It’s Gay Marriage Chat Friday!!

As Ellen DeGeneres once said, it’s not like I wake up every morning and think, “I’m gay!”

I wake up and think about the same things everyone else thinks about: Shit, I forgot to take the garbage out, or I have to pee, or possibly, Did the cat just fart? In other words, being a member of a minority is not exactly in the forefront of my thoughts at all times the way some people seem to think it must be. Granted, when I was 17, it crowded out every other thought process in my brain, bullying away reasonable thoughts like I really should eat or I think I’ll make my bed. But at 51, I rarely sit around thinking about being gay.

That being said, there are the ongoing unwanted reminders in life that I’m part of a group that some people don’t  find particularly amusing. Personally, I can’t say that I’ve ever felt horribly discriminated against by individuals. I mean, once someone hit me in the back with a dirt clod and yelled, “Dyke!” years ago in San Francisco. (This still puzzle me, since I can’t for the life of me figure out how one discerns a stranger’s sexual orientation in a moment’s glimpse from a speeding Corolla.) Another time, I had an old friend from high school crisply inform me that I’d be going to hell with no chance of even purgatory. A handful of people over the years have abruptly begun ignoring me when they’ve figured out that Oh My God She’s One Of Those People.

But on the whole, I can’t say that it’s been a nightmare of acute and specific discrimination. No one’s beaten me up. My parents didn’t chase me out of the house with a shotgun. I haven’t been fired from a job or refused service in a restaurant. Romney never pushed me to the ground and threatened me with a haircut.

Like most every other gay person I know, it’s the bigger picture that generally creates the frustration, anger, shame, and paranoia. And by bigger picture, I mean the World around us. Again, I don’t sit in a hand-wringing heap and obsess about it 24/7, but it really sucks that it’s still illegal to be gay in 33% of the countries on earth. And in many of these countries it’s happily punishable by death or torture. “Whoo doggie!” you’re saying. “I sure am glad we live in the U.S. where we’re progressive and stuff!”

But it was only 8 years ago (EIGHT!) that the last states in the U.S. finally struck down their laws that made homosexuality illegal here. Which brings me to my point: I’m sorry, but I just can’t get that fired up about suddenly demanding gay marriage. Why? Because it’s the lovely dessert before dinner. I mean for pete’s sake, there are still no gay anti-discrimination laws in place in 29 states in the U.S. Personally, I’d really prefer knowing that I can’t be denied housing or a job or healthcare before knowing that I can’t be denied a rice shower and 4-tier cake.

Don’t get me wrong. If it were legal to be gay and married in Tennessee (HA HA HA HA!!!!), I would be, and I’d be thrilled. Who doesn’t like bittersweet chocolate mousse first when faced with the prospect of tuna casserole and canned peas? All I’m saying is that it is a tad cart before horse-ish. And there’s still a whole lot of shit in the cart. That shit includes the fact that it was only a mere 30 months ago that the Federal government finally witheringly decided that, well yes, killing and beating people for being gay should probably be classified as a hate crime. Next stop marriage? Why not!!

Other more nebulous shit includes the jovial willingness to continue to cringingly stereotype gay people in the media. Granted, the perception of What Gay People are Like isn’t really helped by Rachel Maddow wearing men’s suits and sporting a no mess-no fuss barber shop coif. However, shocking as this may be, not every gay man prances around worrying moronically about home decor and wine choices. I like Modern Family as much as the next doof, but I can asure you that 50ish years from now, the over-the-top minciness will appear as awkward as the black stereotypes of  Buckwheat loving watermelon in The Littel Rascals or Prissy in Gone With the Wind announcing, “Oh Miss Scarlett! I don’t know nothin’ ’bout birthin’ no babies!”

Anyway, well crap. I’m really not, in fact, a fan of political correctness. I’m just trying to make a point about where it would seem that American society really is when it comes to perception/acceptance of gay people and how phenomenal a leap that is from there to wedding bells. It’s just a bit baffling to me. I grew up in an era where many people really did believe that you could catch homosexuality by having a brief conversation with someone of that persuasion. Perhaps leaps are more vivid to me.  

I know that gay marriage is the Issue of the Day, and of course it makes me feel good to see it supported. I’m sure it’s gratifying to open-minded heterosexuals to openly support it. It’s certainly more exciting and in-your-face and threatening-to-the-haters than discrimination legislation and tax and insurance laws. Civil unions would give us the rights, but Gay Weddings would take us into an entirely different stratosphere of equality and paparazzi.

