It unfolded exactly as it had in my nightmare. I pressed down the lever again. This time the bowl began to fill, pushing the wadded up toilet paper closer to the rim of the toilet.
“I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news,” I said to the line of shivering runners who were waiting behind me. “But it seems the toilet is stopped up.” I considered explaining how nervous constipation had kept me from contributing to the plumbing problem, but decided in the end to keep that part to myself.
Below the concrete slab I could hear pipes groaning. The urinal on the wall started gurgling. In the women’s room next door I could hear toilets as they continued to flush. That’s when the drain on the floor came alive.
The nightmare had reached its crescendo. “It’s a stopped sewer line! Stop flushing!” I yelled. I went out and found the RD, John Kilpatrick.
“I’ve got some crappy news for you,” I said, and then I told him the news about the bathrooms next to the race start/finish. John handled it superbly. I hope I can hold it together as well as he did should my nightmare scenario ever unfold at home.
Ten minutes later I was standing in a new line, this time awaiting race instructions. But I didn’t pay any attention, because I had run the trail 100s of times and leaf blown more than half the course a few days earlier.
Two dudes sprinted off the start line. It took every molecule of patience to avoid joining them. I settled somewhere around 10th position as we entered the winding single-track.
My training shortcoming over the last five years has been the long run. Time and patience during those outings would usually peter out around the 2-hour mark. My goal for the day was to avoid any periods where I was slowed to a walk (Chehaw’s trail being an extremely flat and runnable course). That meant keeping my heart rate nice and low and getting plenty to eat throughout the morning.
After the first loop I asked John if the plumbing had been fixed, and he said no. So I hopped in my car and drove the half mile over to the next set of bathrooms and did what I couldn’t do earlier that morning. I made it back to the start/finish having lost only about 10 minutes. The only bummer was that the 10-miler runners were just getting started, which meant that I would have to run through all of them. In the end it wasn’t so bad.
Somewhere during the second loop I realized what “running my own race” actually meant. In the past I had believed that it meant sticking to a race plan. For example, “I will keep clicking off 7-minute-miles regardless of what other runners are doing.” But that would never work. My plan seldom understood the undulations of the course, weather/wind, stomach cramps, etc. On this morning, however, about 16 miles into the race, I decided that I was the only person running my race. Therefore I was in first position. I could walk it in the final 16 miles, and I would still be in first place. Or I could redline the rest of the way and finish as quickly as possible. It wouldn’t change my finishing position. I was in my own race. In a race of One, I was always in first place. I could do whatever I wanted without consequence. The only failure would be to not finish the race. The only pressure was the pressure I gave myself to run harder.
By the beginning of the third lap I was feeling decently tired. I could see the two guys who had sprinted off the front up ahead. I’m pretty sure I heard one of them take a spill. A few minutes earlier there had been a spontaneous shriek from the woods. It was a sad, defeated sort of shriek. When I caught them, they weren’t looking good. One was walking and the other was jogging very slowly. The walker had streaks of mud across his back, and I surmised that he had been the one to somersault along the trail. After passing them, I assumed that I had taken the first position in the 50k. I was in no danger of these guys passing me.
A mile later I approached another runner. Maybe he was in first place? I didn’t know, and didn’t care enough to ask. I decided to run behind him for the remainder of the lap so I would have someone to talk to. I don’t remember his name, but he was a triathlete and coach and gym owner. Former military. He asked how I was feeling and I said, “knackered.” I didn’t say “knackered,” of course, because we weren’t running in Dartmoor, ENG. He, too, felt the meaning of knackered.
With five miles to go, I started feeling impatient and passed this veteran of the US military. It felt very different from last year when my legs were completely dead at that point. (Perhaps this had something to do with being around 15 minutes slower than last year.) I passed one more dude with about a mile left. I hadn’t seen him all day, and he seemed to be running steadily. Had I known there were surprises further up the trail, I would have been more eager to search them out!
I crossed the finish line and asked what position I had finished in. John and I looked at the computer together, and then looked at me confused. “You were first,” he said.
Most of the guys I had passed during that last loop (including the guys who started fast) were running the 50 mile distance. Only the triathlete/coach/veteran/gym owner was running the 50k with me.
After the race I was able to catch up with my runner friends while I ate barbecue and drank water and coffee. An hour later I was showered and in the car headed to Atlanta for the Camping and RV show.
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