Practice #1: Pace Assessment, Also Known As Hell

I know, I know. I'm behind on my posts. But I do have a good reason! Basically, Facebook marked sharing my fundraiser page as spam and disabled my account. I've spent the last two, almost three, weeks sending at least five "Contact Us" forms a day since just emails can't get through, nor is there a phone number to reach because Facebook is such a "small" company that their meager number of employees can't handle dealing with users on a personal basis. I kid you not, that is their reasoning. Hopefully everything will be sorted soon.

So what does a Saturday morning practice look like?

Well, it starts with me rolling out of bed at 6:30 in the morning. That in itself is a miracle because I am not a morning person. Still, I made it on time to the Rose Bowl and proceeded with all that fun first day, meet everyone, finalize everything stuff.

Now, every morning has a similar structure. Everyone checks in and then we gather around to discuss what needs to be discussed. The first week, it was meeting the staff, who were all once participants like us. Then, we hear from someone on the team who and what their connection to the cause is. After they share that, we all get a ribbon with the honored teammate's name on it. And we wear them all season. The idea is that we have more and more reasons to fund raise for cancer research and to keep running. These moments have never failed to bring tears to my eyes and wearing those ribbons truly does remind me why I am doing this. I can't wait to have all of them at the end of the season.

(You'll get to meet my honored teammate later!)

After all of that, we trot on over to the Rose Bowl loop. Luckily enough, it is a 5k path that encircles the Rose Bowl stadium and part of Brookside Golf Course. (Yes, there are signs posted that say you assume all risks of stray golf balls. It's serious stuff. I've nearly been hit by one and I hear that one of my dad's golfing buddies may have possibly hit a runner once. But just possibly.) We do a warm up, led by Gaily, and then they set us loose!

Okay, not really.

They sent a couple of coaches off to the corners of the loop to make sure we stayed on course and then stuck us at a starting point. And then said go. The point was to just run around the loop while they time you. Not so bad, right?

Wrong. For this girl, so wrong.

First of all, there is a no headphone policy because you're usually with your teammates. For some reason, having no music or audiobook makes exercising really hard for me. I don't know if it's a distraction or - like when I studied or did homework - a way of focusing myself, but being without that threw me off. Second were the dreaded shin splints. I'm sure you will hear an epic saga of them throughout the season, but because of nerves and me pushing myself, my shins started to burn like they hadn't in a long time. And third, I found myself completely alone.

I'm a bit ashamed at how quickly I was ready to throw the towel in. But there it is. For that first mile, as I tried to push through my intervals and battle the oncoming Frankenstein foot, all I could focus on was the pain and how alone I felt. I can say with surety that there were at least two times I nearly dialed my mom and told her I was done. And as the running became harder, I suddenly found myself thinking how much I felt like this:

Luckily, Rose, who is one of the coaches, was bringing up the rear and gathering the stragglers (aka me). She quickly matched my pace and asked if I was hurting because I was limping. It happens with the shin splints where my feet just come down flat instead of in a natural rolling motion, hence the nickname Frankenstein foot. At that point, any pride I had was gone so I admitted that I was in a terrible amount of pain and I didn't know if I could keep going. She urged me to keep going, even if I was just walking, and assured me I could do it. We quickly came across Scott at the first corner. Now, if you don't know who Scott is, I blame him for encouraging me to get into all this running ridiulousness. Okay, not really, but because he is a friend of the family and has run all my previous races with me, he's very aware of the shin splints. He saw me and knew they were hurting, so he joined Rose and I, and walked with us.

Suddenly having two conversation partners made the entire thing ten times better. I was able to focus on something other than the pain, even as they both reassured me it would get better. It's always nice to hear that from someone other than yourself, even if you're not sure it's true. And surprisingly, by 2.5 miles, the pain had eased off enough that Scott and I went back to short run/walk intervals. Thankfully, I finished up at a run and saved my pride from further bruising.

Here's the thing about Team in Training: these are some of the nicest, most welcoming people I have ever met. And I really don't like people. They are all about support. So as I, the last participant to finish the pace assessment, crossed that imaginary finish line, there was a very large group of people cheering for me. I wanted to crawl into a cave, I was so embarrassed. I did not feel like I deserved any sort of praise or celebration, but that didn't stop them. Each one of them were so earnest in their assurances that it's all about enduring and leaving room for improvement that I left practice aching, sweaty, and ready to keep on going.

So, while the pace assessment might have felt like torture, there is nowhere to go but up. I'm not going to be automatically good to go and I will struggle again, but I'm lucky to have people who will cheer and encourage me, even when I'm the last person to drag myself over the finish line.

Here's to the team, and to better practices to come.