Act 75 – When you have no speed…
I was just 15 and anxiously awaited the start of an epic dual race. Alan Bernath and I were slated for a match race to determine the undisputed slowest runner on the team. With the blast of the starting gun, I dug in and wildly churned my spindly legs as fast as they would go. To no avail – Alan pulled away leaving me with the title of the Patrick Henry Highschool track team member with the absolute least speed.
Over the next couple of years, I did learn. Only once did I outsprint a competitor in the last 110 (Tim Varley with Crawford H.S. – a marathon specialist). However, I learned that by fully committing with a 2-lap kick for the mile and a 3-lap kick for the 2-mile, I could “dust” some of the competition in the latter parts of the race. The sudden change in pace tended to be psychologically devastating for the competition and overcame my lack of speed down the stretch.
Now, present day, I was determined to have a decent Nevada Day 8k race last weekend despite missing working out for 8 of the previous 16 days due to a minor cold. Yes, I know, there is no reason to take that much time off for a minor sniffle… My confidence was probably impacted as much as my actual conditioning, and I planned a conservative pace for the first half. Over the last 2 miles, I slowly reeled in Sadie Goulden – an outstanding youth runner (just 12!). Sadie had come in just behind me in several local races and I was determined to catch up. With 200 yards to go I gently surged as I pulled even. My thought was, encourage Sadie to push it in but then outsprint her at the end. After all, she is only 12…The problem with this was Sadie had more speed than I did and smoked me in the last 50. Ugh. I really have very little speed…Maybe I have learned my lesson for another few years ;O).
Photo: Sadie Goulden outkicking me at the Nevada Day 8k (to view the picture go to https://www.markgookinruns.com/blog ).