Yesterday Kristie and I did a pre-half-marathon run. We ran the full 21.1 KM just to see if we could do it. We did the entire run in about two hours and six minutes, but the run was not without incident.
First of all, I wasn't feeling it from the very start. My calves were tight, my energy level was low, but I was determined to run the whole course anyway. Kristie had pointed out that if I can run the whole course while feeling less than 100%, then I should do well on race day.
We were doing pretty well all the way to the half way point, and were still doing well for about a quarter of the way back, but then we got the point where we headed north, and BAM! We go hit with winds of about 70 KM/H! This continued for about 4 KM of the run too! And the further you got, the heavier the winds got.
This is not uncommon at all here in Wellington. The Point, which is the part of the harbour where the wind hits you, is well known for fierce winds. As a matter of fact, there was a story of a shopkeeper who rescued a man that was blown into the harbour due to the winds yesterday!
As we neared the end, where we would reach the point and then turn west, I was absolutely exhausted! I would look down at my feet while I was running and think:
"I'm barely moving! My feet are very slowly moving forward, but I am making virtually no headway!"
And by the time we finally did reach the point, we were absolutely livid. Our exhaustion was transmuting into rage. To illustrate this, we saw that a couple of runners were coming towards us (being pushed by the wind); they looked as if they saw us, saw how hard we were working just to slowly move forward, and then said to themselves:
"We should turn around now."
Well, holy cow, did that piss me off. I was swearing under my breath at them, calling them wimps, etc. In my mind, they did it just to rub it in our faces!
Anyway, after we rounded the point, the wind finally let up and we had about another 3.8 KM to go. Needless to say, we had no delusions of grandeur to finish the course in under two hours. We simply wanted to finish it with the little bit of dignity we had left...which wasn't much.
We're hoping that on race day, the wind will take pity on us and realize that we had already paid our dues. However, it will be more likely that the wind will combine forces with its friends cold and rain, and attack us simultaneously.
