Iram Leon

After the race last year, I reflected on that fact that I was extremely reluctant to run the ultra again.  But time weakens memories and strengthens aspirations.  The challenges of the moment dissipate as inevitably as the contrail of a jet across the sky.  These traumas seem permanent, but you look away for a moment only to discover that they have vanished in that instant.

My wife sent me an email this morning with a link to a story about Iram Leon in Texas who won a marathon while pushing his six year old daughter.  While it is easy to get hung up on the fact that he has brain cancer or that he won while pushing a stroller (which I can attest is no small feat), what struck me the most was the fact that he has continued to live his life and pursue his dreams with his daughter and that he is putting her first.  (Make sure you turn the sound up so you can hear him singing Bon Jovi!) 

Now, I can add Iram to my list of inspirations along with Julie Moss and Team Hoyt.  Who pushes you?  Who challenges you to do more than you think is possible? Who inspires you to see beyond your own limitations? Who demonstrates that your limitations are merely illusions?  

Last spring I wrote about how I almost quit but didn't because I was carrying Jeannette with me and as a result she carried me over the finish line.  The previous year I wrote about pushing my son as much as he was pushing me to be my best.  This spring there will be someone new who will carry me over the finish line.  And I can't wait to find out who that may be.

 

Article in Woodburn Paper

Click here to read the article about the scholarship recipient that was recently in the Woodburn Independent.

I'm Not Doing That Again

“I’m not doing that again.”  We have all said this.  In some cases it is the guy finally breaking up with the train-wreck of a girlfriend who everyone tried to warn him about.  In other cases it is the addict finally getting sober after relapsing again… after getting sober… after relapsing, again.  Perhaps it is the alpinist  who has a hair-raising open bivy, in a storm, without adequate clothing or food or shelter yet goes back into the mountains.  But we often do.  Memories fade.  The immediacy is lost, and the potency of what was felt in the moment has been diluted to, “It wasn’t that bad.”

After my ultra-marathon last month (heck, in the middle of it), I swore up and down that I would not put my mind and body through the torture a third time.  Depleted of energy, dehydrated, blistered, and broken is a great state to reinforce the necessity of quitting these stupid ultra-marathons and the scholarship that is the albatross around my neck.  But only two weeks later the memory has started to fade.

During this time since the 28^th of April, I have had conversations with many of my students about the run, the scholarship, and the purpose.  Again and again I find myself talking about the fact that the chosen student is not the smartest or the most financially needy.  She is the toughest, most stubborn individual with the greatest drive and vision for herself.  My two recipients have been kids who refuse to say, “I quit.”  The whole purpose for running 50 miles is to demonstrate this value: stuff worth getting is hard to get; don’t quit even when it hurts or cuts you down or seems impossible.  Presumably I am supposed to live this value of dogged perseverance through terrible odds.  Through that lens it seems kind of weak that I have considered quitting because it was “too hard”. In retrospect I also see some very significant problems with how I prepared.  Clearly I had some setbacks including a sinus infection and a sprained ankle.  However, I recognize that I went into the preparation feeling like I could rely more on my own experience than I should have.  Knowing what to expect is helpful.  Adequate preparation is still necessary.  

Like a junkie, I find myself already missing the tortured high of running those long distances.  They are both meditative and elegant in their simplicity.  There is an erosion of the self that occurs; at the end, the carapace that conceals the tender self beneath has been dissolved through hours of sweat and effort.  I am left with only the truth and a self is vulnerable and raw.  Perhaps this is why I found the 50 miles so painful last week.  I was forced to come to grips with what I really wanted from the endeavor.  Was it about time (faster than last year), competition (placing higher than my friends with whom I had trained), or the scholarship (money raised from simply covering the distance)? I find myself entertaining the notion that I will do it again next year.  It matters so much to the winner of the scholarship, and it has been so deeply revealing about who I am.  I would presume that as the summer passes, I will find that “I am not doing that again” will fade into something else: a receptiveness of the idea that the scholarship and its incumbent 50 miles should continue.  Unlike the junkie, the boyfriend, or the alpinist, running the 50 miles does not threaten my well being (despite what people may think).  It is true that I lose my toenails, but I risk little physically.  I was left psychologically wreaked, not corporeally damaged.  Endurance is in the mind not the legs or lungs, and perhaps this is where I should start my training next year.      

  

Heartbreak Hill

Comparison of Boston Marathon and Capital Peak Ultra-Marathon Elevation Profiles

Yesterday, I successfully completed the entire 50 miles of the Capital Peak Ultra-Marathon, running a time of 8:53.  At ten minutes slower than last year, the times are fairly comparable.  However, I feel like the efforts were miles apart.  Although last year I suffered greatly during some portions of the race, I still enjoyed it;  Kathleen, with whom I ran much of it, provided me with companionship and motivation.  This year there was only immense suffering, an absence of joy, and no comradery.  

