Have a little story to tell before getting down to the business of actual running/racing/moving in the manner of a turtle, which is what I call racing.
First: This blog had a few title options. 1: "The Day I saw a lot of strange penis" I decided that would earn me a lot of scary blog stalkers which would be most undesirable. However, we will return to this topic shortly as I wish to bring up the fact that girls can pee without waving their junk all around for the world to see... Other contenders were "The race I slept through" (I did not I went slow enough so that I could have.) "What do Ice Cream and I have in common? We both melt in the HEAT." And so on and so forth.
Second:. Last week... Week three of the busiest 3 weeks of the year. These are the 3 weeks of Summer when it is effing balls to the walls around here! We (my staff and I) have our normal camp riders, which equals about 60 a week. We have another camp group each of those 3 weeks which equals about 80 more rides during each session. Not to mention the fact that I also have my year round students to teach and a couple horses to train! It is NONSTOP MADNESS.
Needless to say, I forgot that the Beach To Beacon was last Saturday.
Luckily my Dad said something about it on Thursday, just enough time for me to appreciate the fact that in the past month I had put in 4 runs. FOUR, count 'em. And luckily in enough time for me to haul ass to Cape Elizabeth and snag my race number.
For the 48 hours that I had to enjoy my pre race excitement I waffled back and forth repeatedly on whether or not I was going to do it. LAME, I know. In the end, I decided that anybody could run 6 miles and that it would be a waste of a hard earned race number to wuss out- so off I went, at 5 AM on Saturday morning to try to beat the traffic, the heat, and at least 1 person so as not to come in dead last.
Similar to stories of childbirth, one never hears positive tales of successful trips to the start of the B2B. The traffic is notorious, the road closures are endless and parking is supposed to be a complete shit show. Perhaps it is because I was completely filled with fear and horror which inspired me to leave 43 hours early but I had no issues. Got to park at the start, hit no traffic on the way and only had issues with the dire boredom which happens when one arrives at a race 687 days early. Egads!
Now, on to the story of seeing far more man junk then I would EVER EVER want to see EVER. Too many people plus not enough porta potties equals peeing in the woods which I am not scared of. What am I scared of? After discreetly doing my thang, turning around and seeing multiple men peeing all happily with their bits and pieces fully exposed. Now, I'm no prude but I actually squeaked in horror and fled the woods as if a monster was in hot pursuit! AK! Never in my life have I seen so much strange penis and never in my life do I wish to again. Sorry boys, but COME ON!!
After that I was scared enough to run slightly faster than a 12 minute mile... Only slightly though! It was hot as shit, so hot that I was sweating bullets after mile 1 which is very unpleasant.
It was a REALLY nice run, it was REALLY pretty and flat and fun with tons of spectator participation. Good times! HOT TIMES. SO HOT...
I felt just fine throughout but really, who doesn't feel fine when running an 8:20 minute mile. The good news is that I ran the exactly same mile every single mile. It was nice to be done at 6 miles as well, it was no day to go sprinting my way across the universe in a marathon like style.
Made it across the finish on 52:11. Not terrible. Not great. But well deserved given the fact that practice is not my friend!
I ate 3 slices of watermelon, 2 cartons of chocolate milk, a package of crackers and then I left.
THE END.
