Like a truculent toddler throwing a temper tantrum, I behaved badly today.
I couldn’t sleep last night so I ultimately decided I might as well get up and go run. That may have been a huge mistake.
Akin to Shakira’s song, my hips didn’t lie in telling me this was a bad idea. They were stiff and rickety from the gong bonged at the start the race.
And while this was billed as the second longest downhill race on the planet, here’s how the race started:
Montana and I have different definitions for “downhill” and this would be a recurrent theme.
The race director had said the course was “pretty well marked” but basically you just had to follow the road down. The mile markers WERE well marked… but just after the mile 14 orange cone, I came to a T intersection with no indication if I should go right or left.
I rationalized that if we drove up to the start, and the road signs didn’t direct toward Ennis, then I should go in the opposite direction of road sign. Half a mile later, at a seemingly dead end, my assumption made an ass out of me. An SUV came rolling down the road toward me, kicking up dust. The driver told me I went the wrong way. I kinda figured and cursed aloud. Not at the guy per se (okay maybe a little — put up an arrow at the T!). I just cursed. He offered to drive me back unless that was cheating and somehow I felt like it would be. I ran back to the intersection and tried to make up for the lost ten minutes of hemming and hawing and running… and to accept the added mile on my double marathon weekend.
I didn’t do a very good job of it. If our character is revealed not when all goes right but when all goes wrong, I’m apparently a whiny, stubborn brat. I lost any momentum I had and my hips and legs made it clear this was all so pointless. I struggled along but the proverbial wind was taken from my sails, the literal wind in my lungs huffing and puffing.
Time slipped away from me. I was grouchy and pessimistic. It was a bad day.
I tried to shake it off when talking to the race director, partly because he kinda looks and sounds like Dustin Hoffman.
He’s also a pretty good guy. But I did tell him I got lost a few times on the course. When I told him where (specifically just after miles 14, 16, and 22) he said they eventually got cones there but there had been some injuries on the course and so it took them longer to make adjustments during the run. And as if on cue, a guy sat down on the bench with a bloody, bandaged head wound. He waved off the Race Director’s concerns saying, “Eh… it’s all part of the game.” My crummy attitude paled in comparison so I just tried to swallow my frustrations and chalk it up as one of those days…
… but in my pouting way, it feels like there have been A LOT of those days and not a whole lot of good runs.
Anyway, per usual with these rambling posts, some photos from along the way:
