Digging Deep for Chicago

It's that time again. Each time it comes on suddenly. First, I have plenty of weeks to train for my planned marathon. And then it's late and I'm not putting on enough mileage and I'm behind where I think I should be and I pull out my training schedule from my last marathon and it seems woefully inadequate to bring me to a stronger faster 26.2 miles come race day. This is where I find myself yet again.

Mile 16 or so, 2013 Steamtown Marathon

I will run the 2014 Chicago Marathon on October 12th, an intense, running-filled, glorious, achy 15 weeks from today. Chicago will be my 7th marathon and I'd think I'd have this figured out by now. But here I am. 

I often find myself days before a shorter race contemplating my race strategy, panicking just a bit and, of course, berating myself for not taking this particular race more seriously. And while not optimum and probably a key reason why I'm not more competitive, I have a strong enough base to "wing it" and survive on all race distances up to and including a half marathon. 

There is no winging it for a full marathon. Not for me, anyway. Strategy and training plans must be sorted out now and my legs must cover the 400+ miles that lie between me and marathon day (and yeah, I just added up the miles in a customized training plan and it revealed an astounding 400 miles over the next fifteen weeks).

My 10.1 miles in the Brooklyn heat this morning felt sluggish. Uninspired. Somewhere deep down shines a bright gem of strength and motivation and love of this wonderful sport that I know will pull me through the training miles and set my toes on the starting line in Chicago. Now to dig deep and find it. Training starts tomorrow. 

Running Outside My Comfort Zone

I am skilled at untangling complicated situations in my job. But, oddly, my brain is often slow to grasp new concepts in my non-work life. Generally  it takes a very clear simple statement from an experienced friend for me to understand. (Take, for example, the recent post  where I failed to figure out on my own that I needed new running shoes.)

My friend Tim has been running and racing since he was a teenager. We have't run together often, but when I first began racing, Tim cheered me on from the virtual sidelines. When I hit stumbling blocks, he always had the answer. I'm not talking about training plans and complicated stumbling blocks. The simple stuff that I wouldn't even know to ask. How to drink at water stations without choking. What do you mean I shouldn't eat eggs before a race?! So the stitch in my side is about BREATHING! 

This spring Tim challenged me to increase my speed. We together signed up for a 4-miler in Central Park, did a couple of speed workouts with my team, and he pulled down my race times to figure out the target.

Yesterday as we stood side by side at the start line Tim told me  it would not be comfortable. And that if I could say for any shorter distance (less than half marathon) that the race was comfortable, I was not racing. The longer races I could hit my relatively fast comfort zone and ride it until the finish. Not so with a 4-miler. Or a 5 or 10K. I had to run it in a place that did not feel easy. Plain and simple.

And so that's what I did.

The first two miles were hard but I maintained. 

The third my stomach churned and demons began swirling in my head, reminding me that I could simply step out of the pack and lie in a pool of sunshine in the grass. I stopped for about 20 seconds to regain my composure and continued on. 

The final mile eased up and was my fastest of the four. The finish line loomed, I kicked in, and we crossed together.

I ran well and finished well. It was not my fastest time. But it was one of my most important races for a couple of reasons. 

First, Tim ran with me the entire way. He could have run his own race, but instead chose to  run mine. Amazing generosity for which I am grateful and inspired. Runners are some of the very best people out there, in my humble opinion.

Second. I get it now. If I want this I now have a simple roadmap for what it will take on race day. What it will take during training I have still to figure out with the help of my coach and my running community. But I need to spend more time running fast. And I need to address those race threatening demons head on. Getting them to back off by slowing my pace can no longer be the answer.

"Why should I practice running slow? I already know how to be slow. I want to learn how to be fast” - 

-Emil Zatopek

For My Mother

My mother lost her battle with breast cancer. I was six years old when she was diagnosed and 11 when she died early in the morning of May 22, 1976. It was a Friday.

Now I am a grown woman with children of my own. I walk through life with my eyes open. I read the newspaper, heartbreaking fiction, and even more heartbreaking non-fiction. I have worked in child welfare for nearly two decades. I love family and friends deeply, leaving my heart and hood open for the sometimes accompanying wounds. I know more than one kind of sadness. I have witnessed great beauty and great injustice. 

Yet—and I am quite embarrassed to admit this—since my mother's death every single time the month of May rolls in it stops me in my tracks. After the birth of my children, and particularly since my daughter has become the age I was during my mother's illness, May is even more wrenchingly difficult. This year I am the age my mother was when cancer took over her days. While the flowers and trees are coming into fresh bloom, my heart overflows with a lifetime of missed moments. And I'm really angry to have not had a mother for all of those moments of my life for the past 38 years. 

