment with the eminent race and our
illpreparedness looming over us, so we packed up, found some driving
directions, and left the apartment at a little after 11:30am.
The golf course that
was hosting the race wasn’t hard to find, and was only about a 20 minute drive
from our apartment. As we pulled into
the parking lot, we could see people with florescent signs saying things like, “You
can do it!” and “Keep going!”, and we could hear race spectators cheering for
the runners. It was a nice atmosphere,
but it had me a little nervous. Parking
was hard to find, since there was a heat of the race that began at 9:00am, but
we did eventually find a spot close to the clubhouse.
Inside the beautiful clubhouse,
there were masses of people in every state.
Runners with finisher medals who looked like they had just taken a light
stroll, people in pain with rosy red cheeks and noses, people who were clearly
family members of runners and had just come along to cheer; they were all
relaxing and eating the Runners’ Brunch.
We were directed to the downstairs lounge and instructed to stay there
until 12:30, when we would receive further instruction.
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| We found a spot and pinned on our numbers |
The downstairs was
packed with runners in the 1:00 heat.
Many of them looked so legitimate and experienced, with fancy running
clothes, nice shoes (with ice spikes on them, in some cases); and many of them
looked at us with a look that seemed to say, “Pssh…amateurs.” I didn’t mind, though, and Chad and I found a
little home base where we pinned on our numbers and adjusted our outfits. A spokesman for the race announced that the
track was still pretty icy, so we were encouraged to drive small screws into
the soles of our shoes for extra traction.
I tried, but couldn’t get the screws to stay, so I went without.
Finally, it was time. We were ushered outside to the start/finish
line, marked by a huge inflatable arch.
Runners shed their outer layers and jumped around to warm up their
legs. I switched to my sunglasses. A man on a loudspeaker explained the layout
of the race: There was a 5K loop on the course.
It was sort of clean, but still icy in places. We were to run the loop four times, getting a
small glass of water after each lap, and finish by running back through the
inflatable arch. There was a countdown
from 30 seconds, and then we were off.
We had purposely
positioned ourselves toward the end of the pack at the starting line, mostly so
no one would run us over at the beginning of the race. The pack stayed pretty close together for the
first bit, and it felt nice not to be in last.
People still passed us, but not in a humiliating way. I told myself that I wouldn’t be embarrassed,
and that the only goal of the day was to finish the race in one piece.
Chad was running faster
than me, and I was having trouble breathing (I was on the brink of hyperventilating
for the majority of the first lap). He would
slow down a little for me to catch up, I would catch him, then he would take
off again. I found myself stopping to
walk and I gave myself a way to handle it systematically: walk up the hills,
run down them, and continue running until I ran out of momentum. I was already absolutely exhausted when I
could see a sign coming up: “1K.” My immediate thought was “THAT was 1K? Are you kidding me?! There is no way I can run 20 more of those!” but
I kept going, and I could see Chad turning around every few minutes to make
sure I was still tagging along behind.
Every now and then he would fall back to run at my pace, and thanked me
for being so slow. “I would probably
push myself too hard and hit a wall anyway.
That always happens,” he said.
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| There was lots of snow at the golf course that day |
My thoughts progressed
in an interesting way throughout that first lap, from “That was only 1K?” to “I
wonder if Chad would be ok if I stopped after the first lap and cheered him on
instead” to “Why did we ever sign up to do this?” to “I’ll probably have to
walk the entire second lap.” The course
was really hilly and covered in snow and ice.
We finished the first
lap together, got tiny glasses of ice-cold water, and started off on the second
5K. It worked much like the first: I trailed a little bit behind Chad, but we
stayed together. I used him as an anchor
point for my running stints, forcing myself to run until I caught him, then
allowed myself to walk until a designated tree or orange cone. The first lap had taken us 40 minutes, and I
kept crunching numbers in my head as a motivator. No lap could be slower than the first, or we
wouldn’t finish in the 3-hour cut off.
As every sign passed by
(6K, 7K, 8K…), my thoughts were similar to the first lap. “There’s no way my body can take this; we
aren’t even halfway through the race,” “I really want more water, but my stupid
CamelBack is frozen.”
