Yesterday morning at precisely 7:00 am I found myself standing in the middle of the intersection of 8th and Broad Street surrounded on all sides by my fellow man. It was an unnerving feeling, the kind of which I have spent a lifetime trying to avoid. It occurs to you that you are as trapped as it is possible to be. At the point of maximum claustrophobia, an eleven year old girl began belting out the National Anthem through an on-again, off-again microphone. To take my mind off the uncomfortable presence of so many people, I began taking a video of all of them. At the exact moment that my panning cellphone camera caught my own face, the poor girl’s microphone stopped working for the first time. My expression pretty much sums up the level of my discomfort.
Soon after, my 8k race began. I stumbled along for several hundred yards trying not to trip or be tripped by the million other feet competing for pavement. About the time I passed Miller and Rhodes—less than a quarter of a mile in to a five mile race, I realized I had to pee. For the rest of my race, instead of visualizing the finish line, I was visualizing a porta-john.
This was a first for me in many ways, not having to pee, but running in a race. Not only had I never run a race, I had never even run with a single other person before, running for me being a solitary exercise I have always done for the single purpose of not gaining a hundred pounds. But several months ago, my son talked me in to doing the 8k version of the 2022 Richmond Marathon. He was planning on flying in from Nashville for the half-marathon and thought it would be fun. Soon, my nephews Ryan and Isaac were on board. It would be Team Dunnevant.
So, I spent the past several months “training”, not an official training protocol devised by Runner’s World, but rather a hodgepodge of my own creation, since I have never liked anyone telling me what to do. During this very unscientific training the best time I had managed for five miles was 47 minutes and 28 seconds. But yesterday wasn’t training, it was the real thing…and I had to pee.
My Apple Watch informed me that my first mile came in at a brisk 9 minutes and 5 seconds. I was quite surprised since it felt like I spent that entire mile trying to find a less crowded piece of asphalt. When the second mile time was announced as 9 minutes and 8 seconds, I thought that I should probably slow down since this seemed an unsustainable pace. The next two miles were mid 9 minutes. But when I crossed the 4 mile marker, something happened to me. Although my hips and knees were loudly barking, I knew from the race map that I had studied carefully, that the last three quarters of a mile was straight down hill on 5th street all the way to the finish line on Brown’s Island. That’s when I made the decision to break into a full sprint, or what passed for a full sprint for a 64 year old man who had already run over 4 miles. I crossed the finish line with an all-time personal best time of 45 minutes and 44 seconds. Then I promptly threw up. But, by the time I saw the large row of porta-Johns in the distance, all was forgiven and forgotten!
Meanwhile, the younger members of Team Dunnevant were busy. I soon found Ryan, who had beaten me by 4 full minutes, walking around the post-race hospitality area looking fresh as a daisy. Youth is indeed, wasted on the young! Isaac, the baby of Team Dunnevant and easily the most fit was flying around his half marathon course like making us all look like slugs. “Youth”, again being served. My son, meanwhile, was at the 5 mile mark and on a terrific pace. I was tracking his progress on an app he had downloaded on my phone the day before. Seeing as how he and Isaac still had quite a ways to go, I decided to head back home, shower off then head back later to be at the finish line for Patrick. In a cruel ironic twist, I received a text from Patrick around mile 7 telling me he was fighting a couple of cramps. He hates running when its warm. His last half marathon was in Nashville last November when it was a crisp 28 degrees at the start of the race. The heat was giving him a lot of discomfort and he still had another 6 miles to go. What made this text cruel and ironic was the fact that I received it while I was soaking in my jacuzzi, giving me a big time case of “dad-Guilt.” The good news is that Patrick gutted it out like a boss and was running at the finish line. I was super proud of him for his toughness and determination.
Since this was Team Dunnevant we are talking about, Pam and Paula had prepared an after race high carb brunch and photo-session for all the participants.
I was told after the race that the 8k had 86 runners in my age division, which was 60-64. I finished 17th. I’ll take it, even if it resulted in vomiting.
Patrick is already urging me to consider stepping up to a 10k with the not so subtle reminder that the Rock and Roll Nashville 10k is coming up soon. I’m going to wait until every joint from hips to ankles isn’t hurting before making him any promises.
