An Ode to Discomfort

Life does not provide a final finish line. There is no end to discomfort until the cessation of life itself. If a cool breeze braces your cheeks at the end of a competition, you should still anticipate the turbulent storm that is bound to follow.

I think most adults believe the act of growing up deserves them a lifetime of ease and painless sustenance. In the west particularly, adults tend to shun struggle, believing the rest of their years should be lived without pain. They “deserve” comfort, they seem to tell themselves. It’s somehow a reward for “struggling through youth.” So, they seek air conditioning, the drive-through, the chair, booze, television, gluttony, and phones. They adult bicycle collects dust if its owner fears the dirt outside. It is those who embrace the chaos outside who last the longest.

I try to avoid comfort as though it’s a disease I wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot pole. I aim to thrive in chaos and live well in the maelstrom. Pain is a necessary part of living and the precursor to growth. Without pain there is no life.

How have I embraced pain lately?

Somehow I managed to bike ten miles home immediately after breaking my collarbone and hitting my head hard enough to not know what year it was.

I bike commuted 20 miles to work in sub-zero temperatures winter mornings over the past few years, while gusts of wind sometimes rocked me with sleet. I learned to change tires on the side of the road while my fingers numbed.

Tolerating pain helped me train for a marathon while my right arm was still broken and unable to swing naturally in stride.

I finished a long run after my face was stabbed by a tree branch (and drove myself to a nearby Urgent Care to have my face stitched afterwards). I laughed as the nurse stitched me up. I now embrace this scar, whereas many would be “distraught by the imperfection.”

It’s why my old teammates at the University of Texas called me “The Manimal.” They knew I can absorb higher loads of pain than most.

My tolerance for pain helped me learn to run after 36 years of just swimming and lifting, and it’s how I ran my first marathon at age 37. To get back in the pool and beat people my age at swim meets seemed too easy. I wanted more discomfort.

When a car hit me in 2021 and tore up my right foot, I shrugged it off and decided that I’d eventually return stronger than ever. I’d run faster than ever as a final revenge to that shitty driver.

I don’t believe a pain-free day will arrive, nor should it, and I try to embrace pain’s inevitable return. I can’t rest on my laurels.

Discomfort keeps me honest. It keeps me strong, alive, and fiery. It is the best friend I’ve ever had.

Know Yourself

I run along a small section of the Riverfront Trail several mornings a week. It’s a one-and-a-half mile straight path, paved along the Mississippi River, spread directly in front of the St. Louis arch.

On this path, someone spraypainted “Know Yourself” in bold and colorful font on some raised cement barriers. It’s probably been there for years. I cross it on almost every run and on some days, if I’m feeling spry, I jump over it.

I think that knowing yourself is a challenge on two fronts. First, it takes courage to test your mental and physical limits. You have to pass a threshold to know where the threshold lies, and that involves pain. Significant, significant pain. Second, knowing yourself means confronting your dark side, and that takes courage. Just look to Luke Skywalker or Jung for reasons why. The dark side is an ugly place and a convenient one to turn a blind eye towards. I’m not sure most are willing to look at their demons with eyes wide open. The dark side of the human soul can reach horrifying depths, but overcoming one’s dark side first requires accepting its existence and seeing what lurks there.

Knowing yourself, the good and the bad, probably nurtures some self-confidence. It leaves you impervious to external remarks because you create your self-perception internally. Verbal attacks tend to hurt most if you accept them as reality, and you’re more likely to accept any opinion if you don’t know who you are. If what your attacker says is true, but you recognize it as true and have already confronted it within yourself, you can shrug off the attack. That’s essentially how Eminem’s character won the rap battle at the end of 8 Mile.

Recently I told someone that one of my goals with endurance running was longevity: that I want to keep running and cycling into my 80s and even 90s. That’s the truth, besides simply enjoying the exercise: I do it because I want to live. The races are just a fun bonus. I was laughed at for saying that. Well, what can ya do? Everyone has haters. “You run marathons for longevity!? Yeah right.” Later in the conversation I was sarcastically called “Longevity Matt.”

It would be easy to feel offended by the skepticism, but I shrugged it off. I know what I want well enough to discard external critics. Maybe five years ago I’d have taken it personally. Age has at least given the gift of “knowing myself” better, and knowing yourself begets wisdom.

I can only conclude that literally jumping over physical barriers, especially barriers with a message such as “Know Yourself,” is a healthy daily ritual.

Running 20 Miles

Today I hit what was probably my best run yet. My coach assigned me a two hour and thirty minute run, with about 45 minutes of it at marathon goal pace. I’m late in my training cycle, which means I’m doing a higher percentage of event-specific work. This equates to a lot more “goal marathon pace” runs.

The run ended up being just over 20 miles (32 km), the longest run of my life. Better yet, it felt pretty good. By pretty good I mean, body parts weren’t straining, tearing, cracking, wobbling, or shutting down, and I also didn’t lose consciousness. I’d be lying if I said I hit mile 20 and said out loud, “damn do I feel great!” So good is a relative description of feeling as far as 20 mile runs go.

Adaptation to long runs is a slow process. I didn’t get to this marker overnight, though it may seem that way since I just started blogging about my running journey. I’ve jogged routine 5ks for years upon years. Last year I finally built up to a half marathon; a marathon is simply the next logical step.

My marathon preparation, like many things, is partly a result of COVID. With everything shut down, I was fortunate to realize the value of being outside. I needed the outdoors because the claustrophobia of being inside with little interaction was suffocating. And what better way to explore the outdoors than to learn how to run and ride a bike?

I felt light on my feet the first two miles and knew pretty early that this would be a good session. By “light on me feet” I mean that a brisk pace (for me) felt effortless. Some days you feel like you’re floating. Others, like you’re Atreyu’s horse from Neverending Story, Artax, drowning in quicksand.

I crossed the Saint Louis Arch around mile 1, descended via an inclined walkway down to the Riverfront Trail below it, and then embarked on what is essentially a long 9 mile stretch north alongside the Mississippi River (and back). There are some brief-yet-steep hills during the first few miles, but the rest of the path is mostly flat.

I remembered to wear sunscreen this time after the pale winter sunlight managed to burn me the week before (courtesy of Nordic ancestors). Three hours later and I see no signs of sunburn, so that’s good. Nothing like telling people you got burned by running on a Saturday morning during winter.

I practiced fueling again; I took one gel before starting the run and an additional four gels during the run, each separated by about three miles. This time I wasn’t hacking my lungs out due to the gels’ gooey substance, so that’s also good.

I averaged sub-7 minute miles on my marathon goal pace, and that’s great for me. Granted, I overdid the effort a little. My ideal pace for a marathon should be about ten seconds per mile slower than what I hit today. I was a little overzealous. Sometimes though, you just need to know your limit and take a risk. I learned that as an elite swimmer. I was glad that I held a steady pace and finished strong.

The final two miles were odd because by the time I returned to the Arch, it was flooded with tourists. Some of them were more than happy to take up the entire walkway while strutting by in large groups without giving so much as an inch of space for a lone runner. They typically do this because they’re staring at their phones while walking. Other tourists would stop and take photos on the “far side” of the walkway so that you inevitably run through their shot.

One angry Karen-like woman who was in the process of taking a photo of the Arch even managed to bark at me while I ran, “Stay out of my shot!” I kept running and smiled. Note that I was on a walkway with nowhere else to go, unless I turned around, which I was definitely not going to do. Also note that the Arch is an inanimate object that will not move an inch within the next century. The “shot” wasn’t exactly going anywhere.

