What a day today. The stage was 45 kilometers long with the same altitude as yesterday 1679 meters of elevation as the highest point. Last night was a bit hard since everybody seemed to be finding things so easy. I felt lost since I felt I didn't belong here either.
I had a great chat with 51 year old Rob Jansen Of Aldegrove BC, he works in agriculture. He was born in the Netherlands and move to Canada about 30 years ago, I guess you can call him dutchman running wild. Rob will be the kind of guy you will love to hate if its not because he is so nice. He is a strong runner that also manages to have fantastic pictures. He is still running strong even after day two.
Last night Rob was sitting with his brother and fellow dutch friends when they asked me when I came in. I told them I came with only 30 minutes to spare, one of them call me a eco runner.
I had no idea so he explained that the eco runners are the slow runners that are always stopping to take pictures and lingering at checkpoints like its a cocktail party eating and drinking. Then it hit me, he just called me a jogger, my ego was sure bruised specially since I had yet to go as fast as I could.
In the morning things became a bit clearer for me, the worst thing I could do was to be beaten mentally. Then and there I decided to fight hard until the end. I also decided to be smarter and not to try and keep up with everybody, just to run my race.
My race is between my body and my mind, and the race to fight and stay in the 350k distance. I started at a conservative 8k per hour knowing that I needed at lest 7, I run slow and even some of the hills at a much conservative pace, yesterday I was doing 11k per hour to only bonk at 30k.
I felt great but I was still worry about timing out, about 32k into I was passed by absolutely everybody, then it became more real that for sure I was timing out if I didn't find the strengh to run hard. Have to thank my kids for putting music on my iPod and the Foo Fighters for that matter,
What a day today. The stage was 45 kilometers long with the same altitude as yesterday 1679 meters of elevation as the highest point. Last night was a bit hard since everybody seemed to be finding things so easy. I felt lost since I felt I didn't belong here either.
I had a great chat with 51 year old Rob
Jansen Of Aldegrove BC, he works in agriculture. He was born in the Nethelands and move to Canada about 30 years ago, I guess you can call him dutchman running wild. Rob will be the kind of guy you will love to hate if its not because he is so nice. He is a strong runner that also manages to have fantastic pictures. He is still running strong even after day two.
Last night Rob was sitting with his brother and fellow dutch friends when they asked me when I came in. I told them I came with only 30 minutes to spare, one of them call me a eco runner.
I had no idea so he explained that the eco runners are the slow runners that are always stopping to take pictures and lingering at checkpoints like its a cocktail party eating and drinking. Then it hit me, he just called me a jogger, my ego was sure bruised specially since I had yet to go as fast as I could.
In the morning things became a bit clearer for me, the worst thing I could do was to be beaten mentally. Then and there I decided to fights hard until the end. I also decided to be smarter and not to try and keep up with everybody, just to run my race.
My race is between my body and my mind, and the race to fight and stay in the 350k distance. I started at a conservative 8k per hour knowing that I needed at lest 7, I run slow and even some of the hills at a much conservative pace, yesterday I was doing 11k per hour to only bonk at 30k.
I felt great but I was still worry about timing out, about 32k into I was passed by absolutely everybody, then it became more real that for sure I was timing out if I didn't find the strengh to run hard. Have to thank my kids for putting music on my iPod and the Foo Fighters for that matter, I put music on and the song the pretender came on and the lyrics spoke loud to me,
"what if I say you are not like the others, what if I say I will never surrender, you are the pretender". I was not the pretender I am a runner not a jogger, I run hard for the last 10k the faster I run the faster I wanted to go, I made a decision, to be who I am and not to be afraid. For the first time in my life I allowed myself to say, I am an athlete, I felt every bit as I fought hard to not be disqualified on the 350k distance. Something changed on the last hour. I made the decision to be happy with who I am to be proud, to focus on the wins but not on the losses, to see them as part of the journey.
Things are changing at the race, people are hurting, while I came smiling and in better shape than yesterday most people found it harder today. There are no way to predict who will finish or who will not today I did it, tomorrow is an other day and I will welcome it for the wonderful opportunity of becoming the person I was born to be.
I put music on and the song The Pretender came on and the lyrics spoke loud to me, what if I say you are not like the others, what if I say I will never surrender, you are the pretender. I was not the pretender I am a runner not a jogger, I run hard for the last 10k the faster I run the faster I wanted to go, I made a decision, to be who I am and not to be afraid. For the first time in my life I allowed myself to say, I am an athlete, I felt every bit as I fought hard to not be Disqualified on the 350k distance. Something changed on the last hour. I made the decision to be happy with who I am to be proud, to focus on the wins and not on the losses, to see them as part of the journey.
Things are changing at the race, people are hurting, while I came smiling and in better shape than yesterday most people found it harder today. There are no way to predict who will finish or who will not today I did it, tomorrow is an other day and I will welcome it for the wonderful opportunity of becoming the person I was born to be.
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