Type: Run
Distance: 5K
Shwag: The brightest race shirt you’ve ever seen.
A few weeks ago I was back home in Pittsburgh for my aunt’s
70th birthday party. While there, I met up with one of my best
friends in the whole wide world, Ms. Ali Perdue, for a low-key 5K in South
Park, only a few miles from where I grew up. I run in the park pretty much
every time I’m home visiting my parents and it brings back so many memories of a
younger and different me.
Because I was running a 5k at sea-level, I wanted
to try to PR. On top of that, my family had been so supportive and encouraging
the night before that it made me want to run my butt off for them. I think I
had more people sincerely wish me good luck the night before this 5k than I did
the night before my ironman.
But, Pittsburgh is hilly as all get out. Seriously, it’s
ridiculous. When I first moved to Colorado, a friend of mine would remark at
how adeptly I rode my bike up hills. My response: Yeah, well, I’m from
Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh is home to the
steepest paved road in the world, which means that a measly little 5k has the
chance to be a suffer-fest. Throw in
some triple H weather (hazy, hot, and humid) and you can pretty much kiss all
of those sea-level benefits goodbye.
There was no course map or info on the website so I didn’t
know if this was going to be a flat race or not. Leading up to the race, my dad
kept speculating on the course, saying things like, “I bet they’re going to
send you up that big hill behind the playground.” Or, “I bet you’ll run down
the main road for a while and then they’ll send you up that big hill past the Oliver
Miller Homestead.” I know he was just trying to think the race through in his
head but, man, he was psyching me out!
As I was leaving on race morning, my dad was pulling in from
his Saturday morning bakery run and he had a box of amazing looking donuts.
In fact, they looked so amazing that they were probably doughnuts. He asked if
I wanted one (I think he might have been serious) and then once again speculated
on the hilliness of the course before wishing me good luck. Psyching me out,
offering me do(ugh)nuts right before the race… wait a second… is this guy
trying to sabotage my race?
Since I had fueled up the night before with plenty of fried
chicken, birthday cake, and something that involved jello and cool whip (don’t
judge), I declined the donut and was on my way.
When I got to the park, I saw that they had orange cones set
up along the fairly flat main drag. Phew. It was going to be a flat-ish race! Too bad
the humidity levels were not unlike that of a jungle.
A few years ago I ran the Pittsburgh marathon, the only “real”
marathon I’ve ever done. (I know it sounds nuts if you’ve never done it but an
ironman run is not the same thing. It's easier.) I affectionately refer to that race as “the
most miserable experience of my life” and/or “that stupid marathon.” The conditions on the morning of the 5k were
exactly the same as the conditions during my marathon: both the temperature and
the humidity were in the 80’s. Ugh.
I didn’t want to completely abandon my hopes of a PR, but I
also wanted to be realistic. Taking the conditions into consideration, I set my
goal as running as hard as I possibly could, given that I was running through
air so thick you could cut it with a knife. If I managed to get a PR,
great! If not, I would still be happy with giving it my all.
As we started to line up for the race, I realized two
important things: I was at a melanoma fundraiser and I had forgotten to wear
sunscreen (oops) and there also weren’t that many people lining up in front of
me. I had placed myself at what I thought would be the appropriate pace group
sign but there was only a smattering of people ahead of me, and not too many were
women.
Just as I was processing this, Ali came up to me and said, “This
is a pretty small race and I think a lot of people walk so, no pressure or
anything, but you might do okay.” Good god. That wasn’t something I needed to think
about! Also, when somebody says, “no pressure,” there’s pretty much immediately
more pressure. I tried not to think about it and instead struck up a
conversation with the teenage girl next and woman standing next to me. My “competition”!
