Sign Me Up!

In our kitchen we have one of those big paper calendars you can buy at office supply stores and that (I assume) professional people used to have at their desks to track their meetings before iPhones took over the world. We use our big paper calendar to keep track of where everyone in the family is at any given time.

I have very little on the calendar, but every other weekend or so there is an entry in my hobbled handwriting that says something like “Southern Bellevue Half Marathon, 10k,  and Kids Fun Run for Ingrown Toenails?” (There’s always a question mark at the end, indicating my general lack of commitment to such events.)

 I like to go through the race schedule here in Northwest Runner and put potential races on the family calendar. Note that I don’t usually sign up for anything. That would require commitment.

Usually after a good run where I feel pretty strong and I didn’t crash, I’ll sit down and find interesting races for the next couple of months. On the rare occasions that I have this burst of optimism AND my giant paycheck from Northwest Runner arrives at the same time, I’ll actually register for a race.  I never really know why.

What possesses us to run in these races? We aren’t going to win. As many a reluctant spectator has muttered over the years, we are essentially paying someone else for the pleasure of torturing ourselves. So why sign up?

A lot of runners sign up for races because of the cause the run supports. Cancer research is a popular one. I have no problem with this other than the fact that I think it is a shame we have to hold fundraisers to find cures to diseases. And just about every run these days is a run for a cause. Name your cause, its name is on a technical t-shirt from a half-marathon.

Speaking of t-shirts, what better reason to sign up for a race than to get a shirt? Like many casual runners, I have a closet full of $100 free t-shirts. Some of them are really cool. Most of them have paint or motor oil on them.

I mostly sign up for races out of guilt. I spend a dozen or more hours a week running and staying in shape. I spend paycheck after paycheck on shoes, clothes, and gadgets related to running. I write this column. If I don’t race I sort of feel like I’m doing it all for nothing. So I sign up.

My friends also guilt me into running, whether they know it or not. Cap’n Ron keeps signing up for races and posting about it on Facebook. Guilt. Owen runs a million miles a week and just decides at the last minute to run marathons and ultras because it’s fun. And the ladies from last year’s Ragnar team keep posting awesome results that shame the rest of us. I seem sort of lame if I don’t step up and tie a timing chip to my shoe once in a while.

The races themselves sometimes pressure me into signing up. The threat that a race I really don’t want to run anyway might sell out sometimes makes me break out the Real Running credit card. (This explains why I am running the North Olympic Discovery Marathon despite being nowhere near prepared for it and why I am already signed up for next fall’s Portland Marathon. Sucker.)

Don’t get me wrong, I love race day. Once I am out of bed and have that number pinned to my shirt, I enjoy the low-grade anxiety and the social aspect of the events. I like the challenge of a race. I like having elementary school kids hand me paper cups of water (and if I were rich I would hire a cadre of small children to stand around and hand me water all day).

Races are there to give us a goal on the calendar. Races are there to force us to train and not skip track days. Race days are there to lamely justify our addiction to running.

Race day is for seeing how well you have trained. On race day you have a reason to go a little faster and try a little harder. And if everything comes together, maybe you can set that new PR. That’s why we race.

Sure, we won’t win. But we might beat that guy right in front of us…

The Social Network

Despite the number of hours spent alone, plodding along the sidewalks and paths of your neighborhood, endlessly circling Green Lake with a thousand other lonely people, or suffering through the last three miles of a long run, running is ultimately a very social pursuit. It just seems like most of us haven’t figured that out yet.

On just about every run, I see cyclists in huge pelotons bombing down the trail, men and women in groups of five walking their dogs, new mothers pushing convoys of strollers to the coffee shop, and a gaggle of unkempt teenagers trying their latest moves at the skate park. Together. But we runners are all alone, as if running is some sort of holy, solitary pursuit that we alone can understand and that must be endured in isolation.

Of course I have days where all I want to do is lace up the trail shoes and spend a couple of hours alone decompressing from a long day, but if we’re all out there anyway, why are we by ourselves? There are hundreds of people out right now running alone…together. We’re not much of a community of runners, it seems.

I’ve been doing my part. Whenever I see another runner I give her the friendly wave, a thumbs up, maybe a quick “howdy.” More often than not, I get a confused stare in return. Sometimes an eye roll. Often, I am just ignored. I have tried to figure this out for years now. While cyclists, walkers, skiers, motorcycle riders and dog walkers share a friendly wave and a chat, runners shuffle past each other in solitude. Why? Somewhere along the way, we’ve been taught to suffer in silence. I don’t get it. Why suffer at all? I recently left the house on a rainy afternoon for a run. I had no plan, nowhere to go, and no time limit. I decided to just run for a while.

A mile into the run, I spotted a runner merging onto the trail and gave him a quick wave.

And miracle of all miracles, he waved back! He then fell into stride with me and we ran together for a few miles. We talked about different races, about shoes, about nutrition, about running routes. After a while, he checked his watch and turned around with a friendly good bye. I looked at my own watch. Five miles of running had slipped by unnoticed. No suffering required.

Even if you don’t run together, meeting up with friends for a weekly or nightly run makes it less of a chore and more of an event that you are less likely to skip. It’s easy to bail on yourself, but if your three pals are waiting for you at the trailhead at Cougar, you will at least have to come up with a lame excuse before you bag out.

Now I know some of you run with groups or training teams. I know there are pockets of the running world that are social, but from what I see on the streets, those groups are not the norm. We have to fix this.

1.     When you see another runner on the trail or the sidewalk. Wave. Simple. A smile doesn’t hurt.

2.     When you see a runner struggling and working hard, say something you have read on a sign at a race before. “There’s beer at the end” is often a good choice.

3.     Before you head out for a run, call someone and invite them along. They might say yes.

4.     If you see someone ahead of you, catch up and run with them a while. Introduce yourself. (Note to men, use this tactic with caution, and don’t be a creep.)

5.     When you are running with other people, make it fun. Anyone else remember playing “race you to the garbage can” in school? Try that. See who can turn in the fastest mile. Challenge each other up that hill. Last one to the car buys the beer.

Run with your head up and a smile on your face. Most runners are cool people (except you, grumpy guy in Woodinville who threw your empty GU package at my feet. You know who you are.) You just might meet someone worth hanging out with.

But maybe you’re just not a social person. At least in real life. Facebook thinks I have a couple hundred friends. I actually only have a couple. Social networking is apparently here to stay, and the running industry has made a clumsy pass at online technology.  Maybe someday we can virtually run together by syncing out treadmills and web cams. In the meantime, grab some friends and lace ‘em up. See you out there.