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the long-distance runner is (voluntarily) lonely no more

the long-distance runner is (voluntarily) lonely no more

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The backstory to this post is that I wrote it for The SF Marathon’s blog, since I’m a social media ambassador for the race (and totally want you to run it! It’s so fun). I’ve had the great pleasure of having family visiting for about the past month, so between all the wonderful family QT and just general life happenings — all good things, all good things — sitting down (or rather, standing) to write hasn’t been much of a priority. I have notes scribbled out, ready to be made coherent, for a handful of posts, so now that life is back to its regularly-scheduled-programming, perhaps my blog-posting regularity (eh), too, will commence. We’ll see. Anyway — yay running. Here you go; I think many of you (my team! my people) will totally get this.

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People often ascribe some element of martyrdom to running. It doesn’t really seem to matter if you’re going for a little jaunt around your ‘hood one morning before work or putting in hours upon hours (and miles upon miles) during training for a half, full, or ultramarathon; for whatever reason, if you willingly run, people seem to think that you’re martyring yourself to a fruitless and futile endeavor, one characterized by literally doing the same thing – putting one foot in front of the other – hundreds of thousands of times.

To say that you’re a runner is to give many people the idea that you’ve taken upon the badge of honor that has begotten runners and joggers alike for the past few decades: a loner, someone who’d rather spend time with his or her thoughts than with other sentient beings. Becoming a runner is to add yet another character to the ongoing saga of “the loneliness of the long-distance runner,” a mythology surrounding our sport since the jogging boom of the 1970s. To be a runner is to live in isolation, away from every_one and every_thing, to be forever an introvert, and to be happiest when being alone.

Except that running isn’t a solitary endeavor. It’s as much a team sport as any out there.

There are so many elements to the running community that seem to have withstood the test of time simply because they’re tradition. It’s practically sacrilege to have anything pre-race but pasta, evidenced by many races’ Marathon Eve pasta feeds, wherein many a runner will stuff him- or herself to the gills with the starchy carbohydrate in part to top off glycogen stores (one can hope) but mostly, I’d guess, out of deference to the tradition. Similarly, many in the running community and those who support us perpetuate this ongoing mythology of “the loneliness of the long distance runner,” conjuring images of runners out there pounding pavement each morning to the tune of … nothing.

While the pasta/carbohydrate loading pre-marathon might have a glimmer of basis in science, I’m calling bullshit on “the loneliness of the long distance runner.”

Thanks to the explosion of social media over the past few years and many runners’ willingness to put themselves and their training out there – creating blogs, twitter and instagram profiles, facebook pages, and creating and maintaining training groups through platforms like Strava, Dailymile, or MeetUp – if you’re a) even minutely connected to the internet and b) a runner, chances are you can easily connect yourself with a team (or three).

Running can, of course, be a solitary and singular endeavor – and many people revel in that quiet time to themselves, a time when they don’t need to stress about their work, family, or any other obligation – but it doesn’t have to be.

Maybe this proclamation is a bit melodramatic, but to run – to be a runner – is to connect yourself with prior millenia’s worth of history, dating all the way back to our earliest ancestors whose lives and livelihoods literally depended on their ability to run. Surely I can’t speak for you, but I think it’s pretty badass to (willingly!) do something our ancestors did so long ago. Not many other sports have been around for nearly the entirety of life as we know it.

Running as a team – running and training with friends – brings with it a lot of practical components that can be beneficial. Of course there’s the accountability aspect – because you’d probably feel like an ass if you left your partner high and dry in the predawn hours, when you’re supposed to be out running – but there are also many other ways that running with a team/with friends can help you, such as giving you more opportunities to run a variety of paces (slower or faster than you’d usually run), which in turn might actually make you a better (read: stronger, faster, fitter, healthier) runner. By actively being involved in a community of runners, you can also forge and cultivate some incredible friendships, and you might also find various avenues to link service with your running, since so many races (including TSFM) give you the option to run on behalf of a charity and to fundraise. It’s a pretty cool thing to be able to use a hobby like running to benefit some social good.

