The Back Streets December 1997

Published December, 1997

February 18, 1995. You would think my life came to an end on this date. Up through this point in time, I dutifully recorded all of my races into a spreadsheet with the essential personal details and results. But for some reason, 2/18/95 is the last recorded date.

The race was the War Party 10K, a small local race. It was a decent effort, nothing outstanding, nor traumatic. I ran, stayed for the awards ceremony, and I went home. So, why did my personal running documentary come to a terminal point after this event?

Well, I’m not sure. Blame it on aging legs that refused to recover from hard workouts. Blame it on a series of injuries that eventually broke my spirit. Blame it on three kids in less than five years. Blame it on El Nino. I don’t know. For some reason my competitive flame fatigued.

In reality, since 1995 I haven’t fallen off the face of Planet Road Race. I’ve continued to enter races, usually content to finish just in front of the baby joggers and fitness walkers. I’ve continued to direct races and volunteer when needed. I’m still breathing, still sweating, and still punching it out on my laptop.

My first documented road race was May 5, 1976, the Toyota 10K. Back then, running a race in the streets was a novelty, and I was young and athletic… so I tried it. My time was a very unimpressive 42:something, and I remember being sore for a week after the race.

Scrolling through my road race database, I found several more landmarks. I’ve picked out a few for illustration:
- First time I broke 40 minutes - Rainbow Run 10K in Greensboro, NC in 1979.

- First trophy - Arts & Crafts 5K in 1983. I remember feeling guilty because all the “good” runners ran the accompanying 10-mile race.

- First big-time race - Peachtree 10K in 1985. I remember looking back just after the start and thinking, “Oh gosh, what if I fall?”

- First race I ever led - Southwest Virginia 10-miler in 1985. The whole time I was in the lead I thought, “What am I doing right behind the police car?” I ended up finishing 2nd… a trend that would haunt me in many future races.

- First “feel good” race - The Charlotte Observer Marathon in 1987. I jogged through the earlier 10K and then paced a friend through the last seven miles of the marathon… it felt great to watch him cross the finish line in 2:59:40, thus accomplishing his lifelong goal of breaking three hours.

- First overall victory – Old Oak 10K in 1988. Imagine my anxiety as I rounded a curve all alone on one of the back-in-the-country roads and found myself staring at a VERY big and VERY mad dog. I repeatedly told him how nice he was during our 30-second standoff, until some other runners finally came up from behind and diverted his attention.

- Marathons – My first attempt was a DNF at Rocket City in 1989. It took me four years to try again but I finally finished one at Kiawah Island in 1993. I quickly learned that I was not cut out to be a marathoner.

These events, and the 200+ others on the list, brought memory smiles… like looking through a high school yearbook. Then I decided to scroll once again and see if I could chronicle my PR’s. In the mid-80’s I seemed to run a PR about as frequently as I got a haircut. Running faster is, of course, the best motivator a runner can have, and it sure worked for me.

My performance curve eventually flattened out, of course, and the PR’s happened less frequently. 1990, however, was a very good year with PR’s in the 5K, 4-mile, and 10K. In 1991 I lowered my 8K PR. The 10-mile and half marathon came down in 1992. I scrolled through 1993 and ‘94 – some good times but no PR’s. Then… the scroll bar stopped moving. I came to the period at the end of the sentence. I came to the last recorded date – 2/18/95.

And then it hit me. My personal records were behind me, way behind me. We all run and run and run, and eventually we all run to this point in the road, where we are faced with the reality that we will not run any faster. I must have hit that point sometime in early 1995, and I’ve been wandering around on this road ever since.

So, where have I been? I’ve been in a continuous comeback from injuries and layoffs. I’ve been adjusting my lifestyle to accommodate the ever-increasing needs of my family. I’ve been coping with a little bald spot on the top of my head and the gray hairs scattering my beard. I’m not as young as I was seven years ago when I ran a 10K PR. A little voice tells me, “You’ll never run 32:40 again. Quit wandering. Move on.”

See you on the back streets.

The Back Streets Oct, 1997

Published October, 1997

Lunchtime.

