What I Do

This summer and fall was marked by me working a lot with running.  When I wasn't coaching the MDRA marathon training class I was coaching cross country at Washington.  In August there were was one week where there was a marathon class run on Saturday morning, an MDRA board meeting the following Monday night, cross country practice at Washington started that week at 10 a.m. every day, a marathon class run on Tuesday, a track night I host every other week on Thursday, and then the weekly Saturday morning run.  That's five MDRA runs or meeting and five Washington practices I had to be at, and stay married.

By the end of August, I had to confess to Emily that I had reached the end of my coaching rope.  Earlier in the summer and we had to kind of intensely talk out/negotiate if all this coaching was worth it.  The sacrifices Emily had to make while I was gone coaching go without saying and at the same time cannot be overstated.  I am not sure when (or if) I will coach a marathon training class again.  This spring I had to be coaxed out of MDRA coaching retirement by my friend Marty in the first place.

But coaching at Washington is a different story.  That is something I will do for as long as I can, until they kick me off the track.  It allows me to be so much more involved in my building and get to know so many new students I only see in passing if I see them at all.  And I get to be at the ground level of a sport I love.

But coaching the MDRA class was a challenge to get up for by August.  I always was able to.  Fortunately, there were so many things to keep me going: working closely with my good friends Deb and Marty, giving back to a sport that gave me so much, the enthusiasm, hard work, and camaraderie of the people in the class, and most importantly Charlotte.  Charlotte loves running.  And she loved to "help the runners with Daddy."  We would fill the water jugs together on Tuesday afternoons in the backyard and on Saturdays I would pick her up while the class did its long run and we would go check on the runners together at various points along the way, and she would run with Marty at the finish of the run... and then eat all the snacks we had laid out for the runners.  She especially liked the cookies and Goldfish.

Charlotte also noted"the blue water for the runners.  They like it."  This would be PowerAid Mountain Berry Blast which I usually made five to ten gallons worth of at each run.  It's an unnatural blue, with an unnatural smell, and an unnatural taste.  The kind of thing a two year old would love, but all summer she said wanted nothing to do with it.  She would say, "the blue water is for the runners.  The regular water is for Charlotte."

Anyway, a week before the Chicago marathon, class member made a video for her friends who were all running Chicago together.  A little background: we break the class into four pace groups.  The slowest group is the Terrapins (a name they chose themselves and they call themselves the Terps with pride).  They are longtime friends and very loyal to each other and our training classes, no matter who is coaching.  So Noelle made this video to celebrate.  The fact that Noelle was able to film and photo and then edit this into a four minute video speaks volumes to the depth of friendships running and this training program has produced.

Regardless, it tells the story of what the MDRA program is all about and why this summer was worth it for me, even if it is too much to do again for a long time.  One day, when Charlotte is older we can watch the video together and I can tell her that in her how special way, she played a small part in this class.  And that for sure makes everything worth it.