So, I don’t know. Maybe the cart before the horse and dessert before din-din is a good thing?

 *sigh*

I do know that those who argue against gay marriage on the grounds of religion and “the protection of the sanctity of marriage” are, in my view, either seriously confused or just stupid. Yes, I can see where sodomy was condemned in the Old Testament, Mr. Comb Over. I can also see where slavery and bigamy were encouraged. As for the “protection” angle, um yeah. We’ve all heard these arguments  before, and the national divorce rate is still 40-60%, Mrs. Bridge Party-n-Crumpets. Let’s face it. The bulk of people who oppose gay marriage oppose it because they simply don’t want people they dislike to be happy. That’s the definition of discrimination.

On a final note, I have my doubts that marriage will ever be legal in the South in my lifetime. But if it is, and in the spirit of carts before horsies, you’re all invited to the big wedding.  Gifts accepted! I enjoy expensive kitchen appliances, foreign travel, and pricey rare books.

Thanks.

Wondrous and Wack. A Month of Races.

Okay, look people, I don’t have a lot of time to fire this one off. In 17 hours, I have to be down on West End in Nashville preparing to run a half mary carrying a 40-yard dragon. Between now and then, I have some seriously important chores to finish including scrubbing some bathroom tile, vacuuming one of our cats, and possibly coloring my hair, though I’m in vanity limbo as to whether I should just let it go white (I bypassed grey and went straight to, “Oh dear, look at that old hag!”) or continue pretending. Opinions are welcome, but cheerfully ignored.

Anyway, I thought I’d do something “fun” and “different” this month, and run 4 races in four weekends. I know some of you crazy kids are out there are saying, “Big whoop, granny!” but I haven’t even run 2 races in a row since I ran Boston in ’08 followed by the Country Music Half Marion 5 days later. That was kind of miserable, so I thought I should certainly do something akin to that again. Of course, this string of races doesn’t include a marathon since, as we all know, marathons are stupid.

So 2 weeks ago, I ran a 10K. I like to stomp around and announce that 10Ks are my favorite distance, and then I only run one every 2-3 years. But, really, I do like 6.2 miles. It’s short enough that you never reach the Why Oh Why Am I Doing This? phase, but long enough that you can calm down a tad and maybe find a rhythm unlike (for me, anyway) in the manic fear and loathing explosion of a 5K.

That being said, I went out in an utterly ridiculously too-fast first mile. Or, rather, I should say an “udderly” fast first mile since this race is called the Dairy Dash and features a lot of cow-oriented stuff. HA HA HA HA!! Ahem. So, there I was running my first mile in 5K pace and panicking all the way to mile 3 where I calmed the fuck down. At that point there was a mile or more of out and back wherein everyone passes each other going in opposite directions.

I kind of like that in races and kind of hate it.

It’s always great to cheer and be cheered (well, “cheer” is a bit of a misrepresentation. It’s more like breathless rasping. Or, perhaps, half-uttered [uddered!] inarticulate gasps of goodwill). However, invariably, someone gives you confounding information or orders that you wish you hadn’t received. I got both “YOU CAN CATCH HER!” and “20 YARDS AHEAD!”

What??  There were at least 15 women ahead of me and 3 over 40. Catch who? Twenty yards to what? A mile marker? A martini lounge? A talking grandfather clock? What? This perplexed me until mile five. I felt oddly guilty for not catching some random stranger and for not enjoying that nebulous point 20 yards ahead of me a half mile back.

But then I was in the final mile and feeling pretty good in spite of my shameful start. I hadn’t run a race over 5K in nearly a year, so I decided not to be too hard on myself for automatically going into 5K mode at the sound of a gun.  So, the finish line came around the corner and I saw some dude dressed up as a huge cow which oddly inspired me to pick it up for the finish which is a true rarity in races for me anymore. Generally, I’m more in the mindset of There’s the Stupid Finish, and I just want to get it over with. But this was actually exciting. A loud crowd, a decent time, and a cow standing on its hind legs clapping.

Yay 10Ks! I even won a cowbell for being 2nd GrannyMasters. A COWBELL. Don’t even try to deny your jealousy.