In the absence of physically running in real life with a team, social media can also be an acceptable way to join forces with runners near and far – and in the process, create your own virtual team (and even complete a virtual race, if you’re so inclined). Sometimes  overbooked life schedules preclude us from meeting up with our buddies for a run, but virtual teams – virtual accountability, if you will – can also be a lot of fun. It can get the job done.

When you train alongside someone (in real life or virtually), you’re giving yourself a buddy with whom you can incessantly “talk shop” about training, racing, running, or anything else that’s on your mind. Your team “gets it” – all the highs and lows of training, the momentary boosts of confidence and the crippling effects of anxiety and doubt – because chances are, your team is going through the motions just as much as you are.

Running and training for endurance events invariably give us opportunities to be raw and vulnerable as we set goals and work our asses off to realize them. Having a team is to have a sounding board through every step, every mile, of the process, and in our moments of confidence, anxiety, dismay, excitement, and the entire emotional gamut in between, your team’s got your back. Even when you’re running by yourself – because no one can run your race but you – your team’s in your back pocket.

So many people have run before you, and so many more will come after you. The greater running community is like one big hippy dippy happy family, singing kum-by-yah as we run mile after mile each month, sometimes praising our decision to run for fun and other times wondering what the hell is wrong with us that we’d voluntarily enlist ourselves in such a challenging activity.

In the most non-patronizing way possible: your team gets you. Your team understands. We do this for all the same reasons that you do (give or take).

Runners are a welcoming bunch, and I encourage you to put yourself out there and connect with some, either with clubs in your area or with the virtual running community. I think you’ll be surprised how much more enriching this sport becomes once you realize that yes, while no one else can run your mileage but you, being on a running team isn’t an oxymoron. If there’s any doubt in your mind, just watch the USA women’s Olympic Qualifying Trials from the LA Marathon on 2/13/16. I don’t want to reveal any spoilers (in the off-chance you haven’t already seen the ending), but believe me: the OQT will assure you that running is as team-based an endeavor as they come. I dare you not to tear up.

It’s one of my fav days of the year – Marathon Monday

It’s one of my fav days of the year – Marathon Monday

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Happy Marathon Monday!! Below is a guest post I wrote for The San Francisco Marathon’s blog. I’m not sure if the race will end up using it, but I didn’t want it to go to waste, so I’m posting it here. It has been so fun to track so many friends working their asses off out between Hopkinton and Boston, and I am so ridiculously proud of so many people… and the results are still pouring in! All my love to all my runnahs this morning. Boston is no joke — I know from experience — and I am just THRILLED for you all. xoxo

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From everyone here at The San Francisco Marathon, we hope you are thoroughly enjoying Patriot’s Day – or perhaps you better know the third Monday in April as Marathon Monday, or Boston Marathon day. Today’s a special day for the running community.

TSFM-and-Boston-2010-medals

A quick primer: the Boston Marathon is the world’s oldest annual marathon – held since 1897, in fact – and is arguably the most prestigious footrace in the world. Entrants can participate in the majestic and grueling footrace through the small Massachusetts towns of Hopkinton, Ashland, Framingham, Natick, Wellesley, Newton, and Brookline, before finishing in Boston, only by way of qualifying at a previous year’s marathon or by fundraising a substantial amount of money for a deserving charity. If you’re toeing the line in Boston this year – or any year, for the matter – congratulations on earning your spot at our sport’s most hallowed grounds. You are a big deal.

with John and Stacey in Hopkinton before the start of Boston '10
with John and Stacey in Hopkinton before the start of Boston ’10

Boston Marathon Monday is important for those of us who will be anxiously toeing the line in Hopkinton, but it’s also quite special for the rest of the running community. Boston Marathon Monday mattered for the running community for the century and decades preceding the 2013 bombings, and Marathon Monday will continue to be an even bigger deal for our community forevermore, in the subsequent years since the atrocities took place.

