The Back of the Pack

I am really liking the beginning stages of marathon training because the workouts are so quick and easy. Sandy and I headed to the rail trail after work today for an easy 3 miler. Today's run felt really good and I felt like I could have ran further or faster even. We ran 3 miles in 31:01, which might seem slow to some. That was one of the fastest runs that the two of us have ever had together. It was only a year and a half ago that the two of us were completing 5K's in 33 or 34 minutes. It's amazing to see how far we have come as runners since we became running buddies. It's even more amazing that I am not always in the back of the pack anymore. I admit that I am a pretty slow runner and it really does not bother me. I have never really cared too much about speed, but I have always cared about going the distance. However, it can be discouraging sometimes coming in towards the back of the pack.

There was one particular race that I really was in the back of the pack because I came in last place by a good 1-2 minutes. It was my senior year of college and a friend of mine had started a running club. The running club would go out for runs during the week and then sign up for local road races on the weekend. I was a little skeptical because most of these kids were runners in high school, but my friend and my college roommate encouraged me to join the running club. I was running a road race almost every weekend during the fall and absolutely loving it. When the running club registered for the McQuaid Invitational, I decided to sign up too. I had never run a cross country race before, but I really thought that I had nothing to lose. I never really knew how serious McQuaid was until we arrived that day. There were hundreds of middle school and high school runners from all over the northeast competing in this huge cross country competition. We were registered for the open race, which was the only race of the day for runners who were not part of a middle school or high school team. I thought for sure that there would be tons of runners just doing this for fun, but there ended up being many alumni and serious runners.

When the race started, I was excited and nervous all at the same time. I started off extremely fast and tried to keep up with the other members of the running club. I always had a pretty fast start whenever I ran with the running club because I was embarrassed that I was such a slow runner. This plan often backfired and I would fall much further behind everyone. There were about 100 runners in this particular race and I quickly found myself in the back of the pack. I was running just a little behind another girl from my running club. We ended up being so far behind that we almost missed a few of the turns because we had no idea where we were. I fell further behind during mile 2 and gave up any hope of catching up to anyone else. It would have been so easy to quit and give up on the race, but I knew that the other runners would be waiting for me at the finish line. I am now proud to say that I came in LAST PLACE in the McQuaid Invitational. The last place finish was really what motivated me to become a better runner. Since I now had the distance down, it was time to stop coming in the back of the pack. I have never come in last place in a race since then, but I no longer register for serious runs either. I truly believe that it takes more courage to step up to the start line than it does to actually cross the finish line.

29 miles complete in 4:27:40 and only 199 days until conquering 26.2 miles!