On a side note, if you aren’t sure what a “Karen” is… Wikipedia defines it as “a slang term for a white woman perceived as entitled or demanding beyond the scope of what is normal.”

I believe it’s important to ignore miserable people rather than let them suck you into their abyss of gloom. Emotions are contagious. If you’re happy and have a strong enough reality in which your happiness resides, you’re likely to make a lot of people around you happy. If you engage with anger, you’ll create more anger. That’s just how the universe works, or at least from what I’ve seen. So I deflected the comment and kept running. It was too nice outside to deprive myself of joy. And hey, if you can’t wait two seconds for a runner before taking your precious little photo of an inanimate object made of steel, learning some patience might be of benefit. Just saying.

So I finished my 20 miles and my legs felt thankfully healthy. I’m four weeks away from my first marathon and I can feel the excitement building. I have a goal time, but to be honest, I’ll just be happy to cross the finish. I think that alone will be a remarkable experience.

Marathon Training Update

I’m one month away from running my first marathon. It’s been a journey and I think that I’m adapting to endurance running well.

Last Saturday was my longest run yet—a 19.6 miler (31 km) along the Riverfront Trail near downtown St. Louis. It was a stellar run that I really should be thrilled about (I think at the end I was too tired to be thrilled). The first seven miles were supposed to be relatively easy, followed by another seven-ish miles at marathon race pace. The remaining miles were easy again.

The first seven miles featured some of the breeziest sub-8 minute mile running I’ve done. I felt light and lithe, and the running felt effortless, like I didn’t have to force anything. That’s the best feeling; it erases all mental stress of “hitting a pace right.” As a swimmer, it’s what you hope to feel during warmups before any big race. Thanks to my swimming days, I know that this typically means I’m due for a good day. Note that it isn’t always the case, but it does tend to be.

The seven miles at marathon pace were difficult, and I may have overstrained a little in an attempt to keep the pace under 7 minute miles. However it was also less strenuous than the week before, which is a good sign because the duration was also longer. The week before I had about 4 miles at marathon pace. Next week I should dial back the effort on marathon pace so that it actually resembles my marathon pace. Note to self.

The run took me all the way to the Riverfront park, approximately 9 miles north of my apartment, before I turned around. I was alone on the trail with the exception of a few cyclists. The sun was surprisingly strong, which I didn’t fully grasp until my sunburn settled in afterward.

One thing noteworthy about this run was the accumulated fatigue that became more noticeable in the final miles. Although the final miles were supposed to feel easy, my legs felt heavier and their joints more strained. If I felt like a spring for the first seven miles, I felt like a dump truck full of bricks on the final 5. To me, this is the point of these long runs: to adapt the legs to these distances. The final miles hurt, at least for me. I was a swimmer and before last year, I had never completed a run of more than 5 miles. With each of these long runs I’m literally entering uncharted territory.

The good news is that with each long run, the fatigue hits me at a higher mileage. The first long run introduced me to “leg shutdown” around mile 10. Then 12, then 14, and now 16. So it seems that with each successful long run, I’m afforded an additional two miles before extreme fatigue settles in and slows my pace to a halt. With only a month left, the final two miles of the marathon (26.2 miles) will probably hurt no matter what I do.

The other purpose of these long runs is figuring out how to fuel. I’m a hair shy of 6’5”, which means that I inevitably need more fuel than most people. I’m pretty sure the average marathon runner is a good deal shorter than me. My plan on that last long run was to attempt to digest five gels, as well as about a liter of water. I find that whenever I take more than three gels on a run, the gel’s substance seems to stick a little in the back of my throat, which forces me to cough. On this run I was coughing every minute for the final 9 miles of the run. That’s pretty damn annoying and a sign that I might need a different brand of gels.

The morning after that long run, I had an easy 10-mile jog with my running group. I held pace with little strain, which is also a good sign; it means I rebounded pretty well. I then took Monday off and on Tuesday had a high-intensity session. The main part of that “high intensity” workout involved two 10-minute threshold runs, a recovery, and five 2-minute fast runs. I hit my highest speeds yet. As in, the highest speeds I’ve ever hit in my life. Pretty cool for a dude turning 38 this year. Again, it means I’m not too broken down from endurance running six days per week. I’m in a good position for being a month away from the marathon.

Marathon training has to be a personal journey. The motivation has to be internal because truly I’ve found that people around me generally don’t really give a damn about it. Even if they do, they probably don’t understand the magnitude of what it requires. Most don’t know how many miles a marathon actually is. Some people do care I guess, but really, you have to prepare for a marathon because you love running or it won’t be sustainable.

“Oh, you’re running a marathon? Well don’t get hurt.”

“Why do you want to run that many miles?”

“I can hit that mileage in my car.”

These are the sorts of responses I often get. I could lash back, which the athlete in me often tells me to do. “Don’t get hurt walking up the stairs, wuss.” “I want to run that many miles because I know you can’t.” “Have fun sitting in your car for a lifetime then; I’m sure that’ll keep you healthy.” However to do so would be petty and pointless.

I look to role models like Tom Brady and how he handles his critics. Brady handles every criticism with grace. He shirks off their condescending remarks with a smile and continues doing what he enjoys, critics be damned. He responds with class and consideration. It’s a brilliant way of interacting with opponents. Brady knows that the best way to lash back at an opponent is to show that you aren’t phased by that person. Happiness is the ultimate weapon, and that’s one of the many reasons why Brady always seems to win. Brady’s enemies just can’t bring him down to their level.

One more month and I’ll be scratching “ran a marathon” off the bucket list…

The Long Run

Saturday was my longest run to date: 17.75 miles (28 km), with about 30 minutes of it at my goal marathon pace.

The mind, like the body, can wander to distant places during a run of this duration. I found my own thoughts bouncing between old memories and an acute attention to the present moment.

I ran along the Riverfront Trail and noticed that although the trees are still barren—they stand like an endless army of crooked dead things lining the Mississippi River—there are some animals returning. This is a precursor to spring. I saw some American robins hopping around in the grass, for example. I haven’t seen those little birds in that area for several months, though I’m sure they’re elsewhere in the city.

The second half of this run was against a harsh wind that blew northward. I ran directly south for almost 9 miles to return home. In times like this I suspect it’s less fun to be tall.

I felt fresh at the end and finished my run with plenty of energy remaining in my tank. I try to finish most runs feeling this way. If you deplete your system too severely, you may sacrifice too many future workouts for an exercise to be worthwhile. At times that may be okay: you have to cross your threshold to know your own boundaries. I’ve been beyond those boundaries enough times to have a good balance now. Still, I do find myself willing to cross it on occasion. It can be a nice reminder that I’m alive.

One thing that keeps me running is my appreciation for the running community. Events can barely feel like a competition between people because most runners tend to support one another. I’ve often seen runners who’ve finished ahead of me remain at the finish line, cheering for me and the others as I complete my own journey.

I really enjoy being a part of this sort of culture, especially as someone who primarily runs and bikes for the sake of longevity. It is a competition that elevates everyone and is a far cry from the stereotypical “cutthroat” American work culture competition, in which every victory must come at the expense of another (running is, at its heart, a sort of spirited rebellion against the adult status quo).

This mutual respect and desire to see everyone succeed also makes participation in running events more sustainable, which is exactly what I’m looking for: something to keep my adventures active for decades. Who wants to finish an event feeling both crushed and beaten? Running a distance event is itself a significant victory. Most of your coworkers probably couldn’t dream of walking as far as you just ran. As far as I’m concerned, you are a champion.

