· Date: Tuesday July 23, 2019
· Where: Cleveland, Ohio to McKean, Pennsylvania
· Total Distance Covered: 101 miles
· Running Partner: Bea
We had started later than usual because today was the first time in a while where the forecast showed decent running weather. The temperature would remain tolerable all day and because we only had eight miles to run today, we decided we could sleep in. We had our morning dedication circle and then split apart to our respective vans.
Soon, we were running along the coast of Lake Erie. If you look at the map, the entire route bordered the lake and we found we enjoyed running here. Like the cooler weather running into Lakeside Marblehead, the water must have been cooling the surrounding air here as well. The traffic wasn’t bad which meant we had a lot of space on the shoulder to enjoy our time running without being overly concerned about cars.
When Bea and I ran together, we started talking about running competitively versus running for yourself. Bea ran Division III Cross Country for her University and said that she often felt like she wasn’t running because she enjoyed it anymore. She was running because she had to. It wasn’t that she didn’t like running, but it now became a requirement rather than a nice to have. Her perspective about running competitively in college reminded me a lot of my time in Sacred Heart University’s band program. I felt the same way. We agreed that when people ran as a hobby or for themselves, they might not be as great, as strong, or as perfect as those who made it their job, but they enjoyed it more. Their passion was stronger because they had freedom in what they did. I explained that this is exactly how my perspective with running had changed after running recreationally in college rather than for a team like I had in high school. Bea told me that running this summer had somewhat renewed this passion in her and it made me so excited to hear this. Even at Sacred Heart, a few people on the cross country and track teams who I was friends with told me that I seemed to have a greater passion for the sport than some of them did. Yet, there was no way I could have beat any of them in a race. If you had a passionate spirit for the sport, and you ran competitively like Bea, you could probably achieve almost anything.
I’ve found that this concept can translate to everything in life. When you do things at your own pace and for yourself, you’ll find more enjoyment and fulfillment with it. In the longevity of everything, this is the only way to stay consistent with your passion for something. Even if you are not the best, you’re probably getting more out of your passion than someone else who appears to be doing better, but only because they feel they must. If you’re able to combine and maintain this passion with consistency and a competitive spirit, because you want to, then you’ll fly above everyone else in anything that you do.
Because of the almost perfect running weather, Bea and I decided to do something different. Bea’s cross-country coach had been sending her workouts to do throughout the summer. Rather than just running her miles at a leisurely pace, her coach wanted her to get some benefits from the miles as well. But as Tyler and I had found out with Project:Return, adding additional structured workouts, was often too difficult. Bea had been ignoring them for some time and we thought maybe today could be the day where she did the first official workout. We ended up running our first three miles as a warmup and took it slow. The next four miles, we ran in a Fartlek style. This meant a slow warmup, followed by running two minutes hard with one-minute rest. We repeated the work and the rest cycle six more times and then had another cool down period where we ran the remaining miles at a recovery pace. It was a great workout and it felt good to properly stretch my legs after yesterday’s time trial with Tyler. It also felt weird because for the whole summer, I was the one being trained, paced, and taught by Tyler. But this time, I was coaching Bea and pacing her through her workout. It was so much fun and we hoped we would be able to do another workout together before we reached Boston!
As we concluded the workout, our miles for the day were also complete. Bea and I were the last running partner for the day and our van had completed the first portion of the route. Since we were in the first van, we still had quite a way to drive towards McKean Pennsylvania and I started to curl up in the van to take a nap. That’s when someone in the Host Van called us and told us to meet them at a state park along the bank of Lake Erie. I am forgetting the name of the park, but it was close to our host for the night and had beaches, picnic tables, and a pavilion with charcoal grills.
When we arrived, the Host Van was there, and they explained more about how they were able to obtain a picnic for us! From my understanding, they had asked a supermarket for donations for lunch. After hearing more about what was involved in the 4K for Cancer, they asked lots of questions. It isn’t often that a business continues to ask questions after they see a tax ID form, but this manager did. When he heard we would be done with our miles relatively early today, he wanted to do something special for us. He ended up donating burgers and hot dogs with buns, chips, condiments, and charcoal for the team. The Host Van found the park where we had our picnic and Amber was grilling the food for everyone. It was an incredible picnic and an amazing time.
The grilling and picnic area were on grass that was high above Lake Erie. You had to take a long wooden staircase down a cliffside to the beach. Once we were down there, the water was super violent and blew sand up every time it crashed against the shore.
“No wonder the land had eroded so much,” I thought to myself as I saw the big waves.
