Tag Archive | cancelled races

The Ups and the Downs

Jun24

If 2020 were an object, it would be a pile of dog poop.   You would be hard pressed to find anyone who would say as a whole this year doesn’t suck the big one.    For some it sucks more than others and it doesn’t even take into account the pandemic.

2020 is also the year that one by one major races and events were cancelled.   Boston while shocking was not unexpected since it was in the beginning of the pandemic.   One by one other large events fell to the wayside.   Many of the larger fall events have been holding out hope.  NYRR just announced that they were cancelling the  New York City Marathon.   Not unexpected but still sad.   For those that were planning to run they are giving great choices for deferment which also unheard of from NYRR.    I believe they did the right thing both in canceling it and before most people started training.

This is the years for runners to decide why they run.   This is the year for runners to decide weather they run only for the bling or if they run to run.   Now don’t get me wrong…… I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE, LOVE my bling.

I get a lot out of running besides bling, but when you are not training for anything it does get easy not to stay motivated.   Not to get out the door.   Not to go for longer runs.   Not to push yourself.    One of the reasons, I have been doing the NJ Virtual Boardwalk challenge.    21 days left and more miles than I would like, but I will get it done.

So while 2020 has sucked and seems like is on the path to sucking till the bitter end, we need to regroup, refocus, and adjust.

What if we took this time as a gift.    What if we viewed everything not through the lenses of what has been taken from us, but what has been given.   What if instead of thinking of all we are missing, we embrace all the things that we have.

Time

I currently have no part time job.   I have no practices to run my son to.   I have no this or that to attend, but instead of thinking about all that I’m missing what if I view this time as a gift.

I now have the time to practice yoga.

I now have the time to go for runs/walks.    I have even started walking the dog with my oldest son just about every night.    This is a gift.

Races

I am missing the thrill of big events.   The fun of small events.   Missing my running crew.   Missing training (really).   Missing a lot…. BUT…….    every since my surgery left me with Hypoparathyroidism, I have continued to push myself.   I’ve continued to train, race, and while I have cut back on number events I was doing, I still kept pushing.   Doing a marathon ever year since surgery in 2016 (actually every year now since 2014).     Now, I have no choice though but to stop chasing events because even though I was realistic about them, I still pushed myself.   FOR ME – instead of being upset that I can’t run NY again, what if I use this time to reconnect.   Not just with running, but the way I need to run.   Think about what works best for me as far as miles, pace, and calcium instead of chasing distances and time.

From January even before Covid, this year has had a lot of downs.   Lots of things have gone wrong.   Lots of drama.   Lots of things that I wouldn’t wish to happen to anyone.   But with each of these events, there has been an upside.   Now don’t get me wrong, I would love to have gotten to the upside without the rollercoaster ride but that isn’t how life works.   Sometimes you have to let go of the handles, put your hands in the air, scream as the roller coaster is racing down the tracks and just be happy when you pull into the end.   You can’t enjoy the highs without the lows.

So while many of us our in lows now, we have no choice except to enjoy the ride as much as we can.

So for now…..

I will continue to run.   I will continue to see if maybe I need to do more power walking especially in the heat instead of running.   If maybe, I just keep moving that is enough and for the next 21 days, I have to not skip a beat and apparently I am a streaker.

 

 

 

What if???

May13

What if there is no easy answers?   What if we have no idea what tomorrow will bring?   What if as each day is just like the day before, we still have no idea what the future will bring?    How do we plan?   How do we accept not knowing?   How do we move forward and not stay stuck in limbo?

Why are there so many questions and not enough answers?

What if it is easier to ask the questions than answer them?

What if?

What if?

When will this happen?

When will that happen?

On and on it goes with no clear cut answers.   No answers that you like.   No answers that make things easier.  No answer that doesn’t lead to another question.

What if I tell you that it won’t always be like this?    What if I tell you that even in the best of times that tomorrow was never promised?    That plans fall through.   That life is more complicated and much simpler than we every realized.  That even when you make plans, sometimes plans change.   Sometimes things that you never thought would happen…. happen.    Things that you only dream of….. happen.

Right now so many of us feel in limbo.   We miss people that we now have to be “socially” distant from which really just means physically distant.   Do you even remember the last person not in your home that you gave a hug to before this all started?    Have you thought about how good it will be to give that person a hug when this is all over?   I, honestly, can’t remember the last person that I hugged and that makes me sad.   Althugh I believe it would have been either my mother or my friend, Jen; but I’m not sure.   It was such a normal thing that at the time I might not have given it a second thought.

Second thoughts are the problem now.   Second, third…. a million.    We are all searching for answers but right now there are no answers.    That is hard for so many reasons.   How do you plan for the future when you don’t know.   So many things that we took for granted before are now gone.   A hug goodbye.   The ability to pop in on a friend.   The knowing that even if plans had to change that the world didn’t.    As hard as some people want to put this pandemic behind us, it is here in our lives for a while.   We have no choice but to give up the reigns and that is a hard pill to swallow.

Right now many people are planning for fall races.   I was asked if I wanted to be part of the Sandy Hook Promise Team and as much as I support their cause…….as much as I like to plan….. as much as I want to; I just don’t think I can for several reasons but I go back and forth.

My first thought really is how much harder this year it would be to fundraise.   People are hurting and many disposable income is gone.     Businesses that have been very supportive in the past are doing all they can to survive now.     While these last 2 years I have had great success with my fundraising and had expected to do it again this year, I just can’t see how that would be possible.    It bothers me too because I think Sandy Hook Promise mission is worthy of all of our support.