It’s a nice day outside so several of my neighbors from across the cubicles decide to give the mouse a break and go out to eat. As we pass through the glass doors into the 3rd floor lobby, we could see the elevator doors starting to close.

It was time for some quick action. They all looked at me. “You’re the runner!” My mind was thinking like Michael Johnson, but my legs were moving like yesterday’s slow-twitch 13-mile run. I “raced” for the elevator button, but lost out to the fast-twitch elevator doors.

So, there we stood for an awkward, eternal moment. We watched the display and tracked our taxi as it moved on to other floors to pick up other lunch-goers. I felt like I had let my co-workers down. Running was my specialty, my physical area of expertise, but I wasn’t able to put five steps together quickly enough to catch a runaway elevator.

So how could I explain to my non-running friends that my legs don’t drag race? My underwear doesn’t say “Turbo” across the elastic band. I can’t just flip a switch and run fast. I have to put my body through a primitive tribal stretching ritual before I can even think about toeing-off in my Nikes.

Our office furniture has more flexibility than I do, but after lots of moaning, and chanting, and coaxing, my toes eventually come into my line of sight. That’s close enough. Next comes the injury checklist… hips are okay, IT band is loose, plantar fascia has been better. Now… I can take those first few, stiff-legged, over-pronated, oxygen-indebted steps. Bill Clinton could keep my pace through the first mile or two. In fact Al Gore, with his crutches, would probably stay on my shoulder until I shuffle and shift through all my gears. Only then do I metamorphose from crawling caterpillar to flying butterfly, from shuffling jogger to striding runner.

That elevator could reach the top of the Sears Tower before I hit full speed.

I’m sure that I’m faster than my 7-year old son and my 5-year old daughter, but they consistently whip me in their 10-yard dashes. “Race you to the car, Daddy.” I lose. “Race you up the stairs.” I’m last again. “Race you to the swings.” Third place for old Dad.

I used to let them beat me, but not anymore. Kids are instantly at full speed, 100% fast-twitch. Their legs work on cue, mine on a 20-yard delayed reaction. They are swinging in the swings chanting “beat you, beat you” before I take my second step.

So, just because I’m a runner doesn’t mean I have 4.3 speed from here to the car, or that I can catch a closing elevator faster than a speeding bullet. It does mean I can run distances most people can only cover in a motorized vehicle, and my heart beats about 30 times less each minute than most human mortals.

It also means that my immortal body stays mortally tired most of the time. So, don’t ask my legs to perform except on their scheduled runs; otherwise they are in a state of recovery from either yesterday’s workout or last week’s race.

Last Sunday morning I ran a 14-mile course around town. It was a little on the warm side, and I ran fairly hard, so after I finished my body let me know that I had overdone it. I found the nearest convenience store and drained them of fruit drinks and All-Sports. By the time I showered, dressed and stumbled into church later that morning, I was a humanoid walking around in a depleted body. The Catholic service was a blur; the priest’s sermon was like a fog rolling in over my inattentive brain. When I was a kid in Catholic school, the nuns used to tell us that God would give us grace just for attending church. On this Sunday, I’m sure that’s about all the grace I earned… the only religious experience I could think about was finding a bed and lying down.

So, maybe I should question my smarts for putting my body through this constant physical torture. Maybe I would be more socially acceptable if my walking gait did not resemble Herman Munster’s. Maybe I would be a more fun person if I could stay awake past 10:00PM. Maybe I wouldn’t be addicted to mega-caffeinated soft drinks if I weren’t so sluggish from running-induced rest deprivation.

Maybe if I backed off of this running obsession I could snap out of this zombie-like stupor and lead a normal life.

Why would I want to do that?

See you on the back streets.

The Back Streets 1995

First published 1995

Last night was not a good night. It was raining when I got home from work, so our babysitter asked me if I was going to run. “Yep, on the treadmill,” as I headed upstairs to change. She’s accustomed to my crazy running habits, so this came as no surprise to her.

