Harrisburg Race Report

I guess sometimes you get what you ask for. After waxing poetically about the joys of small town marathons in my last blog, events occurred that caused me to have to change from the Philadelphia Marathon this coming Sunday, to yesterday's Harrisburg Marathon. Maybe I should have written about the joys of having lots of money, or hair on my head, but I digress. What follows is my recap from yesterday.

Pre-race I wake up in Harrisburg where the temperature is in the mid 40s. The forecasters have it going up to the 60s by mid day. I have two shirts with me; a singlet and a short sleeve shirt. Now, one thing you have to know about me. I am THE master of over-dressing for a run. My approach is to avoid shorts and a t-shirt when a parka and snow pants are available. I wear balaclavas in the summer. Naturally, I put the singlet back in my bag. I eat a couple of skinless potatoes (breakfast of champions) and head to the starting area.

After waiting on the most important line several dozen times, and meeting a few people,, including one guy who is running his 100th marathon, I line up towards the front waiting for the gun to go off. Then without any Sinatra, or any other music or even warning, the gun goes off. So much for having time to worry. My goal is to run 7:30 per mile for the entire race.

Mile 1- We ahead across the bridge over the scenic Susquehanna River for a little tour around Harrisburg. Basically, it's a short circle around the downtown area, of what is the capital of Pennsylvania, despite being its 9th largest city.

Mile 2 Back to the path along the river. I try and fall into a rhythm as I imagine myself running on a treadmill next to my friend Shelly. I am starting to get warm and going a bit too fast.

Mile 3 Boy, I bet that singlet would feel really good right now. We turn onto a gravel path which is scenic and makes my knees smile. Ok, not really. Still, I start thinking about my next race being a trail race instead of one on pavement. Then back onto the path by the river back towards the bridge. The cheering is good and I'm feeling pretty good.

Mile 4 I almost offer encouragement to a runner before realizing that she is doing the marathon as part of a relay team. Ech. I can't stand those guys. They are always so perky. I'd be smiling too, if I knew I only had to run 6 miles and change.

Mile 5 Back across the bridge. Right back towards the baseball stadium where we started. Well that was a lot of effort to go nowhere. We go a little further and then... you guessed it, back across a bridge. It is this bridge which the website describes as offering “a break from typical solid ground, the closely spaced iron grid work of the Walnut Street Bridge is a welcome running experience (runners may also choose to run on the concrete sidewalk on the south side of the bridge)”. A break from solid ground? Iron grid bridge? Perhaps I should consider toilet water as a welcome break from sports drink.

Mile 7 Speaking of sports drink, the drink they are using is not certified as kosher, so I am stuck with water with sports beans. Have I mentioned that it's hot? Being a small town race, the water stops are not that frequent. This is going to be a challenge.

Mile 8 We pass the governors mansion as we run along the river. There are all sorts of signs with historical markers, but now is not the time to read. I see signs for the Civil War Museum and think of my friend, Rabbi Karp, a fellow civil war buff. There are some interesting statues include one of a soldier with a bayonet. I am reminded that today is Veteran's Day and that running a race is not what makes someone heroic. I pass a little girl doing cartwheels and think of my daughter, Maayan, who loves to do them as well. My family is not with me today, but they are still with me, if you know what I mean.

Mile 9 As with every race, there are spectators with signs. One guy has a sign that says “my father can run faster than yours”. I wonder how awkward it would be if I told him that my father is dead. I decide not to find out.

Mile 10 Than I meet Dennis. I've been looking for someone who is running the same pace so that I have some company. He is shooting for 3:18 while I am shooting for 3:17, which is good enough for me. I don't know it at the time, but we will stick together for the next 15+ miles.

Half way- I am not measuring my overall time and there are no clocks but I am right on pace with what be a PR in the half of around 1:38. I am relieved. Ed Whitlock, recently set the record for 80 year-olds in the half. I might not be fast, but at least my time would be a PR for some age group. Hmm, I wonder what the 5K record is for 90 year-olds.

Miles 14-17 Dennis and I continue to chat and run. I remind him to run the tangents, and to slow down, partially to stay on pace, partially because I am struggling. We are at the part of the course they don't talk about on the website. It is an industrial part of town with traffic open in both directions, with a requirement to get across the road. It's kind of like Frogger without the background music.

