nilonilonilo

Last Monday (a running story)

Despite the stormy weather (or because of?) there are lots of other runners out there. Out there = the canal towards Charleroi, southwest of downtown Anderlecht. Lots of dog owners are about too, amongst them the mysterious lady with the long grey hair and her golden retriever, a regular. The ground is littered with branches, lots of them, snapped off from the trees by the wind. Some massive ones too, could crush a car with those. Widow makers.

I decide to go for a longish, slow run. I’m wearing my oversized fluorescent yellow high-visibility jacket, hence I look like a giant running lemon. The jacket is not waterproof, but keeps out most of the wind. Prevalent winds around these parts are southwest, so I have a headwind for the first half of the run. Towards the turning point, it picks up strongly, sending an intense rain shower my way. Fresh.

I reach the turning point, so I turn back. Wind in the back now. Rain is gone as soon as it came. Bright, intense evening light, sharp contrasts, golden glow. The setting sun to my left. Ahead of me, where the rain is drifting towards, a double rainbow forms. Just a few seagulls, there will be more in winter. No heron today. Along the side of the track stands a blue Volkswagen Polo, in which it turns out a couple is having sex. 

Last two kilometres, slowly slowly. More runners, more dog owners. I make it back home, have my shower. My knee never hurts a lot while actually running, but this will probably my last run for a long while. It’s been a fun hobby.

How # 30462 became # 23142 or the day I ran the 20 km of Brussels

So there we were, Sunday morning, before the big race. Met up with my friends at 9 pm, an hour before the start. The sun was shining bright, perhaps the biggest potential source of problems for the day?

Many running friends had given me tips for a good race, such as:

- Eat pasta for breakfast. I did that (wholemeal!). 

- Just pick a cute little ass and keep following that. (Hmm, perhaps not the most scientific piece of advice ever…)

- Drink a lot during the race. (Fair enough.) And when you need to pee, don’t be afraid and look up a tree (which I would turn out to do twice).

We lined up in our starting boxes, me and two other friends in the sixth and last one, our green starting numbers pinned to our chest. (I was 30462.) The first cannon shot went off before I was even in the box. But we wouldn’t leave until nearly half an hour later anyway. 

The tension was palpable. I felt pretty excited/nervous. Would my knee hold out? Would I finish the race? In a good time? Even before starting, my pulse was already at 118 bpm!

Sixth cannon blast and off we went, just walking out of the park, everybody having to go through the gates, but then km 0 started at the Schuman roundabout. After that you turn into rue de la Loi, which provided an amazing sight of a sea of thousands and thousands of bobbing heads stretching out in front of you. Looked pretty impressive, something like this:

But my start wasn’t good. Even though I had the impression I was running really slowly (another piece of advice: don’t start too fast), I couldn’t control my heart rate. And when we hit the first tunnel, after 3 km, I got really dizzy and was afraid I was going to faint and I’d have to give up. Was it the heat? The stress? Lack of oxygen in the tunnel? I don’t know. But this wasn’t going well. Giving up already at that point would have been a massive bummer.

So I thought about the most important tip one of my friends had given me: never give up! When I was certain I wasn’t going to faint or get a heart failure, I just walked for a bit until I was out of the tunnel, where there seemed to be more oxygen. I kept on jogging extremely slowly for a couple of minutes - the only people not overtaking me were the ones walking. I sort of stumbled through two more tunnels on avenue Louise, until we got to Bois de la Cambre. By then, I was feeling much better again, and I managed to find a reasonable, steady pace.

From then onwards, it was an extremely pleasant experience. All these people, going for the same objective, the people standing next to the road cheering you on, the jazz and drum bands pumping out some beats to keep you motivated. As said, it was a beautiful day, the atmosphere was great, and I tremendously enjoyed the run: the greenery, cracking jokes with other runners, sloshing some refreshing water over my head every few kilometres.

After that first initial spot of bother, I didn’t have any more problems. Nothing was hurting, and as I counted down the kilometres, my confidence just kept on growing. Even the dreaded uphill stretch of avenue de Tervueren, a massive uphill section of 2 kilometres, like a fucking Everest you have to tame before you reach the last kilometer, went super smoothly. After that, there’s the last flat section, and you can see the arches of Parc du Cinquantenaire, the finish line, before you. 

I pulled out everything I had left (which apparently was still quite a lot), and just went for it. It was a great feeling, those last few hundred meters, the people cheering (I had three fans by the finish line), it was just bliss. Total euphoria. I almost cried. Seriously.

And so I crossed the finish line after 2 hours, 22 minutes and 37 seconds, which ended me in 23,142nd place. Even so, they gave me a gold medal. And a Mars bar.

(I ate the Mars bar.)

And that was it. I’m so happy I did this. People who have run before may make less big a deal of it, but I’m super stoked I brought this project to a positive end.

Now, perhaps, I will learn how to skateboard.

Run run run

(New Balance 665 running shoes, which I pimped with a “+1”)

For as long as I can remember, I have always hated running. As a small child, apparently i could barely run. It must have looked really awkward. In primary school, they had these races between schools. I never participated, except for one time, out of curiosity. I ended last but one, way behind the rest, but before this other immigrant kid who didn’t even have proper sports attire or running shoes. (I have a distinct memory of my then childhood sweetheart, standing by the side of the track, shouting “Zet ‘m op Nil!”. And I also remember how, when she ran, with her grey and pink Reebok trainers, her hair would bop up and down but totally straight, as if it were spaghetti - seriously, my exact thoughts at that moment.) In secundary school, i was below average in sports, but running was perhaps what i hated most, after gymnastics (which was just way too dangerous for anybody in his right mind to try).

I liked roller blading, cycling, hiking and trekking, and I also started swimming again a couple of years ago, but running? Nah. That is, until last summer, when on a (admittedly somewhat premeditated) whim, I bought a cheap pair of running shoes and started running, just like that. I got hooked pretty much immediately, I guess also because you notice how you improve so fast. The exhilaration of your first 5 km! And then the first 10 km! Hey you know what!? Running can be fun! If you had told me a year ago that I would one day run 10 km for fun, I would have laughed at you. And yet, there you go. Strange things happen.

The culmination of this process will take place tomorrow, Sunday 27th of May (by coincidence the exact date of my return back to Belgium last year): I will be running a 20 km race. That’s probably the most insane thing I’ve ever done. Or at least the biggest physical challenge ever. I’ll be running with 29,999 other people (minus a few cancellations), but it will be an extremely individualistic undertaking. I’m not competing againts anybody else (well, perhaps technically I am), I just have to deal with myself, and somehow finish that race. And not die in the process.

I’m superstoked. My right knee somewhat less so.

Talk to you tomorrow…

PS - Iron Maiden have a song called “The loneliness of the long distance runner”, but it’s not a very good one. Still, I might have to play it today.