Last weekend wasn’t as jolly. It was a 5K that Cheryl and I run every year. It’s always small, and in the past I’ve come in 2nd (to Cheryl!)  and 3rd before, but this year it was seriously small (maybe 70 people), and I won it.  I know, I know. I should be thrilled beyond wearing pants to have won a race, but the overall experience was just kind of depressing. The race was pretty much treated as an afterthought by the organization that was using it as a fundraiser. It was totally thrown together this year at the last minute…No mile markers, no chip timing, a mis-measured course, and no awards. I still don’t even know what my actual time was, because that was effed up too.  I won. Yay.

After the race, I made a comment on a message board of imaginary friends who discuss semi-imaginary races and assign imaginary awards about the fact that I was tired of 5Ks being “glorified bake sales.” This seemed to translate as me complaining about winning a cake at this race (?), but what I meant was that 5Ks, in particular, are the new bake sales. The race itself, fairly often, is waaay secondary to the fundraising efforts. It’s a moderately stale cupcake that you should be happy about eating because you helped a cause.

Don’t get me wrong. The race last weekend was for a cause that’s important to me, but I wish the organization could fathom that the bake sale with homemade baklava is going to raise more $$ than the one with a bag of month-old Chips Ahoy. If a 5K race is the treat you use to raise funds, at the very least, present a decent and well-baked 5K race. Geez.

Well, then. That leads us to this weekend where I’ll be, yet again, amidst the 30,000 (shit) people “running” the Country Music Parade. I mean Marathon and Half Mary. This year, I’m in the mindset of If You Can’t Beat ‘Em, Join ‘Em!! That’s why I’ll be traipsing along at an 11:00-minute pace looking like this:

“Have you no shame, Tanya?” you ask. No, apparently not.

And then next weekend, another goal 5K. There are some Top Secret plans in place for this race, possibly including an important and helpful appearance by a local living legend who is, impossibly, both cryptic and forthcoming.

Curious about the outcome of me hauling a dragon across hell’s half acre? Wondering WTF that last paragraph was even supposed to mean? Stay tuned, then, for more stuff about ME.

(And, yes, I vacuum one of our cats. He likes it.)

Grandmaster Newsflash

Recently, a friend and fellow blogger (like a real blogger who writes something new every week *sigh*) interviewed a local runner who’s crazy fast, along the lines of 50:09 at a recent hilly ten-miler (cripes). When asked about motivation, he had this to say:

 The main thing that keeps me motivated to train and compete to the best of my abilities is that I’m continually getting faster, so of course in typical American fashion, I want more and more. Once I begin to slow down, I don’t know what I will do. The idea of training harder just to slow down terrifies me.

I read this about 2 days after my last 5K. A week or so before the race, I had mentioned to a friend that it was a goal 5k, and she, not unkindly, asked what a “goal” could be when one no longer was able to get PRs. I mean, in my 20s to 30s, I chased after true PRs. After 40, there were masters PRs. But over 50? Yeah, I know there is the grandmaster category, and after that the senior grandmaster, and after that the Oh My God She’s Still Running! category. But re-setting PRs every 10 years seems kind of hollow to me.

So how do I come up with a goal? How do I avoid being terrorized by my own decline? It’s pretty simple. Basically I just want to be as fast for the age I am now as I was in my prime. This requires the use of age grading which, I know, makes some people *cough cough runners in their prime cough cough** angsty and eye-rolly, but I’m never going to beat you, so at least let me have my damn calculator and get out of my face.

Ahem.

Anyway, I was pretty much a 19:00-19:15 5K runner in my 20s. Nothing spectacular, but somewhere in the pretty good range at small races where none of the truly fast chicks showed up. Plugging those numbers into the oft-snarked calculator, it cranks out a 22:00-22:15 for a 51-year-old woman. Somewhere close to that was my goal for the Tom King 5K. Because my 5K times these past 5 months back from injury have been maddeningly erratic (anywhere from 22:10 to 23:30), I decided I could be happy with anything faster than 22:30.

I felt good going into this race physically, but not all that great mentally. I actually wondered if the 22:10 I had run in December had been a mistake, a short course, a fluke. The other three 5Ks I had run had been 50 to 80 seconds slower. In one of them, a masters runner I used to regularly beat, passed me wearing a down parka. (A DOWN PARKA.) In another, I was so disgusted with my 2-mile split that I nearly threw my watch away.

