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Best Cheering Ever!

November 10, 2019 (Morning)

Exercise Type: Run

Comments:
USATF Open New England Championships at Franklin Park today, the race I've theoretically been building up to all season. But I went in with very little pressure because 10k is a weird distance that I only run at this one meet (aside from road races) and can barely remember my best time for.
Williams brought their non-varsity runners as they have for several years and for the first time other colleges came too: Colby, Conn, and one other I'd never heard of. The rest of the race was entirely clubs: BAA (my club), HFC, Somerville Road Runners, Greater Boston Track Club, Western Mass Distance Project, and so forth. We usually do pretty well as a team, but I honestly barely care; most of so-called "teammates" in these races I've never met, often never seen. It doesn't really feel like a team to me. But you know what does? Williams! And you know what else does? GDS! And you know was there today? THE ENTIRE GUNTHER FAMILY!

I intercepted Ana and her parents a half-hour before Julia's race (Ana took the train down from Bowdoin to watch her sister, and kindly stuck around for my race a well, cutting her departure time really close...) During Julia's race I ran around the course trying not sprint, but I certainly got in my 2-minutes of tempo. My assistant coach from Williams Dusty Lopez and I converged on the same spot several times and had a fun time chatting about the course, whose measurements are a bit suspicious! (we both got our PRs here in college, but rumor has it that the 8k version is short). Having run here for most of the last 15 years, I took advantage of my course knowledge to cheer on Julia about 10 times during her 6k race, include spots along the Wilderness loop no one else knew how to reach.

I got in a full set of striders and felt zero nervousness on the line. The gun went off on the third try, and I immediately let myself get shuffled to the back of the BAA pack. I let folks go by me for the first half mile and then started to move up. This continued for the next 5 and a half miles, thanks to the cheering which was AMAZING! First I'd hear Dusty urging for me to catch the pack of Williams Slow Boys ahead. Then 100m later I'd see Ana and her parents cheering me on. A quarter-mile after that Julia would appear alongside her Williams teammates, a couple of whom started cheering my name along with her. Then I'd hear Michael, the BAA coach, or his wife Amanda who had just finished the women's race 7 months pregnant. And to my surprise, Williams head coach Pete cheered for me too! (Two years ago he hadn't, I think because he'd been focused on looking for Williams uniforms and hadn't noticed me go by). I heard each of them cheering more times than I can count, thanks to the course being relatively compact and having loops that repeat several times. In fact, aside from the Wilderness (about 1/2 mile) and Bear Cage Hill (about 1/4 mile) I never seemed to go more than a minute without hearing my name. Each time someone would cheer I'd make a move to try to catch or pass other runners. In the wilderness I'd tell myself I could relax a bit and save my strength, but I often caught people there too, and as I got towards the end of it, I'd pick up the pace again so I'd be in a position to pass people. Maybe I was just showing off, or maybe I was trying to show my supporters my appreciation by demonstrating that their cheering was making a difference. Whatever it was, it really did keep me in a race mentality, chasing after competitors the whole time, which isn't so easy to do when you don't feel that strongly about the people you're racing against and aren't in a position to place highly or win.

I was a bit concerned each mile that I was going too hard, but I told myself to trust myself. I didn't try to turn my brain off since I wanted to keep passing people, but I avoided thinking about the miles ahead and just tried focus on the mile I was in. I tried to judge whether my effort and level of tiredness were appropriate for that point in the race, rather than scare myself into slowing by adding up much more I had to run. This was the formula I used at the best XC race of my life, here at Franklin Park 13 years ago, and it worked wonderfully today. Granted, I should have trusted myself enough to pick it up more from 4.5 miles on and definitely in the sixth (last) mile, cause when I reached the final 400m, I realized I had too much left. I got in a good kick, however, catching the pack I'd been chasing all through the woods and nabbing another 2 guys just before the line. The time was my second fastest ever, certainly in XC and possible on roads as well. Afterward, I shook hands with the Williams guys I'd been near to in the race, introducing myself as the King Slow Boy of 2008 (one of the kids was this year's KSB). Pete invited me to join in the team picnic, I got a chance to catch up with him, Dusty, and Julia. Lastly, I caught up with my former Milton athlete Ben Bosworth and his dad Scott who used to coach with me there. All in all, a great day of cross country!

I rested up for this race perfectly, both in terms of sleep, mileage, and workouts. Even my 100-mile week four weeks ago came just at the right time, and I backed off appropriately after. I think I paced it pretty well; my first mile was a 5:48 and my average was a 5:50. The one thing I can't explain was my 5k split, which was 18:48 (6:03 pace). That means my second 5k would have to have been as 17:28, faster than I've run all season even on a track. Maybe this happened, but I suspect, given that my 8k was around 29:18 (5:53 pace) that the course is about 100m short. Or I really flew in the final mile. I guess it's possible I ran 5:45 in the sixth mile and then 73 for the final 400m. You know what? It's cross country! Dusty says that even when they've neurotically measured the Williams course a dozen times it's still hard to be confident that the distance is correct. I'll just accept that courses are funky, you usually don't get your mile splits anyway, and that the true glory of the cross country comes in battling the course conditions, competitors, and your own soul. Save the precision of times and tape measure for track.

I'm a bit wistful that even with training pretty solidly I can't seem to match the times I was hitting in my late 20s before grad school, but maybe some magic can still happen. Even if not, cross country itself is magical. I'm just happy to be out here competing. I even caught a leaf.