Running to where?
A query-by-means-of-a-story, friends, before I go whole-hog (semi-literally) about the Cincinnati trip:
I'm having flashbacks of my adolescent ineptitude at running-related sports today, after being one of the slowest at the running group based at a neat mom-and-pop running store in Royal Oak last night.
Soccer when I was wee was so fun, up there with Red Rover and Freeze Tag. I was awful at softball and couldn't do a cartwheel, but I had fun with soccer okay. Then at around 12 or 13 it started to suck, and the worst was the running drills - I also had no moxie to be a-g-g-r-e-s-s-i-v-e or handle the ball, and that was that, in my memory. I think I then took this forward to hating running for the next, oh, decade, because who really enjoys feeling awkward and slow? Rowing was revelation at 24, for a whole host of reasons, but mostly because it was something I wanted to do and felt I could actually do gracefully.
So rather than feeling great for sticking it out and doing my miles last night, I ended the night feeling deflated and mixed up. The confusion lies here: on my own, running, I am speedy, well-paced, feel great, jam to my music. There are times when I have thanked my genes for the extra few inches on my legs and think I could go for miles and miles. Slow days, too, sure, and I've never run an any-K race of anything, but I like it.
And so there haven't been many times, since I started really enjoying running a few years ago (as a means to row better in warm weather, granted), like yesterday. Yesterday, ready to go and trying not to be nervous, I thought I would cruise on out and have a good run at the back of the group.* Instead, I just watched the hotshot distance runners take off and was shocked that they are both fast and so ridiculously unfriendly. It's a group and people don't even say hello. The men and women both look everyone over so much, you'd think they were scouting for a team themselves. I'm not a thoroughbred, but I just can't quite abide feeling like a Shetland pony either.
Really, look:
Thoroughbred
Shetland pony
Come on, people! There aren't even any photos of the little squirts running.**
So, friends:
Have you ever or would you join a running group?
Was it Fun or Awful?
What made you stay, what made you bail?
______________________________________
* The man I was running with had recently dropped a log on his foot and taken a week off, just for full comic disclosure - and said periodically "gosh I'm so out of shape, I'm so slow" until I finally said, quietly, "please don't say that." But I really did not have any extra go in me.
** These are the metaphors that you end up with when you grow up around horses. Thalia could probably give me a car example...
posted by Wabes @ 5/08/2009 11:39:00 AM
7 Comments:
i'm proud of you for heading out to give the running group a try, but i also completely understand how you could be happier on your own. really, it seems like such a solo activity to me: one of the (many) reasons i'm not interested in a group myself is that i just don't have the patience to take others' agendas into account as well. baby, if you have a wonderful time on your own with your music, go with that! you and kolz can get your socials in with a bowling league, know what i mean?
lau - any idea how to fix the gnarly thing that is happening with that horse photo?
it doesn't seem to be happening now with my browser (though it did a bit last night, i think), but i think you could duck into the img src tag and just change the dimensions to something a bit smaller? i empathize; horses can be difficult to control.
i fixed it right after i wrote to you...just tweaked the pixels etc.
those horses. seriously. ; )
heeeeee. Cannot believe you just referenced a Shetland pony. But seriously, let's think about this: Shetland has no trees. Those little squirts have to stand some serious ground, whereas a thoroughbred would just get blown right over by those winds. Different advantages.
Just like some of those distance runners would probably just use an oar to smack a whiffle ball around. If they could even lift the oar with their skinny arms. If they even knew what an oar was. They probably don't know strokeside from bowside. ;)
in defense of my sport: not all runners (even the fast ones) are assholes. maybe you met a bad batch at your running store group, and for that i'm truly bummed on your behalf.
it's true that running is a really individualistic sport, and that makes it great that you can do it on your own without having to get someone else's pace, schedule or goals to coordinate with your own. and if you're happy running by yourself, then go with that and yay.
but if you'd like to find company from time to time, please don't think that all runners are such jerks. i went to a few of those running store-sponsored nights, and felt awkward and shy and didn't really go back. but what i did do was talk about running with everyone i knew. if friends or colleagues asked me what i was up to, i told them i had just taken up running, or was training for a race, or whatever. and over time, i met plenty of other runners. some of whom lived in my hood, or shared my pace or time or distance goals, who were looking for a running buddy, and i have found great running partners and friends that way.
what i love about running as a sport is that it has an infinitely wide playing field. there is room for everyone at every pace, and in a race of, say, 2500 runners (the size of the race I'm running on Sunday this week), consider that only 1 person is going to win. probably only 10 are competing to win. so 2490 people are running for some other reason - against the clock for their own best, to see the city on a beautiful day, whatever, and how fast they are is a completely relative measurement. for all of the rest of us, there is no finite definition of "fast." or even of "fast enough." the guy who told you he was running your pace because he dropped a log on his foot wasn't trying to make you feel bad about your pace, he was feeling insecure about his own pace. but what's a good pace for him isn't a good pace for you. there's no finite measure. and unless you give yourself permission to really believe that, it's easy to get frustrated by running because someone will ALWAYS be faster than you. but i find it the most freeing thing in the world to know that there will always be a pack of runners ahead of me, and a pack behind me, and that frees me up to work on my own goals, to enjoy the sport or the race or the day or whatever.
and, in defense of the people who left you in the dust on their way out of the running store: runners can be very driven about their own goals, and that's not, in and of itself, inherently rude. it's not realistic to expect that an 8-min miler is going to pair up with a 14-min miler: one will feel frustrated that they are slowing down, the other will probably feel bad about slowing down the other person. it's unfortunate that 1) the runners weren't nice to you before/after said run, and that 2) you didn't meet someone that day who shared your pace. there's no excuse for the former, the latter is simply bad luck.
ultimately, what matters is that when you are running YOUR pace, you feel beautiful in your skin. screw everyone else.
okay, this is the end of my (hopefully encouraging) rant. tell the snooty runners they can kiss my middle-of-the-pack ass!
@ kev: i did think about the rowing (i know my rowing split, just not my running split!), though not quite so snarkily. i should find a place here in the D to row...
@ jen: all this is true, and i know all runners aren't assholes. too many of my folks are runners to think that! i've found a few people in the meantime to run with, in line with my distance and pace, and that's nice. i hardly wanted people to slow down for me, nor did i expect to be able to run with the group, and i did enjoy watching the speedier folks take off (such great form!). but they were unfriendly, and part of the reason they were rude was because i was not perceived as a peer (rudeness started before the running did) and i was a newbie without the lingo.
the sum-up, for me, is that cliquey people will be cliquey anywhere, and i'd just as well steer clear of THAT mess. running with my chatty logdropping friend made me also realize that i like running alone the most, i'm happier and speedier that way, and so that's my goal.
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