I have adult friends who recently lost their mothers. By instinct I want to assure them that it will get easier. Others provide this assurance. I can't. Because in my own experience, living a motherless life has never gotten easier. Even as a grown woman. Even knowing that she she might not be alive now had she lived a full life. Thirty-eight years later, during the month of May, I just want to crawl deep under the covers and defy all the logic of my educated mind and my lifetime of perspective by feeling deeply deeply sorry for myself. 

Of course, my children know very little of this. I carry my grief quietly. My husband knows, braces himself, and does his utmost to walk beside me through it. 

And so I breathe. I try to be gentle with myself. I go on long hard runs in the springtime sunshine. I struggle to amass good May memories to carry me through the worst of it. And when our children climb into the bed, like our daughter just this morning, I nuzzle their sweet heads and hold them extra tightly. 

Note to Never Take Myself Too Seriously

Last week I had a hard slogging run through the streets of New Orleans. I've had tough runs before and I'm seasoned enough to chalk one uncomfortable run up to "one of those" runs and move on. It was the humidity, the time change, my travel-weary body.

Back in Brooklyn, another tough run. I managed to eek out the promised ten miles but slow and plodding. My legs felt tired and my breathing heavy. Odd. Two in a row.

Then, after dropping the kids at the bus this morning, I set off for a five mile run. Immediately I felt tightness in the back of my upper thigh. Tempted to stop and go home and rest and stretch, I instead kept at it and soon the tingling pain eased up somewhat. But again, there was little ease in those five miles despite the beautiful spring morning. 

So here is the mid-run—without a touch of irony—conversation I had with myself this morning: 

1. MILE ONE:  Maybe I need to seriously this time pay attention to my body and do some cross training. It is ALWAYS my right leg and the PT told me my hip flexors needed work and for years I have ignored all of the signs because...I can run marathons but I'm too lazy to do leg lifts?!
2. MILE TWO:  Running is over for me. It was a good stretch, but now it's over. Sure I'm still passing people in the park, but the signs are written on the wall. All downhill from here. Funny that it happened like flipping a switch, but maybe that's how it happens.
3. MILE THREE: I obviously can't run the Brooklyn Half.
4. MILES FOUR AND FIVE: There is something seriously wrong with me. I must schedule a physical exam and get blood work. Were the antibiotics ineffective after the ticks of last summer? Something even worse?

After five miles I headed home and texted a running buddy this message:  "Wow. Five really tough miles. Beautiful but can't get to easy last bunch of runs." His reply? "Congrats. How are the shoes? Perhaps wearing down." 

Not sure how I failed to note during my run that I have been telling myself for weeks to replace the sad, tired Sauconys that have happily accompanied me over hundreds of miles.

So maybe I'm not through. And maybe I'm not dying any time soon. And maybe I will run the Brooklyn Half Marathon in 10 days.

Heading out this evening for a long overdue running shoe shopping trip (And yes, I should cross train too).

You Can Hold My Teeth at the Water Station

Lately I have been thinking a lot about aging. I will turn 50 this August. When I signed up for the 2014 Chicago Marathon last week I selected, for the very first time, the age category of 50-54. I now can look at my runner’s profile for Chicago and witness, in black and white, that Rachel Pratt is (or very soon will be) a fifty year old female. 

One of the most interesting and objective elements I ponder right now is the potential impact of aging on my running speed. I began racing at age 44. Many say that it takes ten years from the beginning to fully mature as a runner and that speed will continue to increase during those ten years. Because of my late start, however, I am also entering a time when age begins to naturally slow down runners. In the past twelve months I have set new personal records in the half marathon (twice) and marathon distances and, while I am far from the fastest runner, I don’t yet have any proof that slowing down is in the cards for me. This feels age-defying and for that I am grateful.

And indeed, mostly I am grateful for good genes and luck and the self-care that has landed me pretty gently into the upper middle of my life. Some days, however, a melancholy sets in about parts of my life that are in the past, unrecoverable choices, the different nature of future adventures, and the reduced elasticity of my skin. I cannot seem to glide smoothly or without some somber reflection into fifty.

To combat the blues I have been feeling, I’m taking stock of my situation, booking future adventures, and trying to maintain perspective and a sense of humor. 

Taking stock, I have happy and healthy children, a husband who loves me, a good job, great friends, a lovely home in Brooklyn, a family house on a lake, a school I adore for our youngest children and a very bright future career for our oldest, and I am strong and fit and finally learning how to race. 

For adventures, I have already planned a long run through the hills of Pennsylvania on my birthday morning. Not yet sure what the rest of the day, in the middle of a holiday weekend, holds. In addition to the Chicago Marathon, I plan to run back to back Boston and Big Sur marathons the following spring. I have begun looking for challenging trail races. And I may even throw a triathlon into the mix. Non-race travel is part of the plan, too—it has been far too long since I last spent time in Europe and am half a lifetime overdue for Asia or Australia or South America. Fifty might be the year I begin writing a book.