Chad started to really
lose steam around kilometer #9, so we finished the second lap together (at
about 45 minutes), got our tiny water (I almost vomited from the water being so
cold, but I made myself drink it), and set off again. I am amazed that I kept a pretty consistent
pace throughout the race. I stayed with
the “walk a little, run a little” method, and it treated me ok. For the third and fourth laps, keeping my
mind preoccupied was the key. I imagined
what I would write in this blog entry and I counted my steps. I sang a song in my head or outloud with Chad
(“We can do it” from “The Producers” was our song of choice), or mentally reviewed
school recipes. No matter where my thoughts
went, my body kept running, and before I knew it, my thoughts were more to the
tune of, “Wow…we might actually be able to finish this thing” and “I really
want that medal, now that we have come so far.”
Chad was really trailing
me by the end of the third lap, but it was like we traded roles from the
beginning of the race. I would walk and
run, but check behind me to make sure he was ok and not too far behind. Now and then I would fall back to chat with
him and encourage him.
Right before we ended
the third lap, a volunteer who had been cheering us on asked, “Are you done
yet?” with a smile. “One more to go!” we
said. It was nice to know that we were
three quarters of the way finished, but many of the runners were already done,
having lapped us kilometers ago.
We checked the time
while we started off on our last lap, and calculated that we needed to do
16-minute miles in order to finish within the 3-hour limit. That’s approximately four miles per
hour. We can totally do that! Encouraged, but exhausted, we started
power-walking. I am naturally a pretty
brisk walker, so it wasn’t much for me to push a fast walking pace, and this
time, I made sure Chad was keeping up. I
would send encouragements back to him and let him know I was rooting for him,
but I didn’t slow down. We had to
finish.
My breathing was
finally under control, but I was incredibly nauseous for the last lap. I tried to think it away, envisioning a huge
bowl of assorted melon pieces that I was hoping to see on the brunch
buffet. A big bowl of cool, refreshing
melon was all I wanted.
At this point, though
we were walking and had been lapped by most of the runners in our heat, we were
not the last ones on the course. There
was an older woman behind us who had jogged the entire race, and a young couple
(a lot like us) who were behind her. The
lady was so funny; every now and then she would pass us and make a comment
like, “You guys walk so fast! I haven’t
stopped to walk this entire time, and you are still faster than me!”
The sun was starting to
set, but we kept quickly walking. If we
felt up to it, I would push us to run down large hills to keep the average
speed up, but for the most part, we kept to walking. The signs went by, 18K, 19K, and we knew we
would finish. We would actually finish a
half marathon.
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| Finishers! |
And we did! Exhausted but exhilarated, Chad and I ran
through the big red inflated arch and finished the race. The old lady came in a little behind us, and
we turned around and cheered her in. There
was one attendant left at the little water stand, and she rushed over to give
us our medals. Our official time: 3:04:00.
I asked her to take a photo, and she was all smiles and congratulations. “Now go get some food!” she said, and we
slowly staggered, as if we were drunk, into the clubhouse.
Food smelled and looked
disgusting to me. I was still very nauseous,
so I stood strategically by the trash can and slowly sipped water until it was
under control. I turned around to really
look at the buffet for the first time, and there it was: a vat of assorted melon. YES. I
filled a bowl and found Chad at a table.
He had a plate full of fried breakfast potatoes, bacon, and
sausages. I don’t know how he does it.
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| All I wanted during the race was this bowl of melon, and it was all I hoped it would be |
We slowly picked at our
food, we made no sudden movements, but we were happy. We were all smiles. We had done it. We defied our bodies and, with no real training,
we had run 13.1 miles in 10o weather. To me, this race was concrete proof of “Mind
over Matter,” though I don’t think I really need to ever run another winter
half marathon.
We came home with our
medals and called our parents, mostly to show them that we hadn’t collapsed in
a snow drift on a golf course in a foreign country, but also to show off our
medals. We were sore for a few days (I’m
glad I didn’t have class the day after the race), but we only had one blister
between the two of us, which is a small victory in itself.
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| Thanks to this (really nice) medal, I will always remember the day we ran a half marathon in the hilly snow without training |
Overall, the race, the
day, and the experience were successful. We did it. We actually did it.
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