While peers hobble around with first-world conveniences and wax nostalgia for “youthful” days in which they moved with vitality, endurance runners seek the most treacherous mountain yet.

I suspect many runners are on similar journeys to me. I see mutual fighters against mortality, people seeking connection with an ancient part of human DNA. A long run therefore stretches to the extremes of past and future. It might be a search for answers to questions that can’t be articulated, and that’s okay: the odds of finding the answer were impossible anyways.

Footprints in the Snow

It has snowed twice in Saint Louis over the past ten days.

The first time, five inches were expected, but the clouds only delivered a light powdering over the streets coupled with some ice. I ordered some Yaktrax that were delivered the day before the storm and wore them for a morning run. The Yaktrax allowed good traction and I was never close to slipping.

As I darted back and forth along the Riverfront Greenway, I noted the tracks that my footprints left behind in the snow. These markers signify that someone ran through the inclement weather, though they’ll also melt and disappear in a day’s time.

Time will eventually erase my footprints, as it does all things.

I had abandoned most, if not all, of the athletic footprints I’ve left behind. As an elite level swimmer I won hundreds of medals and trophies, some of them at the NCAA, national, and international level. I also lost most of them, if not all of them. My reasoning for tossing them is that I never felt it’s healthy to cling to something in the past. I want to constantly be forging ahead, and I aim to direct my thoughts more on what’s next than on archived text.

I’m actually keeping some of my latest running medals though. Last weekend I ran a personal best 15k, and within the race I had a personal best 5k and 10k. Improvement is fun at any age; it’s also possible at any age, though not in any activity.

Now that I’m more than 15 years removed from swimming, I see how memories and times steadily fade. I found myself Googling some of my past accomplishments that I had forgotten. How did I forget that I was voted most valuable swimmer after my freshman year of college? I think I forgot about that within a year of finishing school. Maybe it doesn’t matter, but it’s interesting that it happened. I see now that having a visible signifier of some of these things may keep them in my memory longer, and without memory we have no identity.

I recall visiting my old college coach in 2015. My final record (for an 800 yard freestyle relay) had just been broken; it had stood on a wall of my old collegiate swimming pool for more than seven years. At the time it was an American and NCAA record. He had the record in his office, a long strip of cardboard that was previously affixed to the pool record board. He gave the cardboard strip to me. I’ve since lost it and wish I hadn’t.

The cynic in me may say that a medal is nothing but a chunk of material to be ultimately tossed by someone else when I’m permanently gone. Everything that remains after I’m gone, in fact, would be a heap of donations and disposal for those who are left behind. There is some truth to this.

However, the optimist says that a medal is a footprint left in the snow, and by maintaining it the snow may melt a bit slower. It’s true that the footprint will fade, but I might as well cherish it while it remains. One doesn’t need to obsess over something to cherish it. The trash heap can wait a few more decades.

Our footprints in the snow are nice reminders of great adventures.

Braving the Cold

Much of the United States had a record cold temperature this week and a blizzard to compliment it. It was a rare “white Christmas”, one of the few that I’ve experienced.

I embarked on long runs on both Christmas Eve and Christmas in spite of brutally cold temperatures and icy conditions. The ground was coated with ice and powdery snow, and the winds were harsh, but I ran regardless.

To many this probably seems reckless. My broken collarbone is still healing, and the cold seems to dig into the bone itself. The slightest gust of wind triggered pain where the break once was. It was an uncomfortable sensation that I hope isn’t permanent.

I risked falling again because I find myself needing the movement. I was cautious though; I ran at a slower pace than usual and slowed to a near-halt when the ground looked slick. I didn’t fall, though on a few turned corners I slid a little.

I continue with my physical therapy. If all goes well, I only have three more weeks. My physical therapist was shocked yesterday at my fast rate of healing. Of course there are still issues, but for only having been seven weeks since the collarbone break, my arm is doing well. I’m raising the arm over my head comfortably now, lifting light objects, and opening heavy doors without fear. I’ll be back on the bicycle very soon.

We can only change so much. I was the sort of kid that saw a hill and mostly wondered how fast I could sprint down it, and the attempt often involved a fall. If I am being honest, when I see hills I still think the same way. Whether on a run or a bike ride, there is a need for speed that I can rarely tame.

I have three prominent new scars from the last bike crash. The most severe scar is on the right shoulder; it will never vanish completely. That crash saw me land on the right shoulder, which is what caused the collarbone to snap. I will start putting vitamin E oil on the scar to minimize the appearance. The other scars are on my right hip and leg. It was initially fearful that I broke three bones: my collarbone, hip, and right femur. However, only the collarbone actually broke. The other bones were severely bruised but stayed intact.

A colleague once told me that I was insane for cycling in cold weather. Exercising in the cold, however, is laughably easy if you have the right apparel. I had to bite my lower lip to prevent a harsh response. I think it’s insane to let the body languish without movement and natural sunlight “because it’s a little cold outside.” It’s even more insane to avoid doing something that you enjoy. Cold is just discomfort; there’s nothing crazy about being willing to experience discomfort. Without discomfort there is no adaptation, and an organism that refuses to adapt will perish under the slightest of disturbances.

Intentional discomfort is not the norm in modern culture. The norm is office cookies, heated car seats, social media grandstanding, and fake pleasantries. Some of these things may be harmless in small doses, but all are crippling as “norms.” None of these strengthen you (maybe cookies if you are preparing for hibernation).

I ran a total of 18 miles (29 km) between Christmas Even and Christmas alone. It isn’t the most I’ve ever run in two days, but considering the harsh weather we’ve had, I think it’s enough. I built up my mileage a little too quickly, which caused a shin splint in my right leg about two weeks ago, but fortunately this splint seems to be subsiding now. I am pretty well acquainted with pain at this point. A splint is the least of my worries.

“Swimming would be very good for your collarbone and shoulder when you’re ready,” my physical therapist told me. “It will help you get your strength and range of motion back.”

I haven’t swam much the last few years, but I do think it will help me regain my range of motion.

In the meantime, I’ll continue running in the cold.

Too Much, Too Soon

5 am. A steady rain pattered the concrete around me as I embarked on a morning run. A haze crawled through the downtown area and only the street lamps provided halos of illumination.

I was supposed to perform a 12 minute all-out effort after a 15-30 minute warmup. The day before I felt decent, but had a slight ache in my left knee and felt what could be a nascent shin splint in my right leg.

After a mile of warm-up I realized the pain was only worsening. The shin splint stabbed inside my leg. My left knee was visibly swollen and barely bending. I attempted a few 80 yard accelerations, but was unable to gain full-speed on any of them.

As I attempted one final burst of speed in my 12 minute run, I felt an additional twinge of pain in my collarbone (the one that broke). I knew that I was toast for the day. The body had enough.

In short, I reaped the consequences of attempting too much, too soon. I walked about a mile back to my apartment in the rain, completely unable to run.

How did this happen? Well, I was essentially bedridden for a month, and had attempted runs of one hour or more for 5 days a week immediately upon being cleared by an Orthopedic to run again. Obviously, this was not feasible at all.

It was a difficult experience for me; before the collarbone break I ran almost daily for 8 months with almost no issues. Suddenly it felt like my body was crumbling.