Miles 18- 20 Hills. Really tough hills. There are three of them in a park that is quite picturesque. We attack them, but they fight back. The ¼ mile with rocks underfoot that are big enough that I can feel through my shoes, doesn't help. We struggle a bit up a somewhat steep overpass. I am not feeling good at all.

Mile 22 I am ready to give up. There's no way I can keep this pace. I tell Dennis to go on without me. It feels like a scene in the movies where the soldier tells his friend to tell his family he loves them. Dennis plays his role perfectly and tells me to hang on until the next mile marker. This is the turning point in my race. If he's not there I give up on the spot and run easy for the rest of the race. Instead I make it to mile 23.

Miles 23-25 Somehow I get a second wind. We are really pushing and passing people. Dennis, who has to be the nicest guy I've ever met, offers encouragement to every person we pass. I can barely talk. Somehow, we are running between 7:10-7:20 a mile. Dennis asks me my PR and when I tell him, he tells me to get ready to break it. I want to ask him our time, but I am too tired to speak. Up ahead is the finish line. Only problem is it's up on the bridge. To get there I have to run underneath the bridge, practically make a U-turn and go UP a sharp hill. That is just cruel.

Mile 26 People are cheering for me using my race number. I am trying to figure out how I am at mile 26 with the finish line still being 100 miles away. It's also moving away from me. Somehow I catch it. 3:16:25. PR by 2:15. 7:30 per mile. I literally feel like I am going to pass out. I have visible dried salt all over my face. 364 days a year I live by the mantra that “food is fuel, not fun”. Not today though. Over the next 10 hours, I eat two bags of chips, two power bars, a banana, two chocolate bars, a bottle of chocolate milk and about 12 servings of chinese food.

My three fastest marathons have all been run at small races in Pennsylvania. Some people try to run in all the famous races. Others try for a marathon in every state. Me? I think I am the king of smalltown, Pennsylvania races, with solid color, long sleeve running shirts. Allentown, I'm coming. Bethlehem Running Festival, piece of cake. Reading Marathon, you are mine!

Thoughts from a Repentant NY(C Marathon)er

Growing up in New York, I thought it was the only place to be. It had lots of people, it was loud, it was fast, it was happening. I couldn't imagine living anywhere else. Then something funny happened. I moved away and stayed away for over ten years. During this time, I discovered something interesting. There were many things I didn't miss about New York. The large crowds, the noise, the energy. Suddenly, I wasn't so sure I wanted to go back.

I've spent a lot of time thinking about running in general the past week, and the New York City Marathon, in particular. I was shocked when it was not canceled right away and then flabbergasted in the way that it was, so close to race day. I thought of my friends who were supposed to be running, as well as what I would do if I had to choose whether to run, but mostly I thought about the victims of the storm and how small and petty we runners must have looked to them.

At one point, I too wanted to run NYC. It was one of the biggest and most famous marathons in the world and it was so close to home. After running it (twice, in fact), I understood why it was so famous. The crowd support, 1st Ave., running through the five boroughs and so much more. Still, I also finished with a feeling of not wanting to do the race again. It was too crowded, it was overpriced, it was run by an organization, NYRR, that I believe in many ways has lost its way. Since then, I have discovered the joys of small town races, with their charm and scenery, cheaper prices and room to breathe out on the course.

I was heartened by the way so many runners responded with kindness in the days following the storm and the cancellation. I'd like to think there is an additional silver lining. Many of my friends who were supposed to run have chosen to run in other races that are relatively close to New York. Some will be small town road races, others involve people trying the trails for the first time. It is my hope that they will discover that there are many great opportunities out there and ways to run. NYRR might not change, but perhaps some runners will.

Finally, given the choice of running or deferring, what would I have done? Would I have let my training go to waste or would I have refused to take part, realizing that it was not all about me? Perhaps the best way to answer the question is with a story.

A rabbi once asked his student what he would do if he found a wallet with ten thousand dollars inside. “Return it” said the student right away. “What are you, a fool?”, said the rabbi. The next day, the rabbi again asked the student what he would do if he found the wallet. This time the student answered “I'd keep it”. “What are you, a thief?” replied the rabbi. Unable to think of any other possibility, the student asked the rabbi what he should have said. “I will not know until I am in that situation”.

The Daily Show

Why would a guy with a large family, a new job, and a running obsession take on a new daily commitment? Although I would love to tell you the answer, I can't. I'm trying to figure it out for myself.

