Friday, May 20, 2011
Day three after cortisone injection…and also the day I’m allowed to start running. I’ve been pain-free for three days now and more than a little nervous about what would happen when I started running. I’d told Nilesh I’d only do a 30-minute run, which he felt would be fine, so when I put in three extra minutes, I didn’t think it would be that big of a deal. Maybe I was being a little jumpy, but just before I arrived back at the car (I was really going for 35 minutes) I felt a little twinge. I stopped immediately and walked it the rest of the way. The true test I felt was not so much what happened while running, but whether I’d have pain later…after sitting for a spell and then getting up.
I drove home thinking of all I had to do…and quickly…if I was going to make it to the District Track Championships by 6 p.m. – starting time. I’d spoken to Kim (Marie’s sister) earlier in the day and she was riding her bike to the meet, which was at Mentor High School. I’d given her my thoughts on the route she should ride to avoid heavily traveled roads and was driving that route to see how far it was. I was heading down Little Mountain Road when I saw her riding towards me…up a steep hill. She noticed me and I pulled over. “So Kim…just where are you going?” She was breathing pretty heavily on the new bike she’d just purchased for her trip to Colorado. “Umm…the track meet?” She’s bright…we were heading in opposite directions so one of us had to be messed up. “Yeah…some bad news. You just rode up that hill for no good reason…it’s that way,” I said pointing back down the hill…the direction I was headed. “Oh maaaan…why couldn’t you have come five minutes earlier and caught me at the bottom of the hill?” This from a girl who was going to be riding thousands of miles in a couple of weeks…including some time in the Rocky Mountains.
She made it to the meet after turning around and like me, and everyone else in the stadium that day, was treated to a very special performance by Marie. She started what is one of the toughest doubles in high school running…the 1600/800 meter races…by winning the 1600. It’s such a tough double because of how close the races are to each other in the order of events. Most distance runners choose the 1600 and the 3200 meter races, which allows another 30-40 minutes of recovery time. Not Marie. She was cooling down from the 1600…which rolled right into a warm-up for the 800 where, running against fresh competitors, she waited until the backstretch of the second lap, before striking. She moved past the front runners and with a strong surge, left them gasping as she cruised to a 3-second victory.
Her day wasn’t over, though. She was anchoring the 4x400 team and received the baton…and a great deal of pressure as she began to run. She was in fifth place and only the top four team’s advance. Additionally, the girl from Mentor was running second and she needed to catch her. Mayfield had the team lead for the District Championship coming into the race – Mentor was two points behind – which meant that if the Mentor runner could stay ahead of Marie they would wrestle the title away from Mayfield…and Marie…and most everyone in the stadium…knew it. Marie surged around the first turn and by the 200 meter mark had closed the 10-meter gap between them. They ran side-by-side as they rounded the second turn and headed into the home stretch…but it was really never a contest. Marie is a girl on a mission who hates to lose. She slowly moved ahead…the Mentor girl had nothing to offer…and she hit the tape ensuring the championship for her teammates and advancing the squad to next week’s Regional Championship. She’ll have a tough time there…competing in four separate races, but the girl knows what she wants and my money is on her.
Run duration: 33 minutes.
Training Heart Rate: 145 bpm.
Calories burned during workout: 600.
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