In a sense my body was crumbling. A collarbone break affects a wide range of upper body movements; I’m still severely limited in what I can do with my upper body. The lower body, unable to perform strength exercises, lost a lot of whatever adaptation to running I had accumulated.

By attempting too much running too soon, I invited a host of issues into my lower body. I have no choice but to take a step back.

I’d say that this is a lesson learned, but in truth I’m not sure. Time well tell. It has historically been my nature to overdo things. The blog title is “Maximal Matt,” not “Precautionary Matt.”

Sometimes I wonder if the end of me will come from an attempt to overdo an activity. Maybe it will be a 90-year-old attempt at an ultramarathon or a 100-year-old attempt to bike across the United States. This would be one of the more virtuous ways to go out in my opinion. The way I’ve always seen it is that you don’t truly know your limit until you’ve crossed it.

I crossed my limit the last two weeks; it hurts because as much as I want to attain the distances I feel that I’m capable of running, I know that this phase of running will have to be a slow build from a much smaller starting point.

When gloomy, I look for inspiration in runners who know how to always find joy in the experience. Camille Herron, the 100-mile world record holder for women, always seems to be smiling, even 80 miles into a treacherous trail run. Joy is possible, even in the suffering of it all.

Maybe I can’t run one hundred miles tomorrow, but I can still potentially enjoy the one that I can manage.

Getting Back Up: Returning to Running

I just completed a full week of running. I broke my collarbone on November 6th and completely avoided exercise for the rest of the month; I believe that healing something like a bone break requires as much rest as possible. In that timespan I lost a considerable amount of conditioning and mobility, especially in the arm attached to the broken bone.

I still have a lot of physical therapy to go before I’m “fully active”, but it does feel great to resume running. I notice my collarbone more often than not, but the pain is never more than a dull ache.

I’m beginning a buildup towards a marathon. I was asked by a friend if, considering the collarbone break, I intended to cancel my marathon event. The answer is, “Definitely not.” My marathon isn’t until the beginning of April. I tell myself that people have bounced back from worse. This is true. Hell, Bane broke Batman’s back and he still managed to heal and return for another fight.

There are some issues that I’ll have to deal with over the next few weeks. One is that for the next month or so I’ll need to sacrifice strength training for physical therapy. That’s just how it is. We only have so much time in the day. Strength training can enhance endurance running performance, but the difference is negligible compared to time devoted to actual running. I’m just glad that I can run right now.

My marathon training plan focuses my first few weeks on a specific running duration, with runs held mostly to a “perceived effort” intensity of “5 out of 10” or lower. This is part of a phased approach to training. The purpose of the first phase is to focus the body on adapting to a higher volume. I’m lucky that the first phase of running is mostly at a low intensity: I wouldn’t want to do much sprinting right now anyways, nor do I think it would be a good idea.

On Saturday, I did participate in a Saint Louis running event—a 12k run—in order to work on my pacing. Having been immobile for a month, I tempered my speed expectations and made the goal of this event to pace my run well. I did manage to do this. I negative split the run (the second half of my run was faster than the first half), which is the first time I’ve managed to do this at an event. If there is a “lesson learned” from the event, it’s that I switched to a faster gear of speed a little too soon; the final half mile was absolutely hellish.

I followed that event with a slow-paced one hour and 45 minute run this morning. And wow was it slow. However, it wasn’t as slow as the same run I did the week before. That’s a good sign; it means that I’m progressing, not regressing, and my conditioning is improving.

I’m happy with where I’m at, all things considered. It could always be worse. The collarbone broke, but the bone could have struggled to reattach. It could have required surgery. I could have ruptured a tendon, or suffered long Covid. I still don’t recommend breaking your collarbone—attempting to sleep is absolute hell—but there are worse injuries (though admittedly not that many).

Though bone breaks are never fun, I have no choice but to remain an optimist. Life’s too short not to find a reason to smile. Each injury makes me appreciate health that much more.

Health is a finite thing, a resource far more scarce than oil or gold. Bodily attrition continues gradually and eventually loses to the onslaught of maladies trying to break in. There comes a day when no Trojan Horse is necessary to enter; the gates collapse with the final push of Father Time. Yes, our days are numbered, so I find it purposeful to spend them doing the things that I enjoy.

The Expense of the Present

I had a dream last night in which I was on a party boat, somewhere near a far-off Pacific island, along with several coaches and teammates from my adolescence. The boat skidded over the gentle waves of a clear blue Pacific towards an ethereal sunset. The sun washed everything in gold.

One of the coaches on the boat was an assistant swimming coach from when I was eleven years old named Will. I found myself telling him about my current training.

“I’m 37,” I told him, “And I’m wondering if I’ve had enough. I’m broken down, but I can still do it. And yet, what more is there to prove? I’m still performing at a high level at this age, but how much longer should I go?”

In the dream, it seemed, I was still competing as an elite level swimmer.

Yet the coach’s eyes were transfixed on the ocean, and he was barely paying attention. He didn’t care. Competition was a long time ago for him. He had moved on and shifted his priorities. Here, it seemed, the priority was to enjoy the beauty that the world offered.

“Should I compete another year?” I asked. I gazed around at the other coaches and teammates, but none of them paid any mind. They were relaxing and having some alcoholic beverages.

“I think I have another 42 second 100 yard freestyle in me,” I added. Yet no one responded.

“I think I can keep competing, but I’m tired. What am I chasing for? Should I go another year?”

Finally, another coached turned toward me and shrugged.

I looked down and realized that I was wearing competition apparel, whereas everyone else in the boat wore trunks and beach shirts.

Obviously my days as a competitive swimmer ended a long time ago, but currently I find myself building towards a marathon.

Maybe the dream was a reminder that a focus on the future, a focus on plotting and competing, must come at some expense of the present.

As I rehab this collarbone break, I find my mind often thinking of “getting the arm back to where it was.”

And what if it doesn’t? The ocean remains unchanged. The sun maintains its beauty. The coaches of the past do not cast judgment.

An aging athlete should not lose sight of the present.

Controlling Chance

There’s a desire in us to want control over a thing called chance. If you have mastery over chance, after all, you control your own fate.

How else can one explain the draw towards gambling, and the feeling of willing the cards into submission. “Luck is on my side,” we often tell ourselves, as though some deity named Fate is either an ally or a foe, and as though we can somehow bend the fabric of time and space in our personal favor.

It’s the desire to conquer chance that also leaves so many fearful of viruses, and so many obsessive with medicine. With the advertisements of a cure we see the means of preventing an arbitrary demise.

I also see signs of the human desire to conquer chance in the exercise industry. Athletes subscribe to every new fad and gadget possible in efforts to control their outcome. Dietary supplements, blood glucose monitors, ice baths, GPS watches, and VO2 Max machines are just some of the tools people use to control their outcome. I’m not criticizing these tools, as each of them can serve a useful purpose. I’ve used some of them personally. But with each of these “hacks” there is a desire to have control over one’s own outcome, to have finished the race before it begins, to watch the movie before the script is written.

It is this same burning desire to conquer fate that leads the modern Protestant-like athlete to overtrain. It is the overtrained athlete that sees success as a mathetmatical formula, as a means of “simply doing more at a faster pace.” The overtrained athlete wills his or her body towards a promised land, negligent of injury and pain perception. The watch shows a pace that must be maintained at any cost, on every day. Success is a matter of abiding by numbers.

It is this mentally that renders these types of athletes little more than the script in a computer program, rather than the programmer. The organic qualities of exercise are lost in an effort to gain power.