So, it was with this fragile confidence that I lined up for the race. I had a vague sense of trying to avoid killing myself in the first mile (my specialty!) and keeping it steady. In turn, this made me afraid to look at my watch since if the first mile was too slow, I’d be worried. And if the first mile was too fast, I’d be, well, worried. Around mile 1.2, I decided to just not look at my watch at all. What difference would it make? I was running as well as I could.

Coming up to the turnaround (180 degrees. Thank you? NO.) I thought I was probably the 2nd masters woman. This wasn’t as important to me as the clock, but it was something. A little extra squeak of confidence. From there to the finish, it was just hard. Nothing else. I wasn’t distracted or angry or worried. But I did feel progressively closer and closer to throwing up, so I knew I had to be running pretty well. When I made the turn inside the stadium with about 50 yards to go, I looked at the clock and thought it said 22:30, and for 2 seconds I was the essence of Extremely Pissed. Ten yards closer I could see that it was actually 21-something (eye exam, Tanya?).

Final time was 22:20, so I was happy. And since the masters awards only went 1-deep, I received my first grandmasters award which was kind of weird, kind of nice, and kind of startling. Startling in that I rarely think of myself as being over 50 (or, really, over 40. Okay, 37.), and there it was all in my face and announced over the PA and stuff. There was even the added prize of The Stick for the grandmaster winners since we’re so old and creaky and decrepit and everything. This was announced and discussed in some detail in front of about 500 people. Good times.

Still, it felt like old times for just a moment. The goal time is slower, but the race is the same. Nothing spectacular, but somewhere in the pretty good range at a small race where none of the truly fast chicks showed up.

Yay! Running!

So, yeah, that 10K Amy and Cheryl ran 2 weeks ago? PR Central. Granted both of their previous PRs had been on that same course (a moronically and ridiculously hilly course), and they’re in waaay better shape now, but still. When it comes to chasing PRs, you never know. I was an annoying nervous Nelly the morning of the race, blathering last-minute tips for hill running during their warmup. I even made up an acronym using the word “beer” for the 4 things to remember on hills, but I seemed to retain at least a shred of sanity and didn’t offer up that gem in the super-stressful minutes before the race. (And luckily for those reading this, I can’t remember it now.)

I was clipping timing chips at the finish (clearly, I’m in a rut when it comes to the jobs I volunteer to do at races), so I had a great view of the finishers coming down the final hill to the finish. Amy came in first, and I bellowed our now completely worn out announcement of racing achievement:  ”You schooled those bitches!” Naturally, there was a mother with her 8-year-old standing right behind me. Nice.

Apparently, Cheryl was about 20 seconds behind Amy, but I didn’t get to see her finish because this guy I know who is the RD for a local rinky dink marathon was practically sitting in my lap as he pretended to be throwing up on me. This is a charming ritual that began a year or so ago after I hurled midway through a half marathon moments after this delightful young man passed me. Isn’t running great?

So, anyway, I missed Cheryl coming in, and then I was all stressed and panicky as the seconds ticked by. Was she okay? Her chances at a PR were gone! Had I committed some heinous coaching error that had ruined this race for her? Would she ever run again? Was I a terrible human being?? At about this point, I noticed her casually chatting away over by the water. Good grief. I was extra happy because: A) Cheryl had clearly gotten a PR, and B) I had promised to buy her a bottle of single malt scotch if she did so, and C) I like single malt scotch, and, let’s face it, I’d be drinking most of it.

Yay! Running!

And, so, on to the big race 2 weeks later. Cheryl was originally going to go for a 5K PR and Amy was shooting for a half marathon PR. (However, Cheryl had been having some foot pain, and in case you haven’t heard about it, I had a foot injury last year which has turned me into Polly Paranoia when it comes to any pain even peripherally podiatric [alliteration bonanza!!]).  So we adjusted her goals a bit. Or, rather, I adjusted them, while Cheryl was still super-secretly  planning to go for it.

The three of us ran together on the Tom King Half Marathon course one week before the race. The entire course is flat as hell and moderately boring. Perfect for fast running. I had instructed Amy to do about 40 minutes at HM pace (8:15), which would be her last workout before the race. This came at the end of a tough week of training, so I figured it might be relatively difficult. When we all met up at the finish, Amy really didn’t seem a hair fatigued, and she presented nary a complaint of difficulty. Later on, though, her blog reflected the classic, “Oh shit. If those 5 miles were that hard how, will I ever race 13 of them in 7 days???”

