Here's Patrick at the top of Imogene:

            

As you can see, Patrick is smiling. But don't try to read too much into that - Patrick smiles during root canals - Patrick even smiles while PAYING for root canals. That's just Patrick.

The Ancyent 'Thonner, who has given up on reading DRS, wants to know when I'm going to report on Imogene. Well, I've already done that on DRS, but he didn't read it, and there are a lot of folks out there who don't read it, so here we go.

I can best summarize the report this way:

!!!!
Ouch!
Damn!
Will I ever feel okay again?

That's pretty much it - the !!! was how it felt leading up to it, the Ouch!  was my experience during the race, the Damn! was my exclamation (several times) when I finally saw the finish line clock and it said 4:00:10 (or so) and the "Will I ever feel okay again?" is how it's been since then.

The excitement was due to my belief that I was training well.

The Ouch! was because of the fact that Imogene is a race straight up the side of a mountain, for over a vertical mile. During the training run, I kept "running" until I got just above 12,000 feet (the top is at 13,120) and then I finally walked, but - as one fellow pointed out to me during the race - "when you're alone, you can keep yourself running - but when everybody around you is walking, it's a lot harder."

I hear folks talking about how beautiful such a race must be - and it probably is, for folks like Patrick, who like to stop and take pictures and talk to the other runners and tidy up the place while they are at it - maybe a little dusting, put up some curtains. But I never really saw the views while I was racing.

Here is what you would see if you were a spectator during the race, and if you were up above the Headwall, looking up towards the pass -

               

But, as a PARTICIPANT, this is what I saw:


                                     

Just like that - and about that blurry.

When I am racing, then I'm not seeing the panoramic views - I'm looking directly ahead, with all of my effort aimed at going faster, and - during a race on this terrain - trying to pick out my footing.

The downhill was much faster, but the footing was much more precarious, so - again - I wasn't noticing the views. But I was noticing the OUCH.

The Damn! - I was still hoping to beat four hours. When I saw that the clock said "4:00:10" or some such when I got in sight of it, I said "Damn!" - then I said it another three or four times right after I crossed the finish line (official time was 4:00:14.3).

Would fifteen seconds have made that much of a difference? I think so, in looking back at it. I am aware that I lost much more time than that while I was trying to fit my jacket, hat and gloves into my backpack on the way down; so a fudging Puckett would say "Yeah, well, I lost that time with my jacket, so I really finished in less than four hours" - but my legs were resting while I was shoving that stuff into the backpack, so it wasn't just wasted time, was it?

The "Will I ever feel okay again?" is the worst part, because it's the part AFTER the race, and that lasts the longest. (One of the things that I've learned from my mistakes is that my life after making the mistake lasts forever, so the time spent during the mistake should be time well spent, making better decisions). 

I ran 9 miles last week, and barely did any lifting. I don't seem to be in any hurry to get busy again. I've played some golf - but I was riding in a cart; and even that seemed to wear me out.

I'm not sure if that is because my body is recovering, or if it's because my brain wonders "Why bother?" - with all of the training - at elevation, with hills (no, make that "mountains") that I was running, at high mieage, I came in dead center in my age group. Right smack in the middle of the bell curve.

Patrick came up from sea level, and I beat him by three minutes - and you can bet that he spent more time than that taking these pictures.

So my psyche is telling me that maybe it's time that I gave up looking for something that I'm good at - something at which I have a talent - and maybe I should lower my expectations; just shoot for something at which I am "better than average" : ) (N.B. - one of the answers is "not golf" : )

Maybe I'll feel better later. I am willing to believe that I will.

But right now, I don't have any proof.

Damn!