I wasn't even panting unitl 600meters into the race, but pressure was collecting in my tear ducts and my throat was stiff and dry. I was ready to burst into tears; I was already defeated. You may think I am poetically exaggerating here, but I was spending as much energy trying to not cry that whole last lap as I was trying to run.

I am a bit of an emotional runner it turns out.

In this instance I think I'll have to liken myself to those unfortunate girls from my SuperSweet16. "But daddy I wanted 2 convertables for my birthday!!!!" That was me at the end of my race.

So heres my deal: I have been running for one month so far, and had a 7sec. PR in the 1500 at the Allcomers meet on thursday to give me a final time of 6:04; and I was pissed. I wanted to take of at least 15secs from last week, maybe even 20, and those stupid 7 seconds were not nearly good enough for me.

It took me about 20 minutes to recover from the race afterwards... not for my body to recover though, but rather for me brood long enough to be sure I wouldn't cry in front of a million strangers at Hayward. "But I wanted to run faster!!! A 7 second PR in a race that's shorter than a mile isn't good enough! Waaaa!!!"

ugg, I'm a spoild running brat, I know. But seriously, I swear to God if I don't improve my time by at least 9 seconds next week I am prolly going to have to choke a bitch.

The final though being this: running, and even more so for racing, is all about accountability, and for me this week I would have failed no matter how much I improved by. Like I said before, I was already defeated halfway through the race, and not because I wasn't improving but because I wasn't fighting. I was dragging my heart some 30 meters behind me and I came up short because getting faster isn't the goal in a real race, its conquering your body and pushing the threshold, and I failed.

well, its been fun. stay tuned for more tales and emotional philosophies from the trail.