Can any of us even remotely fathom how on earth we run the paces we run on race day? No. It’s incomprehensible. It’s otherworldly and insane. That’s why we race.

Hello race morning. Even though the 5K  had a very early start time, and our Circadian rhythms were most certainly out of wack, Cheryl and I felt fab during our warmup run. The weather was perfect. I’d had too much coffee. A huge moon was setting over Nashville just as the sun was rising. Everyone was in a good mood. (Well, except for that homeless dude who was yelling at the sidewalk.)

I didn’t see Amy until mile one of the 5k (more on my racing incrediblosity in a later entirely self-absorbed post about ME). She was standing on the curb with Steve, who would be pacing her, and at that point it was about 20 minutes until the start of the half. In one of those blurred ridiculous thought processes that only occur while racing, it dawned on me that she should be warming up. Amy yelled, “Go Tanya!” and I yelled, “Warm up!!” and as I raced away, I heard a vaguely annoyed, “Warm up?” If I hadn’t been in so much pain, I might have laughed.

Cheryl blasted into the stadium not far behind me at the finish, and came within 19 seconds of her PR, winning her age group. She was instantly despondent, but I barked at her not to get greedy about PRs since they don’t happen every time you race and they never happen anymore for wretched old hags like me. (I’m pretty sure this insightful lecture made her feel better.) She cheered up, and we headed into the Stadium Club for the 5K awards.

I had really wanted to be in the stands when Amy finished so that I could shout out obscenities and stuff, but the awards overlapped with the half marathon finish. Luckily there were about a million TVs in the stadium club showing the finish line and the clock. Amy’s previous PR had been 1:49:54, so I was anticipating her finishing somewhere between 1:47 and 1:48. Around 1:43 I began glancing at the screens. Around 1:44 some chick dashed across the finish and promptly doubled over in the classic finish line hurl pose that I know so well. “Ha ha,” I thought. “Better her than me! Ha ha.”

I looked again. It kind of looked like Amy, but it couldn’t be. Could it?

It was.

1:44:40! A fucking 5 minute and 14-second PR. Steve had paced her perfectly, and these past 13 weeks of training paid off big time. A steady 8-minute pace the whole way when a handful of miles at 8:15 had seemed so hard only a week earlier. Isn’t racing mind-boggling? Yes, it is. Isn’t coaching gratifying? In more ways than I would have imagined.

Later that evening, Cheryl and I met up with Amy and some dude who had also had a major PR (major, I say!) that day for important rehydration. As a thank you, Amy gave me a serious bottle of top-notch Kentucky bourbon (isn’t coaching gratifying?) and a card. Following some very kind and thoughtful comments, Amy ended the card with a nod to our cherished mantra: ”Two words: Bitches schooled.”

Yes, indeed.

Yay running!!

p.s…Amy’s race report!

Gentle Words of Encouragement 18 Hours Before a Race:

For the vast majority of you that don’t know and for the very small sliver of you who remotely care, I’ve been coaching a couple of people for the past several months. What makes me qualified to tell anyone how to prepare for a race? I’d like to think that my centuries of running and the truly impressive array of mistakes I’ve made along the way might count for something. Perhaps my above-average racing skills and my garage shelf full of gaudy race trinkets? My shameful 26.2 sticker and Boston jacket? Maybe my secret attraction to stopwatches and the repressed desire to bellow, “PICK IT UP!” at least once a week?

Maybe. But I will admit to feeling just a tad sheepish over the idea that anyone would want me to coach them. It’s very similar to how I felt when I was teaching writing. Once, a student who typically waltzed in stoned to every class asked, “What makes you qualified to decide if my writing is good or not? Someone other than you might think it’s really good.”

In some ways, this was a really good question. In other ways, it was idiotic since this was a student who once tossed a wad of paper on my desk with a series of crossed-out words and profanities on it as an example of “descriptive writing.” (Actually, just now, I’m thinking that was pretty descriptive.) Still, I struggled a lot with the whole subjectiveness of writing. Maybe I didn’t know what was good. What if there were literary geniuses in my class disguised as morons? I’d lay awake at night stressing over the fact that I never really got or enjoyed anything by Virginia Woolf. Maybe I wasn’t qualified to teach writing.