It’s a day on the calendar, of course, one that affords schoolchildren and many businesses in Massachusetts a day off from studies and work, but for the running community, it’s a day that unites us each year. It’s one where we’re reminded of big goals and the work necessary to realize said goals, and it’s one that reminds us how utterly magnificent the running community is.

yup. (pc: https://twitter.com/OnlyInBOS/status/584415157415256064)
yup. (pc: https://twitter.com/OnlyInBOS/status/584415157415256064)

What I find really compelling about endurance events like the Boston Marathon, and even our own San Francisco Marathon (or half marathon, or ultra, or 5k), is that while our sport might be a bit individualistic on its surface level, at its core, I’d argue that running is a communal endeavor. The running community is what makes racing and training day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year, so special.

I argue that running is a communal endeavor because I firmly believe it’s the running community that enriches the experience for everyone. When I think about racing, I think it is absolutely incredible that we runners – the 99.9% of us who do this stuff for kicks, just as a way to blow off stress or give ourselves some sort of physical accountability – get to run the same exact races that the pros do, the people whose very livelihoods depend on their race day performances. I will never be as fast as Kara Goucher, Desi Linden, or Shalane Flanagan, but you know what? I’ve run many of the same race courses as them. In few other sports can amateur athletes say that they played at, or participated in, the same games or venues as the pros.

That shared experience between amateur and professional in the running community – the fact that both you **and** the pro runners had to deal with subpar weather conditions, for example, or a course that was incredibly fast and flat or hilly and quad-breaking – that shared experience is what binds the running community together. It’s very cool and very humbling. Naturally, we each have to run our own races – I can’t ask Kara, Desi, or Shalane to go knock out 26.2 miles on my behalf – but the fact that we amateurs get to run the same exact pavement, on the same exact day, as the people who get paid to do this? That’s pretty cool.

You don’t have to be a marathoner to appreciate the enormity of Boston Marathon Monday because if you’re a runner – and if you run, regardless if you’re posting 5 minute-mile or 20 minute-miles, you’re a runner – you get it.

You get what it means to put yourself out there each day of training, never knowing what will happen on race day, if you’ll be able to run the race you’ve trained for.

As runners, we value and appreciate the emotional investment our running compatriots have put into their race day – whether it’s in Boston, today, or here in San Francisco, in July – and we know how quickly and easily we can find ourselves being calmly confident or panic-stricken in the days and hours leading into our goal race. Our heart skips a beat when we learn that our running friends have secured that personal best race performance they’ve been working toward for months, and similarly, our soul aches when we hear that our friends’ races did not pan out as they desired.

We’re runners; we get it.

On this Boston Marathon Monday, if you are racing across the country in Massachusetts, are in the beginning stages of your San Francisco Marathon (or half, or ultra, or 5k) training, or are just now considering lacing up for the first time, know this: you’ve got a huge community of supporters behind you.

We’ve got your back through the highs and lows of training, through the emotional uncertainty leading up to (if not also on) race day, and through the race aftermath, when all you want to do is celebrate when things went well or analyze and return to the drawing board when things went poorly.

We know what you’re going through, and we get it.

training with these ladies for Boston '10 -- almost everyone's first Boston experience -- has been one of the highlights of my marathoning experiences. so awesome. so cool.
training with these ladies for Boston ’10 — almost everyone’s first Boston experience — has been one of the highlights of my marathoning experiences. so awesome. so cool.

Have an amazing Boston Marathon Monday, and many heartfelt cheers and fistbumps to our community members out there rockin’ the streets between Hopkinton and Boston. Be swift like Atalanta; remember all that you’ve accomplished during your many months of training; and don’t forget to smile because you are accomplishing something truly life-altering and, in the process, are reminding all of us what it means to work our asses off to chase down our race goal unicorns.

We couldn’t be prouder of you today, Boston Marathoners.

All our love from The San Francisco Marathon & the greater running community.

About:

Erin Mink Garvey has had the pleasure of running 25 marathons, qualifying for the esteemed Boston Marathon 13 times (including at TSFM ’14), and running Boston twice since she began running marathons in 2007. Besides running, Erin digs spending time with her husband and young daughter; writing on her blog; or cooking and baking vegan deliciousness. She and her family recently relocated to San Jose, California, after living in Chicago for more than a decade. Connect with her on her blog, runningruminations.com.