The Race

As the months count down to B’s high school graduation, I often find myself a bit teary eyed thinking about my son leaving home.  I am not ready for him to go.  I am going to miss seeing him each day, sending him off to seminary in the morning, and hugging him goodnight each night.   For me, every moment is now precious and I want to create as many memories as I can to hold on to when he is gone.

As my running buddy and I trained for our first 2 half marathons we developed a great friendship that was more rewarding than actually running the races.  Because of that, I realized that training and running with B would be an opportunity to spend time together and create some wonderful memories.  So, last spring, I asked him if he wanted to run a half marathon with me and he agreed.  Every other Saturday, through the summer, we ran our long runs together.  While we were running, I made a conscious decision to keep our conversations far from topics that could potentially end up confrontational.  Trying to get a teenage boy to talk isn’t always easy, but he did talk and we had some fun conversations as well as some more serious ones.  We got to talk about his strengths as an individual, the good things he is doing, and the potential he has to do amazing things with his life.  He also got to teach me about running.  He’s a great running coach.  Because he is so much faster than I am, I was always the one holding us back.  That created a wonderful opportunity for him to be the motivator, supporter and encourager.  Some of my favorite memories of this experience will be the many times he looked back on a hill to say, “Pump your arms more Mom and run on your toes.  You can do it.  Just dig deep.  Come on Mom.”  Or out on the flat when I would check our pace and we would be under 8 minutes/mile and I would say, “B, you are running my legs off” and he would reply with, “You can do it Mom.  Just keep up with me until we get to… and then we’ll slow down some.”  He taught me about how focusing on the number of steps to each breath in/out could help me push myself and monitor my performance level.  I can’t believe how much faster I became over the course of the summer because of his coaching and encouragement.

September 6^th was the big day…The Lake Placid Classic Half Marathon.  We drove up to B and L’s house Friday evening and then we all drove over to Lake Placid Saturday morning for the race.   R couldn’t come with us because he had to stay home for a football game but the girls came to cheer us on, and so did B and L. Mom and Dad extended their stay at B and L’s house so that they would be there for the race too.  That meant a lot to me.  You are never too old to want to have your parents watch you perform and be proud of you.

At the Olympic Skating Oval Before the Race

The Starting Line

At one point I had asked B if, when it came time for the race, if he just wanted to run it at his own pace?  He told me “no”, he was going to run it with me.  I had hoped that he would choose to run with me but if he wanted to try it for himself, I wanted him to have that opportunity.

We're Off

At 9 am we took off.  The course was beautiful with one really long down hill, some rolling hills through a canyon, and then a long and steep uphill at the end.

Coming down the big hill at mile 2.5

B got caught up in the moment (and because my pace is so easy for him) he really started pushing me.  I was wearing my GPS watch that tracked our pace and he was checking with me, quite often, to see how we were doing.  Our goal was to finish in under 2 hours.  I was pretty sure I could do it since, 2 weeks before the race, I had gone out on a Saturday, for a run, and ran 13.1 miles in 1:59:50.  On the day of the race, I was hanging in there and we were setting a really good pace until mile 10 and then I started dying.  We had to run 4 miles out through the canyon and then turn around and come back.  

Running in the canyon

High Five-ing our cheering team

On the way back, it was a head wind the whole way.  I was getting pretty tired and frustrated, but B kept trying everything he could think of to help.  He was awesome.  He tried drafting me, and when I kept complaining that it wasn’t working, he just kept encouraging me and trying again.  Finally he said, “Here, get in front of me” and then he ran behind me shouting encouragement.

 I was really intimidated by the final hill.  My legs were shot.  I just didn’t know how I was going to get up it.  As I was expressing these concerns to B, he kept telling me to dig deep and I could do it.  About half way up the hill and with more than another tenth of a mile to the top my pace was down to 12 minutes and 30 seconds per mile, a speed that we had been walking at earlier.  At that point I decided I might as well walk.  I told B that I was going to walk to the top of the hill and then I would run the last tenth of a mile to the finish.  He said, “Okay, I’ll see you at the top" and took off.  As I crested the hill, I saw him sprinting for the finish.  His time was 1:53:26

Enough energy left to leap over the line

I took off running again and finished at 1:54:40, 5 minutes and 20 seconds faster than what I had run on post and 26 minutes faster than my fastest previous race time. I was 6th out of 22 in my age group.

Pain 

More pain

B was grinning from ear to ear in all of the pictures we took after the race.  It was great.  The best part was that he ended up placing 2^nd in his age group.  He actually passed one of the people in his age group when he sprinted up the hill, earning him that 2^nd place finish.  I was so happy for him.  I told him that winning that award was his reward for service…for running and supporting his Mom.  What an awesome 1^st half marathon experience for him.  The day couldn’t have gone better.

I doubt that I will ever run that fast again and that is okay.  The time I turned in on this race was a team effort and I owe it all to my son!  He is the best running coach and best encourager.

Eating some BBQ after the race 

Belly is full, time for a nap