Lake Erie was so much more aggressive than Lake Michigan had been. The calm, still water Tyler and I had swum in at Indiana Dunes State Park was laughable compared to this. It truly seemed like we were looking at an ocean. As I looked back at the massive sand cliffside that had been eroded by the lake, I was reminded of the beaches on Cape Cod. It wasn’t the first time the Great Lakes were reminding me of this beautiful area and it only made me want to explore them more. This was yet another place I wanted to go back to after we arrived in Boston.
I didn’t end up swimming because I was tired from the time trial yesterday and the workout Bea and I had done today. It was also a higher mileage week for me, even though the mileage between hosts recently had been small. With yesterday’s additional miles, I had successfully made up all the miles I had lost while going to Urgent Care in Iowa and had even made up the miles from both times I was in the Host Van too. I was feeling extremely pleased with myself. Even if I hadn’t run all the miles when I was supposed to, I still had run all of them at some point.
I wasn’t the only one who didn’t swim because they were tired. Some of us played four-square with a ball we found, and some of us relaxed in the grass and the sun. We listened to music and let our bodies recover from the miles we had run today. All the runners in the second van had finished their miles today before the picnic too, so everyone was in the relaxation mode we often get when we are settled at a host for the night. This picnic is another one of my favorite moments on 4K that shows how simple our lifestyle was. When we had enough food, I loved it. Part of me didn’t want it to end, but the other part of me was ready to see my family and get back to reality.
Suddenly, as everyone was about to leave, we heard a bunch of commotion down on the beach. Somehow, the water had tugged at Rizwan’s running shorts and he had lost them in the lake! Because running shorts often had underwear attached to them, he had nothing on underneath the water. All you could hear was laughter down on the beach and Rizwan yelling for help. As we looked down, someone threw an extra pair of shorts out to Rizwan. He was lucky the water was dark, and no one could see anything! He was even luckier that someone on the team had an extra pair of shorts close by! This was a story that brought laughter to the whole team over the next few days. Even Rizwan started to laugh, but only after he had shorts on.
The host tonight was a large Baptist church. We were sleeping in their gym, but they, like many other churches we had stayed in already, had classrooms, meeting areas, a café, and dining areas. It was like a small village inside a building. There was only one shower though and we needed to be cleaned up in time for the community dinner that the church members had planned. We ended up creating a list of who would shower when on our team. Each person limited their shower to one song and then that was it. Even then, it still took a few hours for the whole team to shower and some teammates had to shower after dinner. The dinner was chicken Francese with salads, pasta, potatoes, and the whole works. There were even gluten-free, vegetarian, and vegan options that complied with all the team’s dietary restrictions. It was impressive that the church community could pull off a meal like this and we enjoyed every minute of it.
That night, Tyler, Rob, and I ended up driving the Host Van to a nearby Ross. This was the store that Rob had shown me in Chicago, and I was so excited to go. They sold name brand clothing, shoes, and other items for less because of structural or aesthetic imperfections. When Rob and I had browsed around a Ross in Chicago, I had found a pair of track spikes for only twenty dollars, but they had been the wrong size. Tyler and I each wanted to purchase a pair of spikes because we figured if we did things correctly, this could be the difference in lowering my mile time before reaching Boston. After yesterday, we had formulated a plan and workout regimen with a few ideas for locations for our last time trial. With that in mind, we just needed the spikes to complete the plan and the workouts. We both found a pair of spikes right away. This was a fantastic store for running apparel and shoes! Since Tyler had worked in a running store for a few years, he checked both pairs for any structural imperfections that could injure us or affect our running form. When we both could only find aesthetic imperfections, we got so excited that I wanted to run in them later that night. I ended up paying eight dollars for my spikes and Tyler paid about twelve.
“You’re a high roller man!” I joked around with him. Normally our spikes would have been about eighty dollars each. I wish there was a Ross near me in Connecticut!
Once we got back to the host, Tyler and I finalized our plan and training schedule. We had to take into consideration the mileage for 4K that day, the terrain, and the surrounding roads that we could train extra on. We were lucky if a host was located near a track and tried to create our schedule around these days as well. It was super interesting, and I am sure I could bore everyone to death with it, but Tyler and I had a lot of fun doing this. He taught me a lot!
I also wrote a little bit about Project:Return from yesterday and then called it a night.
Although not a lot had happened today, it was a great day between the picnic, the dinner, and the spikes. I was hopeful that the team’s atmosphere would continue to be a good one until we reached Boston. Already, we had some sad moments when we realized that any time, we did something together, it could be one of our last. Contemplating this brought about so many emotions, even now it is hard to express them in words.
Comments