What is the solution? In my opinion, the solution is simple fun. It’s random, wild, and selfish fun. Exercise for the sake of joy.

Just watch kids exercise. They aren’t linear like adults. There is little planned because predeterminism is the enemy of a child, not the friend. Kids think little of athletic apparel, heart rate, or qualifying times. These are the dreads of the aged. And kids have something many adults don’t: smiles.

To relinquish control is a scary thing. However, as I’ve learned over the course of 37 years, we cannot control the future. We can make decisions that affect the future, but we never own rights to the final scene of the script.

We might as well enjoy what we have and save ourselves the existential dread.

Maybe luckily, I’ve never been good at gambling

Rehabilitation - Week 1

I started feeling significantly better approximately one week after the collarbone break. Though I cannot lift my bad arm over my shoulder, I am better able to extend the arm when it isn’t in a sling. Simple movements such as standing up and sitting down no longer hurt. Coughs and sneezes no longer send shockwaves of pain shooting through the shoulder and neck.

The key to recovery from injury is simple in summary and complex in execution: rest and sleep as much as humanly possible. I say that it’s complex in execution because adults have obligations. There’s a job to pay the bills, dishes to wash, clothes to launder, and errands to run. This is hustle culture, after all. “I’ll sleep when I’m dead” is the declaration of the productive. And yet obligations are typically hinged to stress. The body treats stress like it would any physical trauma. Therefore each stressor is a detractor from recovery.

I have to allow life to slow down a little. In order to heal the bone, I have to prioritize myself and my happiness.

Yesterday, meanwhile, I had a Zoom call with my upcoming marathon coach. I ultimately decided to team up with a coach because I have no running background and I’m attempting to cross personal uncharted territory. 26 miles is a long way to go for a swimmer who specialized in the 200 yard freestyle.

There was only one person I had in mind for coaching, and I’m happy with my choice.

Now is not a time for training. It’s a time for reposing, sleeping, and reflection. In the long run this is probably a good thing. I think we Americans overvalue work and undervalue rest. I had a long grind to the half marathons that I ran in October. The legs and feet needed a rest. With the extra rest, I also gain a few extra hours each day to appreciate the simple things.

I feel more comfortable resting at this stage in my life. My current training is a far cry from college athletics, where there’s a definitive ending to everything. Therefore, there is no rush to recovery. As a swimmer in college, I had four years to swim as fast as I could. The final times at the end of year four were final, and there would be no redos. Therefore, any significant injury could ruin everything. Worse, every vacation was equipped with the paranoia of losing a physical edge.

My timeline is stretched comfortably now. I look ahead in decades, not seasons. There is no specific time I have to hit and no deadline to hit it. I move for the sake of movement and joy. All times I strive for are arbitrary, and there is little pressure to hit them.

That in itself is reason to sleep comfortably.

The Halloween Half-Marathon

Following my San Diego half marathon, I needed about a week’s worth of physical recovery. The few jogs I did were light, easy, and brief. My legs were sore.

I couldn’t rest for too long though, because I signed up to run the Saint Louis GO! Halloween half-marathon just three weeks after San Diego. Running two half-marathons in three weeks is asking a lot from a body that has never run an event at that distance before.

So I took an easy week, followed it with a more traditional training week, and then followed that with a “taper” week.

I don’t consider taper to be recovery, though there is some recovery involved. It is a reduction in training volume, but the training conducted still has a focus on race-specific movement. Taper is the final tuning of the instrument before the symphony. The musician has already rehearsed and the dexterity has already been earned through hours of practice; there are just a few necessary tweaks needed to deliver a rousing melody at the right pitch.

As running is somewhat new to me, I had no idea if my plan would work, or if it was feasible to run a second decent half marathon within weeks of the first one.

Physically, I felt sluggish and lethargic until about three days before the Halloween half-marathon. I had about three days of decent sleep leading into the event and ate mostly natural foods between my events, however. It wasn’t until two days before the Halloween half that I believed it could be a pretty good run; I woke up one morning and suddenly felt like my usual self.

The hours leading to the start were a blur. I arrived at the race with my girlfriend (who ran it with me), stretched, had an energy gel, and lined up near the start line. I felt loose and relaxed. I promised myself that I would not take this race out too fast (I was out way, way too fast on the previous one).

The challenge with this event was that it mixed 5k, 10k, and half marathon participants in the same racing pool. So as bodies propelled forward at the start, I had no idea who was running what.

Another challenge was that this event featured much more elevation than the San Diego event via some brutally steep hills. Whereas my San Diego race had about 80 feet total of elevation gain, this was estimated to have 500 feet of elevation gain.

I felt the elevation during the first mile, which was up a steep incline. Runners shot forward at fast cadences.

Hold back, I told myself. Just hold back.

As my calves tightened and the hill ahead of me steepened, I slowed my cadence. People flew past me. This was alarming. The race was just starting, and I was falling behind. I decided I’d let them take the lead here. This later proved to be the right move. It was only one mile of more than thirteen, and were plenty more hills to challenge me.

I passed my first mile marker at 6:26. This was about 20 seconds slower than my first mile in San Diego. I felt fresh, though, in spite of the early hill. I had 12 miles to make up ground.

I accelerated downhill, letting my longer stride give an advantage as I loped downward, and passed a few runners.

Mile three saw another hill, this one longer and equally as steep. My lungs heaved more than I wanted them to. I knew that I was still off of my San Diego pace, but still, I had to let myself slow a little. So I did. Then, like after the first mile, I accelerated downhill.

Mile four, mile five, mile six. I made no moves. I didn’t accelerate, or really do anything interesting. I just sort of plodded forward. But my pace was pretty good, and that was enough.

At one point near mile five, my pace faltered and several runners passed me. I felt my legs tighten and my hear pump louder. Then I arrived at an aid station and grabbed some water. I recognized one of the volunteers at the station from my running group.

“Let’s go Matt, you’re doing great!” He shouted. Suddenly my pain evaporated and I accelerated forward. I was back on pace.

I am Virgo, so I studied the course before the event. I knew that the hills only encompassed the first six miles of the race. The next seven miles would be relatively flat. A successful race, I decided, would be dependent on feeling fresh for the final seven miles.

Mile six proved to be devastating. It was the steepest hill yet. Winding and twisting along streets that cut through a rural Missouri landscape, it stretched brutally upward and seemed to have no end. Was this a hill or a mountain? My pace slowed and alarmingly so. My legs grew heavy and suddenly it was like one of those bad dreams where you’re running from a threat, but standing in place. For a brief moment in time I was a full two minutes slower than my goal pace. A runner passed me. Still, the fatigue was mounting. I knew I had to risk a bad time and slow down.

Then we reached the hill’s apex, and I realized that I was quickly recovering, and before I knew it I wasn’t hurting all that bad. I accelerated downhill again and found myself running shoulder-to-shoulder with the runner who had just passed me.

“How you doing?” He said. I was out of breath and managed to say, “Not bad.” I’m sure my face said otherwise. That hill hurt. I felt confident that I had enough energy to finish the race, but damn… it hurt.

I regained the lead over him, determined not to let up my quickening tempo, but heard his feet padding the earth close behind me. We passed mile seven. Six miles to go. Now the race begins.

I checked my watch. I was now even with my San Diego running pace. In that event, my pace had slowed down by mile four. I was relatively steady today and making ground on that race. This meant I had a shot at a best time.