Maybe it was because it was a small race, or maybe it’s
because the race was in Pittsburgh, but people were incredibly friendly at the
start. Actually, when I say it was a small race, there were still hundreds of
people so I think the good vibe was definitely a Pittsburgh thing. One thing I
love about that town is the general sense of comradery that goes along with
being a Pittsburgher. I suppose it goes back to the tough, immigrant, steel
town days but the feeling is that you’re one of us and we’re all in this
together and we’re going to help each other out in any way that we can. And even
if you’re not actually a Pittsburgher, we’ve still got your back. It’s an
amazing thing that you don’t find in too many other places. I love it when I’m
home and I miss it when I’m not.
When the gun went
off, I felt like I had already been running for an hour because I was drenched
in sweat from simply standing outside. I started out slower than I wanted because,
despite having an altitude advantage, the humidity made it hard to breathe. I
tried not to think about who was or was not in front of me and was happy with
my ability to stay in my bubble, despite the fact that the woman running next
to me was obviously racing me. When I hit the first mile marker, I decided that
I should push myself a little more and so I picked it up a tad, but not much
because, my god, the humidity.
It was an out and back course but I didn’t bother to count
how many people were in front of me. I just stayed focused and tried not to
think about the fact that I felt like I was running in a steam room. As I was
coming up on the finish line, I looked at my watch and saw that I wasn’t far
off my PR but I also knew there was no way I could run any faster in those
conditions. I crossed the finish line knowing I was done with my race but that
I wouldn't be done sweating until the next day when I was back in Colorado’s much
more arid climate.
I normally don’t stick around at races because I can count
on two fingers the number of times I’ve placed in my age group. But, given the
lack of people in front of me while running, I decided to check the results. To
my utter delight, I was second in my age group. Since it was a small race, I
wasn’t sure how many age group award they would give so I did a quick drive-by
of the awards table and saw the age group awards went three deep. It kind of
made my day.
Ali and I planned to get breakfast after the race but I made
her stick around until I got my medal. It
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| Smiley Cookies! |
While waiting for the awards to start, a girl named Lauren
came up and introduced herself to me. I remember her from the race because she
and I were running pretty close together for a while and she had multiple
people cheering her on along the route. I first noticed Lauren around the turn
around point, where she was running in front of me. Then I noticed she was running
next to me, and then she was running behind me. As the race went on, I could
tell that she was getting farther behind because the cheers from her pep
squad(s) were getting more and more faint. Then again, that could have been because
I had a bit of tunnel vision in the last quarter mile because, my god, the
humidity.
Without an ounce of self-consciousness, Lauren told me that
she and her sister were trying to chase me down but couldn’t. They pick someone
to beat at every race and this race, it was me. I found this endlessly amusing
for so many reasons, but mostly because she was just so friendly and open about
it. There was no ill will, no hard feelings that I had beaten her, no insecurity
about her running ability or herself. She wasn’t trying to make herself feel
better by beating me. It was straight up competition and that was a refreshing
change from Boulder where the “friendly” competition often feels like it has a
little bit of a yucky edge to it.
Lauren asked how I did and I told her I got second in my age
group. She said, “So did I. So you must be in the 20 – 29 age group then.”
Lauren is my new best friend.
I also met the woman who had been racing me in the
beginning. It turns out she’s a friend of a friend of my friend Ali’s. She
finished a bit behind me but managed to win her age group. Oh to be 39 again!
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| Me and my fellow winners |
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| My new BFF, Lauren, and the other woman who was trying to beat me |
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| The Goods |
After I got my well-earned medal, Ali and I spent not enough
time catching up and then I was off to meet my family for more fried chicken,
more birthday cake, and some wacky fun in and out of the city. One thing that
made me laugh throughout the day was that when I commented on the ridiculous
amount of food I was eating, people would say “yeah but you ran this morning so
you burned it off.” I ran enough to burn off one bite of fried chicken. I’m not
sure all of my races so far this year would be enough to burn off all of the
food I ate that weekend. But, quite often, food = love and there was a lot of
love to go around in Pittsburgh that weekend, in so many ways.
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| Me, Ali, and a dinosaur that was looking at our butts |
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