You don't have to be in my world, or even Jewish to have heard about the event that took place this past August at Met Life Stadium. Intrigued by a gathering involving tens of thousands of Orthodox Jews, the media covered this past summer's Daf Yomi Siyum. The event involved the completing of the entire Talmud at a rate of two pages per day over a seven and a half year period. For the uninitiated, this might not sound so challenging, but imagine studying a text in a foreign language, with no punctuation and vowelization, while reading legal arguments about abstract and occasionally arcane topics, and you begin to get a clue of what is involved. Now imagine doing this every single day for more than seven years. On vacation? Doesn't matter? In the hospital? Keep on studying. Not in the mood? Too bad. Amazingly, there are tens of thousands of people who did this and continue to do so as the new cycle is underway.

I was there at the stadium that day. Not as one of those completing the talmud, or, even as a celebrant. I felt that, as a father, I should bring my older sons with me. I was in the middle of a prolonged crisis of faith, where serious talmudic study and even prayer, felt like a burden. Unlike many who were in the crowd that night, I left the stadium with no plan of joining the new cycle which would begin the following day.

It hadn't always been that way. After finally figuring how to study talmud in my 20s, I dove in pretty seriously. I openly spoke of my plan to finish before I reached the age of 40. I made progress, both through the Daf Yomi system, as well as more in depth study with friends. Then life happened and I fell off the wagon a bit. I comforted myself by telling myself that my teaching to my students counted as a form of study. Before I knew it, the goal of finishing the talmud faded from my mind. In fact, I started a new form of daily communion; running.

Where I had once felt the need to master Jewish law, lore and philosophy, I now felt a need to do speed work and hill repeats. While Jewish law kept me from developing one of those obsessive streaks of running every day, I soon was running each day when it was permissible. While I occasionally felt guilty, I had a plethora of answers that kept my guilt from growing strong enough to move me to change.

I felt like a hypocrite as I encouraged my children and students to study, while I did not. My feeling of unease grew as I started to struggle with religious doubts. I didn't exactly embrace them, but I can't say that I worked hard for answers.

Amazingly, my oldest son, who already spends many hours a day studying talmud, started to do the Daf. Although I occasionally studied with him, I didn't think much about it. It was more of a way to connect with my son, than a religious act.

Recently, I decided to stop being passive and started poking at my doubts. I had some good conversations, read some good books and essays, and did a little soul searching. On Yom Kippur I made a somewhat modest decision. I decided I would join with Daf Yomi for the next volume of the talmud. For the next six months, I will be trying an experiment. As I travel for work, I will continue my study. As the due date of our 8th child approaches, I will do the daf. As I feed my addictive personality with daily doses of mileage, I will give it a second helping as I study each day.

Where will this lead me? I have no idea. As I occasionally do when I put on my running shoes, I am going to just get started and see where I end up.

Desks, Running and Learning

12 years is a long time to sit at a desk. Although I know my son Ashi won't actually be sitting in one for that long, I felt a sense of trepidation as I watched him go off to school to begin first grade this morning.

As many of you know, one of my biggest challenges, and hence, one of the things I write about the most, is my relationship with my sons. I often struggle with letting my boys become who they want to be, instead of forcing them into the place where I want them to reside. This manifests itself in all sorts of ways; from sports to religion to religion (did I mention religion?). Of course, as I became obsessed with running, and even moderately successful, I had to fight the urge to try and get my sons to become runners. Of course, my oldest sons being teenagers, helped me, by reminding me that anytime I pushed too hard, they would respond with a pull the other way.

All of that made running my first race on Thursday night, with not one, but both of my oldest sons, so special. I didn't push them, threaten them or even try and bribe them, I just invited and they accepted. I can't deny that I was particularly pleased afterward to hear them talking about bringing down their times at their next race.

Which brings me back to Ashi, who today began the transition from play-time, nap-time and story time, to desks, homework and blackboards. I fear that he will have a hard time sitting still, as some male Sommers, perhaps even myself, experienced in the past. As a (former?) teacher, I know that not every student is cut out for classroom learning, and that much of what we make them do, has no real connection to what they will need to do later on in life.

Of course, there are all sorts of things that I hope he will learn and love. I hope his teachers and I remember that learning happens in a ll sorts of places from classes to parks. While sitting still and running fast.

Breathe

I can't breathe, but I push on. This is why I've never really liked 5Ks. The pain, the struggle to bring oxygen into my heaving lungs. I keep looking at my watch to see how much farther I have to go. Almost there.