Eventually, I decided I was better off just writing rather than trying to teach it. If I was astoundingly average or smirkably horrid, at least I wouldn’t pass that on to young, impressionable, and stoned minds. I would no longer have to stamp a grade on creative efforts. Vast relief.

Still, you know, there is always that ongoing desire to share knowledge and experience. Possibly this is vaguely tinged with the desire to feel superior and boss people around, but mostly it’s just gratifying to help anyone who’s as enthused about something as you are. (I should note that English 101 and Expository Writing classes were not necessarily jam-packed with literary enthusiasts.)

And while I still feel a touch sheepish about coaching, at least racing is not subjective. Thoughts on training may be an utter minefield of wildly divergent hoo-hah, but the exam is the race and the grade is the clock. I attempt to design training based on past grades and hope that everyone feels pretty confident that if the work is done, the grade will always get better. This is not necessarily true with writing. One can work one’s stupid brain to a nub and still crank out the most astounding mountain of drivel. It’s entirely possible to get worse the harder one works. Encouraging!

Anyway, speaking of drivel, let’s move on.

Tomorrow is not a goal race for either runner I’m bossing around, but I’m feeling PRs anyway. One of the runners had an astounding 5K PR after I’d only been working with her for 5 days. I’d like to give myself complete credit for that one. Ten weeks later, that bitch had better have a major 10k PR or ELSE.  No pressure.

Seriously though, good luck to Amy and Cheryl. You guys rock. Plus, you work exceptionally hard, race well, and hardly ever ask me annoying questions or show up at races stoned. Kick ass tomorrow. But most importantly, of course, make me look good, dammit.

The Ultimate Crab Patch Race Report

I’m an equal opportunity 5K race participant. Middle of the summer and straight up a hillside? Delightful. Dead of winter and through a dull neighborhood? Love it. Four loops around a mall parking lot? Pleasant. Christmas mad house downtown night-time gassy throngs of children run? Bring it.

What I’m saying is that I’ll sign up for nearly any 5K. I think I might draw the line at those slop-through-mud and climb-over-a-wall-and-collapse-on-an-obstacle-course 5Ks, because, obviously, those are just stupid.  

Otherwise, I really don’t care. I ran a 5K in San Francisco years ago dressed as a giant chicken. Didn’t care. For the past 5 years I’ve run a totally un-scenic 5k in monstrous heat where video of me hurling at the finish in ’08 is on YouTube. Don’t care. I’ve already signed up for a March 5K that is considered the crybaby weenie race for toddlers that accompanies the Important Half Marathon. Still not caring.

So when fellow-runners warned me not to run our local zoo fundraiser 5K, I was all, “Whatever, dude.” (Early on disclaimer: I wholeheartedly support this race’s cause, and it’s astoundingly well produced and organized in spite of, well, everything else.) I mean, I figured a race through a zoo would be pretty cool. Lots of animals and stuff. Sure, there were supposed to be a few turns, but it had to be pretty flat, right? And the walkways would have to be moderately wide and well-maintained, n’est-ce pas? An afternoon race is not my dream, but how bad could it be? And a big crowd? Oh, boo hoo.

Where to begin?

Cheryl was volunteering at the race (even she had said, “You’re going to run the Zoo Run? Really?”), so we got there 2 hours (SIGH) early. As it turned out, there were already enough volunteers to hand out timing chips (this is an exhausting job of handing people chips and saying, “here’s your chip.”), so Cheryl and I sat her car in the parking lot for an hour observing the throngs as they arrived for the race. And by “observing,” I naturally mean “making snarky comments.”

Let’s say it’s 47 degrees, a bit damp, and overcast for an afternoon 5K. What would you wear? Perhaps jeans over a pair of tights, gloves, a down vest over an imported Shetland sweater, earmuffs, and a balaclava mask? How about a full cotton sweat suit complete with a sports jacket and hiking boots? Maybe ski pants and a fur coat (at the zoo)? If you said Yes! to any of these sporty options, you would have fit right in. I exaggerate not when I say that the bulk of the crowd appeared to be gearing up for a major trek across the frozen Siberian tundra.

Camelbaks. We saw at least half a dozen. I know you think I’m making this up, but I’m not. Ask Cheryl. She never lies. I lie all the time in this blog, but she’ll be tediously honest about what we saw. Anyway, Camelbaks at a winter 5K. With water at every mile noted in the entry. Dear God.

