Uncomfortable
Last weekend I finally had my break through with distance. It of course revolved around poorly marked trails and push of my fellow trail runners.
The weekend before last we did 15 miles and after the initial burn I had nothing to recover from. My body let me know that 15 miles with moderate elevation gain and loss was okay and we could do it again.
We decided we needed to push further and we planned at 17 or 18 mile trail run. As par to any trail we have never been on, we got lost and took the longest possible path back to where we knew the trail linked up again.
This is only partially my fault. I wanted to take Pointed Rock Trail (more commonly known as Training Hill or K2) because I wanted to be able to finally put to rest any apprehension to hills. After K2, I have absolutely no apprehension what so ever. That hill that is a mile straight up at a 30% grade pretty much kicked my ass and handed it back and made me run another 24 miles after it.
After I learned how to skydive on my own I felt like there was pretty much nothing I couldn’t do. The exception to that was to run a mile without stopping, even if I was being chased by zombies or a serial killer. During movies where the character is running through streets or the forest to get away from being hacked to into a hundred pieces I would think to myself, ‘yeah, I would be the first one they knocked off.’ And I would always hope that it wouldn’t be after running to escape. Kill me off while sitting on the couch or making out in a car. I’m totally okay with that.
I would also watch those people just running and running and think, “that’s retarded.” Oh wait, I still do that. Last weekend I figured out how they do it without stopping every few hundred feet and yelling, “FUCK ME THIS IS STUPID AND I HATE IT!”
Because of what I learned I finally was able to tell Tabitha that she is going to run in the Western States 100 mile endurance run. She looked at me like I was little crazy and then she let it sink in. “Okay.” I told her my time frame and what we would need to do to qualify. She took it all in without really saying too much.
Yesterday while at work I got an email from her. She had sent me the information for a 50 mile ultra that I had already researched long ago when I secretly decided to do this. “We can do this and we will need it to qualify.” The fact that my friend looked it up and started the researching just made my heart swell with pride. What I proposed to my friend takes months and months of training without fail, rain/scorching sun/hail and snow…we have to train, we have to devote up to 20 miles a weekend on those trails in the beginning and then push forward to 40 and 50 a weekend, we have to take on K2 or an equivalent every weekend. EVERY WEEKEND. This is just absolutely crazy what I suggested and she said, “okay” and she started the research to get us there. I felt like I had asked her to give me her kidney or bone marrow…or her 3 and 5th child. She has truly become a friend that will walk through fire with me. Literally she will because we will soon do The Tough Mudder.
Success doesn’t meet you at where you’re comfortable. I was uncomfortable for many years, but I didn’t use that to push me forward to a new place, this place. Thank you Tabitha for walking this path with me, being my cheerleader and being uncomfortable as long as it takes before we are successful. You’re not alone my friend, I’m right here with you!