The past few weeks have brought a number of races and a few concerts, two things that seem unconnected, even if one did involve the singing of “Born to Run”. Still, there was a common element. As I watched Bruce with my brother at Fenway, and Moshav Band with my wife, I felt like I feel after crossing the line in a short race; the amazing feeling as air fills my body and my breathing goes back to normal.

I never realized how much I need music until my father passed away. That year, as I followed the Jewish custom of not listening to music as a sign of mourning, I felt an extra level of pain. I don't know whether I might have been able to receive rabbinical permission to listen, but I didn't ask. The very night that the year of mourning was over, I went to a concert and I felt it. As I listened to the music I had that feeling. I was breathing again.

It varies from time to time, what I want to hear, or more correctly what I need to hear. I have my ideas as to why it changes, but I'll save that for another time and place. Either way, I've found it interesting that as I've been to these concerts, I've reconnected with the pain of shorter races; not only accepting it, but embracing it. I don't think it's by chance that as I've done so, I've been able to set a few PRs and even win a trophy for winning my age group.

I am pretty sure that the pain and discomfort are what make the breathing feel so good. I can't even claim it's a tradeoff that I would willingly make. Still, there is something about pushing and fighting through the pain, accepting that it's there, and the wonderful feeling that comes as, just for the moment, I take in the oxygen and just breathe.

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The Evangelical Rabbi Learns a Lesson

A friend once called me, only semi-jokingly, an evangelical runner. Having gained so much from running, I try to share it with others (Want to lose weight? Try running. Want to be happier? Try running. Want to get rid of bad breath? Try running). When asked about how to make time for running, I generally said something deep and sophisticated like “Do you have time to be in the hospital?”.

Well call it divine providence, karma, luck, comeuppance or my preferred term, God's sense of humor, but this summer, I've learned to be a little less preachy.

It has often been said, with only the tiniest amount of exaggeration, that the two best parts of teaching are July and August. Having left teaching after 16 years, to start Team Just One Life, I am no longer off from work in the summer. In fact, I am not only working but find myself on the road, recruiting for the team. From the pork capitol of America (Washington D.C.) to the dairy capitol of America (upstate New York. OK I know it's not, but even the dog I saw there, was white with black spots) I am seeing the world, or at least the Northeast corridor of the US, which to a former New Yorker, might as well be the world.

Well, between the long hours, and the time on the road, I have had a harder time getting out on the road in the best sense of the term, RUNNING. It seems that it's a little easier to train when you are working from 8-2:30 with a break in the summer. Fear not, I am still getting in 50+miles a week, but it does mean waking up at ungodly hours and being a bit more flexible.

I still think running might be the answer to practically all that ails the world (get Abbas and Netanyahu to run together and there would be peace within 5 miles), as well as what ails man (I can practically swear that I feel my hair follicles starting to sprout again). Still, I'm a little less smug than I used to be and will understand if you can only mange 45 miles a week.

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Take the Leap

I received a friend request from my father-in-law the other day. At first, I have to admit, I thought it was a little strange. He's not exactly in the age demographic of most Facebook users. Still, upon giving it some thought, I thought it was pretty cool that he signed up for an account.

After I made the decision to end my career as a teacher, I received a call from a good friend. After he wished me luck, he added how much he admires my willingness to break away from what I was doing to try something new. He admitted that he is not thrilled with his job and wishes he he could change.

I spent 16 years teaching teenagers, or at least, trying to. I was frequently struck by the lack of willingness on the part of students who were making poor decisions to try and change. The thinking seemed to be based on the idea, that their current way of operating might not be working, but at least it was familiar.

It takes guts for a non-runner to try and take up running. At the beginning it's awkward, uncomfortable and frustrating. It's much easier to give up, or better yet, to not even try. Still, I know that it is not only my life that has been transformed by having fought through the uncomfortable initial effort.

We spend so much time talking about how life is too short and trying to live longer and yet, paradoxically, at the same time, staying in situations that just don't work. Often, we are alive, but not fully, trudging through life half asleep.

Of course, I had a little push getting to where I am. I can't deny that my new job comes with a steep learning curve. Still, I feel alive, productive and challenged. If I am successful, and I think I will be, I will also get to change lives. I suspect that there will be days when I will miss teaching. What I know that I will not miss is the feeling of being stuck, of being in a rut, in a situation that no longer felt ideal.

To my friend, my students and all of you I would say, take the leap. I suspect you'll be glad you did.

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