Mile 8, mile 9, mile 10. Flat earth ahead of me, edged by trees and walls of their yellow and orange foliage. Every mile looks like the one before. My legs steadily tightening. My cadence steadily slowing. What was effortless thirty minutes ago was suddenly a struggle. Suddenly the aches in my calves from the earlier hills are in pain. My breathing is heavier. Here we go. Just focus on getting through this mile.

Mile 11. I’m still in this. I no longer have an acceleration in me; the fatigue is too much. It’s a matter of maintaining pace now. I hear the familiar runner behind me speaking to me.

“Thanks,” he says. “Your pace is bringing out the best in me.” He’s hurting too.

“Likewise,” I reply. There are no losers here. I love the camaraderie. We want each other to succeed. “We’ll get to the finish and hug,” I say. And so we run on.

Mile 12. Where is my mind? It’s on my legs. I’m tightening too much. The pain is getting intense in my calves, and there’s nothing I can do about it. I try to change my running form a little so that I land on my heels, not my forefeet. Anything to keep the pain at bay. But that doesn’t work either, so I stick with what’s natural for me.

I’m forcing myself to keep pace, but my pace is still slowing. However, it’s not slowing as much as it did in San Diego.

The last mile. My running rival passes me. I have to let him go. I’m taxed. To try and stay ahead risks injury. Better to just chug along. Besides, if I leave a little reserve in the tank, I’ll have enough for another best time on the next run. But damn it hurts. My mind starts screaming, “Just walk it in!” But I know I can’t do that. I’m so close to making it. I won’t let it count for myself if I walk.

Suddenly a left turn and I see the inflatable arch at the finish. I’m right there. One more runner passes me, and I notice it’s someone in my running group. He’s a great guy, and I’m glad he makes it. I spring to life and pick up my cadence. I run through the finish line, then hunch over. I’m in serious pain; the final mile was a blur. Everything hurts. I can’t pinpoint any exact source of agony. I high five my running group partner. I exchange a hug with the other runner who passed me on that final mile.

“This is your first year running?” He says. “Damn, you’re a natural at these things.”

My final time was more than a minute faster than it was in San Diego. And in spite of a slowdown over the final mile, I paced this one better. It was a best time. More of a struggle, but a best time.

I finished second overall in my age group. Not bad for a swimmer! And there were over 800 participants.

I got a pumpkin pie as a prize. I then ate some donuts and had a latte. I made it. The season is over. The journey is complete.

My running quest ended with the fastest run of my life. I’m triumphant, or that’s how it feels. But what did I win? What happens after the curtains are drawn? Where to next? What’s the aftermath? What is the grand life epiphany? Have I solved some deeper existential crisis?

I have some water and note only my own worn body and a free pumpkin pie. But the fall air braces me and the smiles at the finish are contagious.

I wanted to prove that I could bounce back, that the car hit last year wouldn’t take me down, that I was still alive, and frankly, that I still had life inside of me. I wanted to prove that I’d return, and run farther and faster than I ever had in my life. This was a personal battle. I didn’t give a damn what anyone thought about it. It’s a good thing I don’t, because running at these lengths is very, very personal.

My previously injured foot feels good. I feel good. I’ll take a few weeks off of running before prepping for the full marathon though.

Until next time!

Moving Forward to Go Backward

I personally find distance running to be a means of reversing course through the act of going forward. I think that’s why so many people discover their passion for it after the age of 30.

Endurance running is an act of discomfort, and potentially agony. When completely focused on each stride, on one’s breathing, and on the immediate environs, I believe distance running steadily rips off the facade that we created via adulthood.

Humanity never needed to run a long distance as fast as possible until relatively recently in history. Maybe it’s a draw now because there’s too much comfort in our lives. Maybe we’ve realized that comfort doesn’t necessarily lead to happiness, nor does comfort provide any important answers about our existence. A virtual meeting doesn’t make us “happier” than a real one, and an electronic purchase doesn’t make us “happier” than a trip to the mall.

So what do we do to rediscover meaning? We brutalize our legs and feet in half marathons, marathons, and ultra marathons.

I think back to the way I ran when I was young. Running was spontaneous and wild, a series of zigzags with no destination and only reckless abandon. It had no splits, required no heart rate monitor, was free of charge (all you needed was functional feet), and lacked a coach. It was always equipped with something many adult runners lack: a smile.

I miss those days and sadly know that it will now be difficult, if not impossible, to recapture them. I sign up for events and note my speed, my stride, my cadence, and my total time. I calculate, though I am conscious of my calculations. I push myself to exhaustion in an effort to reach some sort of zenith that really means nothing to anyone but me. And yet I still chase it.

This type or running, however, is fun in its own right. The chase is worthwhile, and I’m currently not sure why. And in this more predictable and calculated path forward, I try to bring back that wild youth, that gunslinger who was willing to dare a burst of speed up or downhill, willing to jump over a fallen log or stop and note the wildlife lurking in the underbrush, willing to deviate from all expectations. I try to revert back by going forward. So maybe the best I can hope for is a mixture of young and old.

Still, in spite of a watch on my wrist, with each additional mile I find myself hoping to rediscover the lost in me.

Story of a Half Marathon

My first half marathon event is over.

I signed up for the Pacific Beach half marathon early this year. My brother and I signed up together; it was supposed to be our “misogi,” which is best described as a challenge that has at least a 50% chance of failure. I try to complete a misogi every year if I can. Why do a misogi? I believe that most of us are too comfortable. As we settle into adulthood, most of us make the pursuit of comfort a pursuit when in fact it should be the opposite.

I had never run more than 3 straight miles before this year and spent most of last year rehabilitating some torn ligaments in my right foot. So, I figured there would be a chance that this event would end with the dreaded “DNF” (did not finish). It seemed like a fitting misogi.

My running improved faster than expected this year, and by June I realized that completing the event would not be an issue. The event transformed from a misogi into a stepping stone for something else. I decided I wanted to run longer and give myself time goals. I wanted to run a marathon. Better yet, I wanted to run a marathon at a good clip.

Still, I needed to complete this half marathon first. This was an important marker for me. That’s why I logged as many running miles each week as I could muster and spent the week before the event mostly resting.

My brother and I arrived at sunny San Diego, California, on Thursday at dusk. The sunset was a beautiful strip of glowing ember, even at the airport, and a gentle breeze soothed me even though the prevalent stench of pollution and car fumes was far from balmy.

My clumsiest move of the weekend happened outside the airport. My water bottle fell out of my backpack as I exited the shuttle for the rental car agency. My foot then his the water bottle, rolled, and I fell back, flat on my ass. It was like something out of a bad comedy film. I was fine, so I had to laugh at myself.

We ate Thai food that night (I had a tofu bowl because I have been mostly eating vegetarian for the past few months) and stayed at an AirBnB located just one block from the beach. The sound of nearby ocean waves and the crisp coastal air prevented any anxiety about the half marathon.

The next day was spent relaxing and enjoying San Diego city. We started the day eating açaí bowls at a local coffee shop, slurping lattes, and having cold water baths in the ocean (the Pacific water is freezing).

I had a warmup jog along a trail on the beach that gave an excellent view of the sparkling light blue water and a nearby marina. In the distance I could see the rolling San Diego hills, which are dotted with homes and trees.

The jog was a “shakeout” run (just allowing for some bloodflow after a day in an airplane). I did feel my right hip after my clumsy fall the day before, but the pain wasn’t serious.

