In awe

Tag: nothing

  • [644]

    Fall season is here! And so too for signing up for races

    I just paid a lot of mulla for this website. It is not yet due but they already took my money. But they asked me for payment the other day. No they don’t ask, they just charged it to my card.

    I am poorer by the minute. Now race sign up season is upon me.

    I have not decided which races to run for next year.  Never look back. Always step foward.

    Looking back, I have done a lot. I only want to run a marathon. Now I have ran close to 20 one-hundred milers. Ran 8 this year alone and there are couple more left. Where am I heading next?

    Tough. I want to have an over arching strategy of where I will be heading. The original mission was to run across the US one day. Still is. It is the reason I am running ultras.

    Next goal originally was to do the UTMB and Hard Rock.  I do have the lottery tickets (stones), from having run the Western States this year, but feeling cold feet at the moment  making the next step.

    My motto is to reach for the impossible. Never look back always forward.

    There is the Rocky Slam, Hard Rock, Big Horn, Bear, and Wasatch. I might go for one of them.

    Then there’s the Midwest Slam, Indiana, Hallucination, Mohican, and Burning River, Kettle Moraine

    Personally, I want to do Bootlegged, or Red Dirt, some easy 100, like Pine Creek or Oil Creek. There’s also the Pinhoti some said is doable.

    Then there is the Cruel Jewel. I have been avoiding that one, but it pops back from time to time. It will going take a lot of self talk to get me to sign up.

    I am thinking of running some of the same race over, Burning River, Devil Dog, Massanutten and maybe C&O Canal. Doing something familiar is easier than doing something new.

    Enough for now. I have to sleep on it.

    (I have nothing to write, so I am just filling up the paper with my thoughts on next year plan, which I don’t have any at the moment)

  • [638]

    I am in search of adventures.

    I finally have a bit of breathing room from all the races I have been doing.

      Since the end of last year, I have been on edge because of the race of Western States 100.  It was a big race. I did not know if I was up to the challenge to do it.  Days and nights, and every waking moment I was consumed with the race.  I watched countless videos, formulated many plans, listened to other people who had run it, and waited for more than six months to run it. It was finally over.

    No more training. No more worrying. No more thinking if I have done enough or having the dreaded feeling that I could do more or feeling regretful that I might have taken too many off days.

    It is like a balloon deflating.  Finally everything is over. Almost…  But we can call it done.

    Now I am thinking about next year.  What do I want to do?  I could do the same thing.  It is a question I asked myself each new year.  What are you planning to do!  The answer always have been “To take over the world” (reference to Pinky and the Brain in Animaniacs, one of my favorite cartoons).  To me it has always been to run more races!

    Somehow, I don’t want to run any more races.  Yes, I would run races, but they are no longer part of the must-do things for me.  It would still be nice to run some more races, but they are no longer my sole goal.

    Several years ago, I wanted to run in all 50 states, primarily marathons, and only marathons but now I wanted to do the same for 100 miles.  However, both of these goals now seem pretty boring once I realize there are no longer “risky”.  I could now run 100s, or at least I feel like, with my eyes close.  They are still hard and there are plenty hard 100s out there, but I felt I figured it out at least for the average 100 races. At least, I can have a completion rate of above 50%. The key to 100 miler, is as long as you run like the first half, you can walk the second half and finish.

    Something in me wanted to try new things.  It is not just because of seeking new riskier or dangerous things to do. Partly yes, I wanted more thrill but risk of physically harm is not part of the calculus.  I just want a new type of adventure, at least that what got me into running the first place. The Adventure and travel.

    Sorry, this feels a lot like ranting. 

    Maybe next year should be rim to rim to rim year I always wanted to do.  I don’t know.  I would like something like that, something off the beaten path, something more organic.  Rim to Rim is a run (self supported) to cross the grand canyon (big G), in a day and back. It is about 40 miles. It has some element of danger (people do die doing it, usually from the heat). It is something that involves a bit of planning. Somehow, it requires months of booking in advance.  Plus dealing with the uncertainty of the weather and such and to have a plan B in place.

    Anyway, I hope to do more of this kind of thing instead of signing up for races, I should make my own kind of races.

    I have been bored out of my mind the last week. I know, do something. (Yes, I did, a lot boring stuff: I totalled up the cost of this year race and it was a lot of $$.  I figured out next year race schedule, like 50% of it, there are a few races I haven’t committed to yet. The schedule will be released later in the year once I signed up.  I signed up to a marathon in the fall!  Which one?  The one I have been jinxed since the pandamic.  I’ll reveal once the date is closer. I believe this is only one marathon left I have not done in my area. It is quite famous. OK. I will leave it at that.  It is already added on my calendar for those who want to know 😉

    Yes, I love running marathon a lot still, more than any other distances.