As some of you may know, I rolled my ankle fairly severely in December, putting my training off until late January.  Then at the end of March I contracted a severe sinus infection that ruined night after night of sleep.  Fortunately a two week regimen of antibiotic was eventually able to stem the tide of gunk flowing from the cavities in my head.  This left me with marginally two and a half months of time to seriously train.  These are not excuses for my performance but reasons why I was unable to arrive at the start line fully prepared.

Although I started the race with my two friends, Andrew and Andrew, there was no assumption that we would run together.  One had trained like a machine and the other had two decades of experience to rely on.  I knew that both would soon leave me behind to run my own race.  Within a few miles, I fell in with a small pack that included, surprisingly, Kathleen.  She remembered me from last year, and we chatted briefly before also parting ways.  By the time I left Aid Station #2 at 9 miles, I was essentially running alone.  On the initial climb to the top of peak, I passed nearly a dozen people and continued to feel quite strong as I began the loop back around to begin the "grunt mile" on the second trip up to the summit of Capital Peak.  This is where things really began to fall apart for me.  

At mile 20 I was 3.5 hours in and still not having any fun.  In fact I thought about pulling the plug and dropping down into the 55k course to finish.  My reasons for doing this were fairly simple (lungs weren't working right, I was too much in my head, my feet were killing me, etc.), yet I thought of Jeannette and the promise that I had made to her: I would do everything in my power to finish all 50 miles.  The pledges my sponsors had made were also in the back of my mind.  They had demonstrated their faith in me by making a commitment to support the effort.  I had to do right by them as well.  Therefore I made the agonizing decision to continue on the 50 mile course.  

I swear that when I arrived at Aid Station #6 (29.6 miles) there was a tiny man in a sombrero and Mexican poncho.  He greeted me with an upbeat "Hola", and I simply responded to this bizarre illusion with the idiotic, "Did I run all the way to Mexico?"  Was he real?  If not, then who refilled my water bottles while I crouched to ease the ache in my knees?

The 5.7 miles from Aid Station #6 to the place where you begin the long descent off the ridge line was bad for me last year and nearly as much this year as well.  Along this stretch, you begin to cross paths with the runners headed out while you are headed back.  The pitch of the trail is generally in their favor, so chugging back uphill is exacerbated by their long strides and easy demeanor.  At this point I could feel blisters forming beneath my nail beds and between my toes.  A change of socks and shoes as well as Bodyglide was waiting for me at Aid Station #7.  I just had to tolerate the discomfort until then.

When I finally arrived, I was fortunate to have the assistance of Becca and Shana who refilled my stock of gels and fluid as well as helped me into dry shoes.  Troopers that they are, they cleaned up after me including my disgusting and soaked Cascadias.  For a moment, as I sat in the delicious comfort of that chair tending to my angry feet, I thought again of just pulling the plug.  I knew that fresh shoes were just a stop gap measure.  They had offered to help me lance the blisters, but I declined knowing that with all the sloppy mud left to run through, doing so was risking getting foul water in the wounds.  I absolutely did not want to continue, but I stood up and jogged back into the woods. 

Again I thought of my commitment to Jeannette and the principle that I was trying to illustrate for her as well as all of my students.  If I quit, it would not have been because I couldn't finish, only because I didn't have the will to finish.  As if to illustrate that point, the last fifteen miles were pure agony.  My feet were stoic and putting up their best fight.  My quads, although trashed, seemed to relish proving that despite their depleted state they still had some mileage left in them.  It was my mind that was gone at that point.  (Remember the hallucination of a Mexican in a poncho?)  For six hours I had been running by myself.  Rarely was anyone with earshot.  Often it seemed that I was the only person on this 50 mile long ribbon of mud and rocks and sand, and this messed with my head.

As much as my body was trashed when I crossed the finish line, it was my psyche that truly lay in tatters.  A group of people, including my four friends, were milling about eating and drinking in the afternoon sun.  Exiting the chute, I headed to the deserted corner of the parking lot, dumping my hydration belt as I went.  A wave of emotion was poised to overtake me, and I was reluctant to let it all come apart publicly after having suffered so privately for so long.  Eventually I dropped into a squat and allowed the relief of finishing to finally overtake me. 

We live in a world ready to laud our greatest successes and condemn us for our worst failures, but in reality most of our day to day existence is neither triumph nor tragedy.  This race, this effort, was neither success nor failure.  It was merely coping and making do until the end was finally reached.  The goals that we set are only significant in relation to what we have done in the past.  For me, it is hard not to feel like the ultra was a failure because of a slower time and greater suffering throughout.  No one was there to witness those private moments when I faltered on the trail and felt like crawling to the next aid station was a legitimate option, so they only saw the final result which was completion of the whole 50 miles.  That must equal triumph, right? 