Later that day we visited San Diego zoo, where I finally saw some koalas in person. Koalas are animals I admire more than almost anything except for the almighty sloths for their calm demeanor and smart priorities (eating and sleeping). As a light sleeper, I find it to be a lifelong goal to sleep more like a koala.

The half marathon arrived before I wanted it to. We woke up early, around 4:30 am, to prepare for it (it was slated to begin at 6:30 am). I ate some granola and drank some electrolytes, along with a cup of coffee, and did about ten minutes of foam rolling. This was the day I had prepared all year for: my misogi.

I didn’t know how many people were participating in this event. I guessed beforehand that it would be about 200 or so, but this was a wild guess. How many people would actually sign up to run for more than 13 miles (21 km) early on a Saturday morning?

The route for the event went along Pacific beach in San Diego. That’s why I chose the event over any other (no offense to Saint Louis, but if you’re gonna be in pain, you should be in pain on a beach!).

My brother and I arrived at the start line; it was packed. There were easily over a thousand people (we later found out there were about 1,500 participants). Whoa. This was going to be bigger than I thought.

My race plan was to begin the first three minutes at a fast pace, much faster than my targeted average race pace, while my legs were fresh. After three minutes I would dramatically slow down to a more comfortable pace, and then slowly build back up again over the next 90 minutes of running.

I told most people that I didn’t have a time goal, but admittedly I wanted to break 1 hour and 30 minutes. This was a significant marker in my mind because it was the pace required to break 3 hours in the marathon. It would require running faster than 7 minutes per mile on average, which I figured would be a formidable challenge for someone’s first half marathon.

A surge of adrenaline poured through me as the event started. I found myself near the front as the race began. More than a thousand runners were behind me. My cadence was fast, much faster than I intended. I checked my watch: I was faster than 6 minute per mile. That’s way too fast, I thought. I tried to slow down a little, but the excitement was overwhelming.

The first mile was over and I was still near the front. My GPS watch beeped: 6:12 for the first mile. Crap, I thought. That’s way too fast. I didn’t slow down enough.

Maybe you can maintain, I thought to myself. I kept the pace steady. The race led me up and down some winding hills, the ocean edging the path to my right and a beautiful park to my left. The final mile of the race was on the beach itself and required running on sand. It would finish in the sand. I would collapse, having completed my 13.1 mile run, facing the ocean, and I would raise my fists towards the heavens in triumph.

Another mile ended. 6:13 for the second mile. I was still too fast: way, way too fast. My heart rate had elevated near it’s maximum capacity. That’s not a good sign, I thought. And still, the legs felt pretty fresh. But I knew that I needed to slow down. My mind knew that my body would shut down before the end if I kept it going. Collapsing was now a bigger risk than running a slow time.

I slowed my pace down about 30 seconds per mile and a few runners passed me. Still, I felt more comfortable. My breathing steadied. My eyes focused directly in front of me. I kept telling myself to run my own race. It means nothing if you don’t finish.

I crossed mile 3. 6:30 for the third mile. A little slower, but still not slow enough. I decelerated further. At mile four, another runner passed me. Then another. I stayed steady. The other 1,470 runners or so were still behind me. And I was on pace to break 1 hour and 30 minutes.

I refueled near mile five. Shortly before an aid station I reached for a gel packet that was stuffed in my shorts and managed to swallow its contents while running. The taste was bitter. I coughed; my throat itched from the flavor. I had never eaten a gel while running at this intensity. That lack of practice with fueling, I realized, was my first rookie mistake.

A few minutes later I started to cramp in my right side. I tried to stretch it out with my hand, while continuing to run, and took some especially deep breaths. Another runner passed me. He was younger than me and looked impervious to fatigue. We ran alongside each other for a few minutes. He could somehow tell that I was cramping.

“Are you okay?” He asked. My face was grimaced but the cramp was subsiding. “Yeah,” I managed to grunt. He nodded and continue on. So did I. I was fine. I’ve had worse cramps.

Just ahead I heard him cheering for some other runners. “You all look great, keep it up!” He said. That’s one thing I love about the camaraderie of these distance events. It isn’t so much a competition between people as it is a competition among people. And in that competition, everyone has only one opponent: themselves. It’s for that reason that strangers in the same race are willing to cheer for each other and lift each other’s spirits up.

I crossed 7 miles, past halfway, and my legs still felt pretty good. I swallowed my second of three gels in spite of my stomach telling me not to. Then I took a cup of water from one of the volunteers and swallowed what I could. I coughed a little out. “You look great!” A volunteer shouted. I wanted to shout, “Hell yeah!” But I was too occupied with coughing to speak.

Keep the rhythm, I kept telling myself. You trained to finish this. You trained to break one hour and thirty minutes, and you’re on track.

At mile 9, I had to cross over an arched bridge. It was the steepest incline of the race, and as I fought upward with my tired legs, I realized that my pace was slowing. I checked my watch at the top of the bridge. I had slowed to 7 minutes per mile in the upward trudge.

I tried to race downhill to gain back some speed, and felt myself accelerate a little. But the watch said I only accelerated to 6:40 per mile, and that felt like a sprint. The fatigue was officially settling in. Pain becomes a frequent visitor in the world of endurance running. You might as well consider it a guest resident.

Four miles left. You’ve run four miles so many times. I fought to keep my feet kicking up, and focused on just one mile, my sole focus on keeping its time faster than 7 minutes. I crossed mile ten: 6 minutes and 47 seconds. Success! But it required everything I had. It was a sprint, and it nearly depleted me. How was I going to do it again?

I needed to swallow my final gel, but I didn’t want to. My stomach felt bloated. Still, I knew that I needed fuel. I forced the final gel down my throat, a little worried that I might puke it back out. I didn’t puke it out, but my stomach was telling me, “absolutely no more gels!”

Time itself, as well as my pace, was slowing down. Mile eleven felt as long as the first five miles combined. The legs were now refusing to keep up the fast cadence I had established over the past hour. You’re so close, damnit, I thought. Just a few measly miles. You can’t collapse now.

The race rounded a bend in another park and on the other side was the final stretch of pacific beach. The next mile was on a walkway beside the beach and the final mile was on the beach itself.

Another two runners passed me, and I felt as though I was in a bad dream where you’re running through quicksand, or where you’re sprinting but barely moving.

“You’re doing great! You look great!” Volunteers kept saying. That had to be a lie. But, I was still maintaining, still holding on. I suddenly wanted to finish more than anything on earth. Still, I shuddered at the thought of seeing myself on video at this point.

I completed mile eleven and the time was 7 minutes exactly. I slowed a little, but not as severely as I feared. In fact, I was doing fine. And I knew that as long as I didn’t collapse, I would beat my goal time.

Where I once galloped, I was now shuffling. But I knew I had to keep going.

I passed the mile 12 marker and followed the race path as it crossed onto the vast sandy beach. The finish was in sight, just a few minutes ahead. Waves lapped the shore to my left. Spectators cheered to my right. From somewhere beyond the finish line, pop music blared and people were celebrating.

In my fatigue, my feet slipped and skidded over the sand. It was like a movie where the protagonist takes his last agonizing strides as he escapes a brutal desert.

My eyes locked on every step in front of me. I maneuvered toward the wet sand that lined the ocean because it was firmer and more packed. I skipped over seaweed and seashells. I thought of that game you play when you’re a kid, when you run along a sidewalk while trying to avoid the cracks.

What a fitting end to a half marathon, I thought. The run ends where life itself began: at the sea.

With just one minute of running left, another racer passed me. I was close enough to the end, though, that it was okay. Let’s just end this thing.