  • Another week [Day562]

    I am behind on a post or so, because nothing much (of interesting things) happened in my life. I go to work, I come home, and I get tired, and I sleep. Then I repeat. You can get tired by not doing anything. Also, you can get tired and can’t fall asleep. That is the worst.

    The post marathon blue really hits me hard this time around. My last marathon was in May. Someone please help me get out of this, jk.

    I don’t know if this is consistently happening every year, but I go through this cycle of being bored, then sign up for races, run them and get bored again.

    I ran, I trained, then I now in a phase where I pause. For what? I don’t know. I just don’t feel like doing much.

    Sure I want to run more. If only I can go to say the Grand Canyon and do the Rim to Rim to Rim (R2R2R), to run from one side of the canyon to the other side and back. That would be an epic adventure. Why don’t I? Because it is hard!

    There are times where I just have the spirit to sit down and take care of all the logistics in one shot. But I hate to make decisions.

    How I got the Bay Bridge signed up was my friend was next to me and and kind of telling me what to do. Bay Bridge is one of those big races like the Rim-toRim, but instead we are closing the longest bridge in our area (the Chesapeake Bay). It is about 4 miles long, so it makes a good 10K.

    When I was a younging runner a few years back, I dreamed of cross that bridge on foot. I actually did sign up, but lo and behold we have the pandemic and it was canceled or something. I was offerred to run as a virtual event. I received a virtual medal (it was a real one, they sent to me).

    Anyway, then I lost interest to do it after I came to run much longer distance. The glamor and novelty kind of worn off.

    Here I am again to give it a second go because my friend was thinking of going to do it but reluctant because he wanted to do an ultra the day before (Stone Mill), one which I actually signed up.

    I said surely you (or me) could do two events on the same weekend. So it is a new challenge to me. I know I could run a 50 mile and a 10K the next day. It is not even an issue. So I signed up.

    What I was going to write though was I had a thought while driving home that most of us can be a one dimension person. I am. I was thinking how light is polarize. In that with certain lense you could filter out its components. I was thinking how some streamers on social media can be so famous such as they get tons of views on their stuff when they post certain subjects. For example, I know some cosplayers, where they get tons of likes in their cosplay postings, but when they become their every-day-self say their game play on twitch, they have no viewers. However, they love doing their less glamorous stuff.

    Anyway, I was thinking, like how I like running and posting about running. I don’t know how to write about any other things. But as I was thinking light and EM wave (electro-magnetic) can be polarize, and it dawns on me, when people read my stuff, what if they have a polarized lense on, and I my topic is outside of their interest, I am like the polarised light get filtered out. Anyway, it is fine. It was just an insight while commuting to work.

    My life is pretty boring. I was thinking on what to write. Then of course, I write about the topics I like.

    Another thing I think is very impactful to me was during my run at the MMT Race. My friend was telling me to make time my friend because time was my enemy/challenge during that race since I was afraid I might get behind on my pace.

    Making time my friend is easier said than done. However, it means to me is to make the most of my time. In that race, it means to run smart. Always moving. Always look for ways to cut down the time. It means be faster at the aid stations, be faster getting out, be faster at climbing, be faster at coming down. Run when possible. No waste energy etc. It helps. It carries into life too.

    I have been thinking a lot, of what can be done now as whether to do it later. Yes, many times it pushes me forward.

    I ended the week with a surprised. I will be taking part in a 50 mile race, called OSS/CIA. It was a race I wanted to do last year or the year earlier. I got to know the race director these last couple years. It is a small world. Last weekend (two weeks ago, and three weeks by the time this is published) I was at the Old Dominion Race. I was cheering for my runner and some of my friends. Alex, was there. I did not connect him to being the RD of the OSS/CIA. He was crewing the second place finisher and some other runners. He knew me, but I didn’t know him. We chatted and such. Lo and behold, tonight we had the pre-race meeting, and he said hello, nice seeing you at the Old Dominion, and I looked closer. It was him! Silly me.

    That’s all for now. I don’t get everything solved in my life. Things are hectic. There is no perfect life. I don’t have to. I am just trying to hold onto a tiny piece where I found perfection.

    By the way OSS/CIA is hard. They say maybe 50-60 percent will finish. I remembered running that course (same as the Devil Dog), where it takes me 7 hours to do 26 miles. So looking at the course cut off of 13 hours, I will be a bit tight in time.

    Oh, note to self, half a year review is near. I need to refocus and get my second half of the year together.