The comparison at the top of the page is meant to illustrate the relative nature of success.  Before I starting running ultras, I had completed a series of marathons.  Although Boston was not one of them, I use it as a comparison because of its famous Heartbreak Hill, which is the last of four climbs between miles 16 and 21.  Rising just 88 feet over 4/10ths of a mile, it is the final climb for the course.  I had my own Heartbreak Hill yesterday; however mine was not a stretch of asphalt or section of trail but rather a state of mind.  Somewhere around mile 40 I realized that adrenaline could not keep the pain at bay and that I simply would not make the goal of besting last year's time.  But I would finish despite the doubt that had crept in along the way.  Defeating that hill was not a physical accomplishment but a psychological one: how appropriate for a scholarship that seeks to reward determination and perseverance over academic skill or financial need. 

The Scholarship Award Goes to...

I am pleased to announce the winner of the 2012 Endurance Scholarship.  It is Jeannette Selvas Orozco.

As a junior, Jeannette realized that she was significantly short of credit and was faced with the question, “Would I make it?”  She then made the biggest decision that she had ever had to make: Jeannette decided to enroll in the Oregon National Guard Youth Challenge Program in Bend, Oregon.  Willingly and freely she entered a boarding school environment that is built on a foundation of strong discipline, extreme structure, and rigid protocols (the contents of a student’s personal locker have prescribed places: choice reading book on the right side of the second shelf; socks rolled and placed just so).  She did not just survive in this new school; she thrived.  Jeannette was recognized as one of the top 5 cadets in her platoon and honored for academic excellence and high achievement in physical education.  With dreams of boxing in the Olympics and becoming a law enforcement officer, she has a clear vision for herself in the future.  As she clearly articulates in her application, Jeannette refuses to be just another Mexican-American teenager who didn’t make it. 

I had the opportunity to listen in on my panel’s conversation, and many of the same themes recurred from the discussion they had last year about Caleb Dron, my first scholarship winner.  They saw in both applicants a person who was living their future dreams through their present actions.

I would like to write more about her experiences which have led to this point as soon as she and I have the chance to meet and talk about what she feels comfortable sharing with a wider audience.  I hope to do this sometime next week, so please check back for more information about her story and her journey.

It is my absolute honor and privilege to run for her on Saturday.  The shirt that I am wearing today (pictured above) is in honor of her and her accomplishments and will be the one that I will run in during the race.  Having her name on my back will certainly motivate me to run all 50 miles with heart and drive.    

Decision

Last night my panel was hard at work discussing the candidates for the scholarship. The letters of reference were weighed against the student’s responses to the essay questions. The life experience of one was considered in relation to the life experience to the other. Ultimately they came to a unanimous decision, but I am not going to share their choice until I have the opportunity, tomorrow, to speak to their choice personally.

Needless to say, I found it profoundly interesting that the members of my panel brought into their discussion their own personal experiences: as a psychologist, as someone who works with adolescent girls, as writers of applications, and as seekers of references. Each has witnessed their own version of perseverance. Their conversation was colored, for the better, by how they individually saw the world. The fact that they all came at it with a unique lens makes their unanimous decision all the more wonderful and significant.

I am profoundly proud to run on Saturday with this person’s name on my shirt and for their future as my cause. It motivates me and moves me emotionally. I look forward to sharing my panel’s choice with them tomorrow.

Application Due Date

Tomorrow the applications for the scholarship are due. Currently I have two in my possession, which I received today, and expect four or five more to come in before the end of the day. My panel of three has been assembled. Their task will be to sort through these applications this weekend and make their determination.

The group has asked for guidance: how to choose? The same issue was raised last year. They needed to weigh the life experiences of one individual versus that of another. It is horribly subjective, entirely personal, and ultimately gut decision. What is clear, though, is the set of values that the scholarship seeks to support.

First, the applicant should demonstrate that they are truly dedicated to their education. This does not mean that they are 4.0 student or in challenging classes. Instead they see the intrinsic value in becoming an educated person and are willing to make sacrifices to reach their aspirations. This person may struggle to find academic success, but they make that success their primary focus.

Second, the applicant should demonstrate that they have had significant and longstanding barriers to their educational success and that they have been proactive in trying to surmount them. This is not a chance to tell the best "woe is me" story. Although it is easy to be sympathetic to the trials that they have faced, the panel should be focused more on how the student has worked to overcome the barriers that they have faced. Ideally, these impediments have been an issue for a long time (i.e. not just a few months or even a year) and are academic and not just personal in nature.

Third, the applicant should demonstrate that they have forward momentum. I want them to find someone who will keep going and who will fulfill their dreams. The panel will look to the recommendations for insight regarding the likelihood that this will happen. As well, they will need to listen the voice in the student's writing. In their words, do they hear motivation, determination, and drive? The scholarship is a one time award. It is a launching pad from which a young person can take the next academic steps. After that they will be on their own.

I do not envy the task that the panel has. I watched the process last year, and at times there was tension between the members. Each felt like they had a dog in the fight. Yet it was truly remarkable to see them come to genuine consensus regarding their ultimate choice.

I hope to have their decision posted by early next week.