On top of that honestly, I know so many runners are holding out hope of fall races but I don’t see how that can happen.   How in a matter of months can NYC expect to host an event with 50,000 runners and their supporters.    It seems like a foreign thought to me.   For those holding out hope, I hope I’m wrong.   It will be a strange November without a NYC Marathon but I’m sure the people of Boston felt the same way.

It is hard to plan for the future when the future is so uncertain.   For me, that means just doing the things that I can do daily to make my life seem like I am not a house plant.

Exercise Daily – Check

Shower Daily – Usually

Daily walk – Usually

Try not to eat all the chocolate – I’m trying

For me….   Making a conscience effort not to plan is my plan.      I would love to plan for a fall race, but I just don’t see how that can be.    I would rather let that go now as, for me, that is what I need to do.    This is not to say that I am giving up planning and doing.   I am just going to plan and do things that are in my control.   Right now I am in the process of deciding weather I want to run the NJ Parkway (172.4 miles) or the NJ Turnpike (117.2 miles) – Virtually, of course.   There is an online challenge where you are in control from running the distance of the boardwalk (28 miles) to going as far as taking the Jersey Devil challenge (579 miles).   These distances will be run starting May 15 through July 15th.   Mile wise I’m leaning towards the Turnpike but I’m more of a Parkway girl, so I have not figured it out yet.    That will be something I control.

So, for me, when the world is our of my control; I will take the control back where I can.   How I can.

What are you doing to stay in control?

 

 

 

Time after Time

Apr30

Time has lost all meaning to me, but I think we’ve pretty much been in going on 6 weeks now.   Who knows.   Is it still April?   I think April now has 675 days.   Each day is the same.   Each day is long.   And yet still there is not enough time to fold the laundry or empty the dishwasher until the sink is filled with dishes.   I’m not sure how that happens, but it does.   This is my life now.   Searching for food delivery slots that are not available.   Making carts on the off chance that someday I will hit the lottery and get a slot which has happened twice in these 6 weeks.   Then there is the inevitable suiting up to go to actual store since teens in a Pandemic apparently will eat more food than required by a heard of elephants.

This is my life.

I am still blessed.

On top of that every and any event has been cancelled.   Not just for now, but for next month and the month after and the month after.   On and on the cancelations go.   So much for my doing a race a month for the year.   Ha.   I will take for still being able to fit into my running clothes when this is over.    That being said,  with health officials already talking about a reoccurrence of this crap in the fall during flu season, you wonder if this year all major marathons will be cancelled.    Chicago while not cancelled is allowing participants to cancel.   Unheard of.   Many while not outright cancelled do not have a new date yet which makes you wonder.   NYRR has cancelled their NYC half and their races through June.   It makes you wonder what they will do for the Marathon that normal has 50,000 runners.   To me, a layman, runner; I just don’t see how it is possible but what do I know.

I had been thinking of running NY again for Team Sandy Hook Promise but I don’t see that happening.   With so many people hurting financially raising $3,000 does not seem feasible.  Honestly nor does the thought of going to an event with 50,000 people.   I went to Target for groceries and thought I would have an anxiety attack with all the people in the store who were wearing masks and most being good about socially distancing from each other.    I couldn’t see myself at the village start line.   Honestly  I can’t imagine how an event like this will happen even though it is still months from now.

Who knows what will happen.   I do know that no matter what I can’t see myself in the middle of it.   That being said, I have run a marathon every year since 2014, somehow someway I do not want 2020 to be the year I don’t.   I’ve already been thinking that trails are the way to go.   Who knows, I might have to do my own virtual marathon.   Then again maybe I just skip this year.   In the whole scheme of things, it is not the be all end all.

Yes, I miss my running crew.

Yes, I miss group events.

Yes, I miss it all.

But what I have taken away the most is that in the big scheme of life….. for me……  although I am a runner, although I love to run,   although I have had and will have again so much fun running……… When this is all over, I do not want it to go back to business as usual.

I want it to better.

I want to think about things differently.

I want to realize that while I am a runner, I am so much more

 

 

 

Cancelled

Mar28

cancelled

Everything is cancelled.

Rightly so.

Everything is cancelled and while we understand why, we appreciate the gravity of the situation, we know the necessity of it; for some reason we think we shouldn’t feel sorrow over the loss.   Maybe it’s just me, but I call BS on that.   Not just for runners whose races have been cancelled, but anyone who has anything which is everything cancelled.

We are allowed to miss meeting friends for coffee.

We are allowed to miss meeting our Mom’s for lunch.

We are allowed to miss running with our friends.

We are allowed to miss all the things that are important to us.

If our child came to us and told us they were upset that their soccer season was cancelled (which it is), we would never tell them that their soccer wasn’t important and they were being selfish.   At least most of us would not say that.   We would tell them that their feelings are understandable.   That it is ok to be disappointed.   That we understand that their soccer (dance, play, graduation, prom or what not) is important to them and that we wish things could be different.  That it sucks and we are sorry.

It is no different for us.

We are allowed to be disappointed that races we thought we would train and be ready for our cancelled.   For the runners who were ready to rock a race and then week before the rug was pulled out from them.   You are allowed to be upset.   You are allowed to feel sadness.   You are allowed to feel.

And just because you feel that way does not mean for one iota of a second that you don’t understand that there are people suffering, that people are loosing loved ones, that first responders are putting themselves in harms way for the good of the many.    You can hold both feeling and truths in the same heart.

You are allowed to feel.