23:42 on my watch, 23:44 on the chip

the alarm went off at 5am and my first reaction was 'isn't it saturday?' to which i replied 'yes. you are the dork who signed up for a 5k. get your arse outta bed.' so i obeyed myself which is generally a good rule of thumb. got up, drank a glass of water and ate a banana and sipped some coffee and took a shower and got dressed and suddenly i was late. gah!

getting dressed could possibly have contributed to the lateness because it was cool enough to wear the compression tights. yay! but i put them on a little wonky and if you have ever been trapped in wonky compression tights you know this is Not Good. the compression has a bit of a mind of it's own and when the tights aren't on straight, you just better hope you're racing in a circle. i couldn't decide which shirt to wear but when i got out the shirts - there was the day-glo yellow! perfect! that shirt is the perfect weight for the weather and plus, who doesn't like day-glo? i did wear shorts over my tights and if you think that is dorky then just see paragraph #1 b/c i have clearly already established myself as a dork. the shorts protect the tights if i need to sit on the curb and pluswise they have a pocket for my car key. i'd rather be dorky than stressed about carrying my freaking key.

so then i was still sort of on time but gathering all my stuff together took forever so then i was really late. should have done that last night. yeah, well, I DIDN'T SO SHUT UP. a bonus of running a bit late is that it's the perfect excuse to drive 85mph to get there. not that i would do that or ever advocate speeding or breaking any laws of any kind ever. i am just saying it would be a good excuse.

got there. checked in. received bib, chip, tee shirt. i tend to be a bit angsty about the chip so i was glad to get someone else to tie it on my shoe, specifically dr monkey - the guy who was going to pace me in this auspicious event after phastguy bailed. dr monkey was being a sport but wasn't approaching things with quite the same enthusiasm as phastguy because he had been sick and wasn't sure he could even keep the pace for himself. some of his lame anxiety was wafting all over me which didn't bode well but then he was like - finish getting ready, you have some work to do.

work? me?

turns out that having someone pace you only means they will run with you and try to help you stay on pace. it doesn't mean they are going to bodily carry you across the line. who knew? dr monkey wanted to warm up. okay. great. no problem. we yogged around for like 20 freaking minutes! who warms up for 20 minutes?? wearing me out before the race even gets started!

no seriously, this little 20 minute jaunt sort of highlighted for me in bright day-glo letters that having someone pace you is a committment on both sides. the pacer commits to help but you commit to be real about trying. seeing as i have no problems with committment of any sort, as soon as i realized what was expected of me, i was completely on board. which of course means i just about bailed right there.

but it was too late for bailing because dr monkey brilliantly executed the warm up to put us at the start line about 2 minutes before the gun went off. 'bout as well run, now that we're here. jeebux.

so we took off and had to weave in & out and around just a few people then we found a place and we were off & running. he said we were going too fast, which was quite a relief to hear, but it turned out "going too fast" meant like 10 seconds too fast. trust me, unless you are really experienced you are not going to feel a 10 second slow down in pace. the first mile is a lap around the stadium and we passed the first mile at like 7:30 or so which was still a little fast.

we had gone only one mile.

i thought maybe i had bit off more than i could chew here, axt for too much. we had not even gone halfway and i was already worn out. freaking stupid 20 minute warm up! freaking stupid 5k! freakin stupid wankette in her sports bra! nobody wants to see that, you wankette!! everyone here is stupid and this is the stupidest thing ever and i am just going to quit!

apparently i started maybe hyperventilating a bit b/c dr monkey was all - control your breathing, control your breathing. and i was all OKAY FINE and so i did try to relax and breathe and at this point my legs were still moving which was good and he wasn't just running off and leaving me... and then he was sort of running off and leaving me. so i am trying to keep up and he's all - don't slow down, don't slow down. and of course i can't talk because there is not enough air in the world to simply maintain my breathing or else i would have pointed out that maybe he was speeding up or something. and then he goes - this is mile three.

wait. what?

we have only gone two miles?!

no way. i cannot run another mile-point-one. no. cannot do it. i am just going to lay down here and die. right here. die. and he's all - don't slow down and breathe easy and just breathe & run, that is all you have to think about and look at all those people we are in front of, you are beating all those people and keep it up, don't slow down, breathe. i managed to gasp - i am dizzy, and he's a dr and all so he's real helpful with that, he goes - you can fall down after you cross the finish line. thanks, doc.

so we make it back to the stadium and at this point there's a problem with my legs not paying attention anymore and i am thinking, like hell you are going to quit on me now! and i am focusing on the breathing and the moving and the not falling over and dr monkey is all - you are stronger than you think. and i am thinking, if you want to know how strong i am let's just stop this nonsense right now and throw down b/c i will punch your freaking lights out for this!

and then THANK HERMES we are at the stadium entrance and down the ramp with dr monkey still with the "go faster" crap and out into the stadium for the loop around the grass so i suck up what little there is left, just suck it up, and i finally pass that idiotic 9 year old girl and that old guy that must be her father. there is nothing like passing a child on the last lap to really make you feel STRONG!

and so then i crossed the line and it was over. all the fretting and planning and imagining is over just like that and no matter how many different ways you had imagined it, the concrete of time has set around this event and it is what it is. for me, it's a lifetime PR, it's knowing that i put in a maximum sustained effort, it's knowing that i can do it... although not without help. not yet at least. maybe not ever. that's another decision for another day.

i did learn a bit about having a pacer and it's different than i had imagined. this person is sacrificing their race for your race, and even if they weren't going to race-race, they are sacrificing their time, effort, strength, and sleep for you. they are making a donation of themself in the bank of you. the return on their investment is that you will get your goal time. so they are going to protect this investment by making you warm up properly and keeping an eye on you during the race, not let you just sort of drift back unnoticed. they can't physically pull you so they pull you with words, a stream of unrequited chatter b/c you're too frogged to talk, and while most of what they say to you is encouraging, there's an element of bullying in it. that sounds a little harsh maybe, but they are committed to not letting you quit. that's the bargain: you say, i will try my best to do this and they say, i will not let you quit.

it's humbling, in a way. not humiliating. no one is there to make you feel bad about yourself. it's all about helping you achieve a goal. but the co-dependence of having someone else involved that way, it's humbling. like training wheels. i came in 9th place woman and 2nd in my age group and most of all achieved my goal of sub-24 so it was a good race, but if i had known what i was asking when i asked someone to pace me, i never would have asked. never. i cannot imagine how painful it must be to have someone do something real for you, like save your life, and i am amazed that people stand it.