Humor and perspective is the hardest part most days. But there are some shining laugh out loud moments, like this one, that assure me that all is and will continue to be well. A couple of weeks ago I was chatting with with my cousin and running buddy Scott, lamenting the aging process and extracting promises of many years of shared runs. Scott’s reply, the perfect antidote to my whining and all the perspective I require:  “You can hold my teeth at the water station.”

Gliding through Times Square

At 7:12 on this cold and windy Sunday morning, I stepped into my corral for the 2014 New York City Half Marathon, six back from the starting line. Breathed. Made small talk with a few guys around me. Breathed. Started my GPS watch. Listened to the speeches and National anthem. Craned, failing to locate my friend Tim in the corral before me. Tossed my XXL burnt orange Coney Island hoodie into the donation bin along the sidelines. Shivered. Began the forward movement with the crowd, slowly at first, taking about five minutes after gun time for my foot to hit the mat.

From start to finish, my race today was marked, remarkably, by a lack of thinking. It was crowded but I hit my stride about three miles in. I knew I wanted to maintain a pace of just below 8:00 minute miles with the 2nd half faster than the first. I periodically reviewed how I was doing and the answer that invariably returned was that I was just fine. Nothing hurt. Nothing was even particularly uncomfortable. A couple of times I felt my energy flagging a bit and downed a half of a gu before the upcoming water station. I paced myself with other runners who seemed to be moving at the pace I wanted to move, until I was ready to pass them. I flowed around the park, through Times Square and 42nd Street, down the West Side Highway, and around the tip of Manhattan, staying strong in every mile.

What made this race so different from other races for me? I had one vivid moment, while still in Central Park, when I realized that nothing mattered. I was there, running and that was all that I needed to do. I didn't need to think about the time or my previous times or what was ahead. I ran. And no one, particularly myself, had any expectations at all of me on this day. It was mine to do with what I wanted.

My fastest half marathon to this point, other than during full marathons, was last year's Brooklyn Half. But that race was marked for me by going out too fast, taking several pit stops during the run, throwing up at the finish line, and an overall sense that it was not a race well run despite the strong finishing time. 

Today I ran a little more than two minutes faster than Brooklyn. And it was my most mature race ever. I stuck to my planned pace, never got discouraged, and each 5K was faster than the last. 

Recently I have realized that my status as a newbie runner is no longer a fit. Today proved that. I have a ton still to learn, but this morning I finally loved racing.

Just Remember Yourself

While publicly pondering the NYC Half Marathon a few days from now, a running friend said these words:  Just remember yourself.

Yesterday, late afternoon, I went out for a five mile run. It was a glorious much-needed spring day in Brooklyn. My run should have been full of joy. Instead I felt heavy, dehydrated, and plodding. I picked up some when I hit the park, but none of the miles were easy ones. Five years as a runner and I know that every run is a good run, so one rough run is not troubling.

In my head as I ran I kept hearing the words "just remember yourself."

Some days it is hard to remember myself on any level. I did not have children until late. And so for two decades after leaving high school, while often in relationships, I was only responsible for myself. I moved to New York City in my mid-20s and spent days wandering the City's streets, visiting museums, making pottery, drawing, going to theatre, dining out with friends, focusing on my career, reading books on park benches and while walking home from the subway, sitting in cafes.

My son, Gus, was born ten days before my 40th birthday. My daughter Genevieve two years later. This summer Gus will turn ten and I will turn 50. 

Most days that young woman who wandered the streets of New York City is a dim memory. But I am realizing that she is being replaced by a more complete version of Rachel. Those young decades formed me. But childbirth and the subsequent years, most particularly parenting and running, are completing me. Or at least as complete as I am now—I'm sure there is more to come.

The birth of my children was fast and furious and I, frankly, didn't feel like I did childbirth very well. It was the most physically intense experience of my life up to that point. Now I am deep in child rearing, learning by trial and error, always in demand, with little time for the pleasantries of my formerly simple life.

Two years after my daughter's birth I had lots of reasons for starting to run and, later, for running marathons. But one of the most important catalysts was proving my strength after feeling so humbled by the arrival of two small wailing infants.

Through running—and particularly distance running—I have again become confident in my own strength and endurance. I can run 26 miles hard and fast and finish smiling. I can still set new PRs as I get ready to hit 50. I experience intense joy. I can endure the pain of the distance —aching muscles, blisters, nausea, sore feet, chafing. Weather is not an issue. Snow, rain, heat, cold. Whatever. Bring it.

And so for Sunday's race, this is the myself I will remember and be. I will breathe through the pain, cheer myself through my mind's sometimes desire to lie down on the sidelines, and I will remember crossing the finish line of my last marathon in 3:33:33 with tears of joy streaming down my face.