About an hour beforehand, I started my warmup and was happy to only hear a few people loudly blast, “WHY WOULD SOMEONE RUN BEFORE A RUN?? HA HA HA HA!!!”  For what appeared to be well over a thousand people, I saw very few people doing anything other than rushing over to the activities center to cram themselves inside, flop down somewhere in exhaustion, and eat gels until the start. This was slightly troubling. I’ve seen pre-race lethargy, but this set a new gold standard of languor.

The start was a study in cell phone worship and the exuberant tossing of race etiquette out all windows.  After a couple of hours of previewing the participants, I was alarmed enough to position myself way closer to the front than I usually would. Nonetheless, there I was amidst a sea of grade-schoolers and astoundingly overweight 30-somethings all gazing placidly at their phones. I noted that a woman next to me had her timing chip tied around her neck. Just in front of me, a rotund young man was on his phone announcing, “Under 45! Under 45! That’s my mantra for this one!”

And we were off.

Do I really need to describe the horror of that first half mile? Let’s just say that there was substantial coming-to-an-abrupt-stop-to-text-someone not even a quarter of a mile into the race and leave it at that.

In my notes in my running log, I described this race course as “An inexplicably idiotic course of hills, constant switchbacks, gravel roads, and slippery bridges. Where was the fucking zoo?”

I saw some bamboo and flamingos around mile 2, but that was IT. Mostly, it was a tour of the employee parking lot, grounds keeping sheds, machinery, and weaving muddy gravel roads that connected these delights. Granted, it’s not like I was going to enjoy some pleasant memories with the elephants during a 5K, but come on! Zoo Run my ass.

Needless to say, it was crowded. There was also a higher level of extreme manly panic when I passed guys in this particular race for some reason. The highlight, really the zenith, of this race occurred around mile 2.5 when we were headed downhill and over a wet slippery bridge. Coming up behind me was a pretty huge dude I had passed on the prior uphill. His weight began throwing him off-balance and he was windmilling his arms and yelling WATCH OUT! as he barreled right into me. I may or may not have addressed him with a coarse oath.

Cheryl was working the finish line, clipping chips.  I careened around her for 15 minutes, a veritable fount of complaints. I said, “Never again!” about 300 times just in case she, and everyone around her, didn’t hear me the first 299 times.

 Later that afternoon, she told me that 3 separate people had asked her if the buckets for the chips were for puking. (Her response was, “Do you think I’d be sitting here if it was?”) At least two hundred had asked what the chip was for.  Nearly a third of the crowd had begun texting or calling or whatever people do on phones before exiting the finish area. At least a dozen people had gotten pissy with Cheryl when she had to run after them to get their chip because they were too busy cramming their phones to their ears to hear her.

Afterwards, standing in the beer line (thank you Jesus), I listened to three young women in front of me dissect the race in terms of treadmill walking settings.

“We did it in 4.1! I’m so proud of us!”

“I think I actually ran across the whole parking lot near the finish.”

“That second mile was tough. I must have dropped to a 3.9 or less.”

“I felt so bad for Ashley. She was like so not even 3.6!”

Maybe I’m just old and peevish. I’m all for anyone getting their lard ass off the couch and going to a race, whether they can run fast or not. But the bulk (heh) of people at races really don’t race anymore. The concept of a race as an event where everyone runs pretty hard, or at least to the best of their trained abilities, is mostly a dinosaur idea. I don’t think it’s an overestimation to say that 50% of people at a lot of 5Ks have not trained at all.

Every six months or so, ye olde “Were Runners Faster in the 80s??” question comes up on running boards. Younger runners get stressed and panty-wadded and old hags and farts get pompous and supercilious. But the obvious answer is No. Times are faster now. Loads of new records have been set. The fastest runners today are faster. Hello.

The main difference in the 80s was the fact that races were races. No one showed up at a 5k to walk or jog. The idea of “just finishing” was preposterous. Were runners faster? No. But people who ran races were.

Anyway, the Zoo Run aftermath wound down to a lot of (good) free beer, decent prizes, and seeing a lot of friends. I guess that more than made up for my idiotic race.  In fact, after the 4th beer, I was all, “This race is great!” Yeah, I’m an equal opportunity 5K race participant. I may even be back next year.

And another thing…

I ran 2050 miles this year.

That’s like running from Nashville to Bismarck, North Dakota, standing around for a while and saying, “Wow. This place sucks.” And then running back to Nashville.

In summation, running’s stupid.