I settled into my “5 MPH so I won’t hurt my hip shuffle.” After a few minutes, my hip warmed up and felt okay, so I was satisfied that my rehabilitation was still progressing in the right direction. At about 10 minutes my 3-year old daughter came in and offered me one of her peanut butter crackers. I thanked her but politely refused. Strange aid stations on this course...

Around 19 minutes I heard an awful noise underneath my feet. I looked down expecting some ugly treadmill troll to be grabbing at my feet. No troll, but something was bad wrong. I instinctively jumped off and the belt took off at about 90 MPH, so I quickly cut it off. My 4-year old son came running in to save me and excitedly asked what happened.

“It broke,” was my simple and blunt answer. Of course one simple answer never satisfies my son, who wants to know all the details. “It just broke, okay? It’s broken,” I shot back at him after he had climbed all over it and asked four more rapid-fire questions.

My demeanor carried over to dinner where I fussed at my children for not eating their dinner and I just about lost it when my son accidently knocked his plate off the dinner table. As I was cleaning up the mess I noticed we had ants again, all over the kitchen counter.

Last night was not a good night.

I’ve learned a lot of things during my latest injury period. For one, I know for a fact that injured runners are not pleasant people. All the positive things that running does for you, like stress reduction and mental relaxation, probably work in reverse when you’re sitting on your couch watching others run by the window.

Most runners are somewhat limited in their social skills. We can’t join in the office discussion on the latest John Grisham novel because our idea of good reading is a race report on some obscure race in Georgia. We just smile and listen when the rest of “the guys” in the office talk about the latest technology in golf drivers. An occasional polite question in my direction about running usually results in blank stares and polite nods of the head.

Injured runners are even less aware of their environmental surroundings. We are tunneled into one thing... THE INJURY. I can now tell you all about hip injuries. I know the proper way to stretch it, I can give myself an ultrasound treatment, and I can tell you about itophoresis treatment. The diagnosis from my expert physical therapists is hip bursitis, but I think they’re being kind. I just call it old age.

By sheer coincidence, David Atkinson and I had exactly the same injury at exactly the same time. I was Crip #1 and David was Crip #2. Since we had each other as an audience, we took advantage of the situation and called each other daily to talk about our hips. “I think it’s a little better today,” I lied. But there was alway hope. We kidded each other about our 10-minute mile pace, about my course that extended about two blocks from my house, and about his course which constituted back and forth laps on the Greenbelt. David was a little more diligent in his rehab program so he has recovered more quickly than I. But he cheated. He confessed to sneaking off to the restroom at work for ice treatments.

I learned, through trial and lots of error, that some slow jogging, mixed with walking, was the right workout recipe for me during my rehabilitation period. I hate to walk, especially during the middle of a run, but I swallowed my gazelle pride, and conceded the need for several minutes of walking threaded in with my slow running.

The other day I was on my daily shuffle when I passed one of the neighborhood joggers going the other way. I was actually into my walking segment when we passed and he shouted across the road, “It sure makes me feel good to see you walk, I’ve NEVER seen you walk before.” All these years of running, racing, awards, and I bring inspiration by walking in the middle of a run. Go figure...

Even though the past three injured months have not been fun, I have learned some valuable insights into my running. I finally learned why I run. It’s easy to take an activity that we do everyday for granted, but when you can’t do it; when you can’t run, or when you can’t run at the level that you’re accustomed, you start asking yourself some tough questions.

Over the past several years, my running has evolved from the tough, regimented workouts driven by competition, to a more low-key approach (with an occasional road race here and there), driven by the demands of my growing family. I’ve also stayed involved in the sport administratively through race directing and consulting.

So, when my hip decided to throw me even further into the sidelines of this sport, I had to ask myself if I really wanted to continue running. The answer was never in doubt. I’m running, if you can call it that, and I may never be as competitive as I once was, but I want to recover more than ever. I want to get back out on the roads and gulp down gallons of sports drink as soon as I walk in the back door from my run. I want to wave to neighbors mowing their yards as I glide on past their grassy masterpieces. I want to see impromptu sand-lot baseball games and couples holding hands on the Greenbelt. I want to stay in shape. That’s why I run.

See you on the backstreets.