And then I crossed the finish line and heard my name announced. I raised a fist and smiled. Volunteers rushed to me and gave me water and a banana. I bent over, resting my palms on my knees. I wanted to go to sleep in the sand, right there, on the spot.

The final runner that passed me gave me a fist bump. Another of the runners approached me and gave me a hug.

“You had a hell of a run,” he said. “Taking it out so fast and somehow maintaining and finishing well. That’s impressive.”

And suddenly I wanted to cry. Instead I limped around and absorbed the moment. I made it. 13.1 miles. I ate a banana and waited for my brother.

My final time was 1 hour and 28 minutes. I was two minutes faster than my goal time. I placed 5th in my age group, which for a non-runner in his first half marathon, and in a field of 1,500 people, I figured was pretty damn good. I’ll take it.

And so, a new journey begins. I hope that race was the first of many. I finished a half marathon. A foot that a year ago seemed like it might never heal, held strong. I felt good. I felt happy.

My brother crossed the finish line having ran the entire event as well. It was the first time he had ever run that far.

We celebrated with Mexican food and a San Diego Chargers baseball game. The 2022 misogi is complete.

I have a full marathon next year. That will be quite a journey.

Soldier On

It seems fitting that Dave Mustaine, the frontman of legendary metal act Megadeth, just released what some critics are already calling his band’s best album since Countdown to Extinction. The guy has an endless supply of vigor and musical fervor. He’s survived decades in an industry that sees most rock acts dissolve in a blink. And if you thought that he might mellow with age, you were wrong. The new Megadeth album The Sick, The Dying… And The Dead! is as fast-tempo’d and furious as anything Megadeth has ever dropped.

Mustaine survived cancer; his purported 51 radiation treatments, coupled with the pandemic, seem to have redoubled his artistic flair, as well as his awareness of his own mortality.

One of my favorite tracks, Soldier On, is about the desire to persist in spite of anything, or anyone, that life hurdles at you. It’s about the simple need to keep going.

The song makes me think about why I embark on long runs. Why go so far? Why push past fatigue, mile after mile, hitting the earth with a force equal to up to five times the weight of my own body? Simply put, because it’s only when you exhaust yourself fully that you understand who you are. Maybe it’s another form of Tyler Durden’s treatment for materialism (“It’s only after we’ve lost everything that we’re free to do anything”).

As the miles pass, the logical mind takes a back seat and a more primordial self helms the vehicle that is you. Your trivial anxieties and plannings for the future, your dreads and longings for the past, and all that’s left of your ego can seem to dissolve.

You’ve peeled every layer from the past that piled onto you over the years, and at the core is just an organic being attempting to persist, attempting to push forward, one step at a time. And that experience reveals an important part of what the core of your being actually wants: to soldier on.

Party Like It’s ‘99

On Wednesday I finally saw Rob Zombie live for the first time. He was my favorite solo artist in high school and I still listen to his hits from time to time.

Rob Zombie is immortal. He possesses more energy and vitality than lead singers half his age. He’s highly mobile throughout his show and rocks the dance moves of a lithe professional dancer. He’s a perennial headliner for a reason. Viewing the elaborate stage setup at his show is like glimpsing into another gothic world. His bandmates are also perfectionists. John 5, the lead guitarist, is possibly the most skilled soloist I’ve ever watched. The guy can flat-out shred.

Zombie is currently 57 years old and looks as lean and fit as ever. He’s also vegan and has been vegetarian since childhood. This is noteworthy to me because most long-lived cultures I read about eat a relatively large portion of natural carbohydrates and a relatively lower amount of meat (not all, but most). I am not vegan, but I often consider this.

What was my takeaway from watching my teenage idol perform at a crowded amphitheater in front of thousands of fans? Love what you do.

Do I love what I do? I find myself yearning for my hours when I’m free. I love cycling and have gained an appreciation for running. I love connecting with other runners and cyclists who share similar goals, who find themselves aging, yet are eager to accomplish physical feats that they never have before. But that’s not what I do.

An aspiring marathoner told me on our jog last week that he’s training to “give his son a story of something that he accomplished.” That’s what I enjoy learning about: people on their journeys, and how those journeys parallel my own. What can I learn from them? How many miles can we actually crank out together? What is our true limit on this planet?

“Love what you do.” Watching Zombie was a reminder that I need to write more and create more content.

Progression Run and Memories

I embarked on my weekly “long run” this morning a little before 7 am. Tomorrow is July 4th, Independence Day.

The run totaled 12 miles. I kept my pace in a low heart rate zone for the majority of the run; I’m mindful of the human tendency to overdo exercises. I accelerated the final 25 minutes of the run, but felt relatively fresh at the finish.

I prefer having the majority of my long runs in a low heart rate zone because I find myself in a meditative state while running at a prolonged low effort. My mind wanders. There are no thoughts of physical pain or fatigue. This pace is my “forever” zone. It is a pace in which time ceases to exist. My sights are on my environs, not the ground beneath me.

For a brief moment I thought about what I surprisingly miss from living in China (I’m staying in the US, but I did get a lot of value from my time in China). There are several things I admittedly miss, but I’ll only detail one of those things here: the struggle of it all. Through the struggle of figuring out how to persist in China, I found meaning.

The temperature, for example, was almost never ideal. In the summers I baked due to a lack of air conditioning. In the winters I froze due to a lack of adequate heating. And yet somehow I adapted (or attempted to as best I could). It was that adaptation that strengthened me.

In the return to a world utterly obsessed with perfect temperature regulation, I’ve found both comfort and a relative emptiness. The A/C puffs a cool breeze that both soothes my skin and drains my soul.

Every now and then I’ll turn off the air conditioning and let my apartment’s temperature shoot up to around 80 degrees Fahrenheit. I try to remind myself that it’s discomfort that spurs growth, not comfort. I’ll let myself sweat it out at night.

I find “discomfort experiments” such as this worthwhile because I am building up to some extreme endurance activities. Endurance running and cycling require the ability to withstand and understand discomfort. So, I try to disrupt the status quo here and there. I think back to my life in China. I try to resist the innate temptation to overcompensate with comfort.

In China, my struggles were also exciting. The struggle to communicate, the struggle to eat adequately, the struggle to adapt. They caused stress and yet they enlivened me. I miss those things and more. I don’t plan to return to China, but these struggles taught me valuable lessons.

My thoughts of China were brief and mixed with several other random reflections.

Another thought I had on my trail run regarded the animals I often cross on my path. I’ve seen a menagerie of wildlife: geese, turkey, robins, crows, squirrels, rabbits, possums, and even a family of beaver. There is something deeply satisfying in crossing paths with these animals. I’ve gained a better understanding of some species-specific behavior. I’ve had a better glimpse of the world as it was meant to exist, outside the vice grip of the city.

Turkey, for example, are much flightier than geese, which will often “stand their ground” defensively. The turkey take off running.

I suspect that distance running is really about connectedness. You can’t find that on a treadmill. It’s about experiencing the earth’s surface, developing a relationship with it, and finding connection with nature. A treadmill is more of a torture device. I can’t run on those things for the life of me. They lack fun in every sense of the word.

Tomorrow is Independence Day. For the sake of memories I’ll post a photo that was taken about 4 years ago. This one still feels like yesterday. I feel like the thrill of it all captures how I think of my time in China, in general: exhilarating, nauseating, unique, and brief enough to feel like a dream.

I rode this in China and then fought to avoid puking for an hour afterward: