I am not a summer person. It's not that I don't like sweating, because I don't mind that at all. It's that I live in this pathetic stupid city of DC where in the summer it's 90+ degrees, 100% humidity, and not a good place in sight to cool off. When I lived in NY, at least when it got unbearably hot there was the Atlantic within a 15 minute drive to cool off in. But the blistering DC sun and lack of good watering holes, makes me an unhappy person. So once the hot weather starts (because it goes from beautiful balmy 70 degrees to oppressive 90s in like a day), I have to run early early early in the morning so I don't burn to death. But sometimes my elaborate planning fails and I start my run at 10am when it's VERY sunny, the temp is hovering around 80, the humidity is through the roof, I forget my water pack, and there is little to no breeze along my route. Fun times. These were my runs on Days 495 - 500, (and btw 500!!! I have made it almost a year and a half of blogging about running) blistering hot and uncomfortable. Day 495 was a long run and Day 500 was a sprint workout built around 100 pushups, 200 crunches, and 300 air squats, both in the crazy DC heat.
Day 495 was going to be one of those Epic failure days right from the get-go. I woke up much later than normal and then was rushed getting out of the house to start my run. I wasn’t feeling so awesome and then realized when I arrived at my run start spot that I forgot my Camelpak at home. I said screw it and went out for my “4-5” mile run. Well that is not entirely true. I told everyone (aka, my parents) I was gonna do a 4-5 mile run, but inside I was hoping I’d make it through at least 5, maybe 6 miles. So I headed off down the Rosslyn hill, booking it. Let me stop here and explain to you that I (along with nearly every other runner in the world) am an idiot, in that when I come to a downhill, I can’t help myself. Even if I’m exhausted and broken, I have to sprint down a hill. I LOVE sprinting downhill; leaping over barriers and diving (essentially) out of the way of pedestrians. I love it, it’s one of the only ways I feel fast (the other way is by skydiving). So as I sped downhill, I enjoyed the momentary wind and the childish notion of speeding along like a bullet.
I quickly progressed along my route allowing myself a couple of seconds to stand on the Francis Scott Key Bridge and admire the view. Sometimes when I’m running around DC I feel like part of the crowd and other times I feel completely alone. It’s easy as a runner to see other runners or cyclists along their route and associate with them. You look up at someone else and think ‘oh hey, look someone just like me.’ As humans, we are constantly searching for commonality with each other. When you meet someone new, the first thing you do is try and find a way to connect. If you do, then you can be friends. But if not, you lose interest in them and go off to find someone else. That, mind you, is an immensely simplified version of the process, but is essentially what goes on. When I see other runners or I meet someone who calls themselves a runner, I instantly feel like I can identify with them even if everything else in our lives is different. But that morning on the bridge, I felt like Will Smith in ‘I Am Legend.’ All alone, even though there were tons of people around me, even runners. So realizing that standing there was doing me no good, I moved on trying to shirk that loneliness feeling.
By the time I was passing the Kennedy Center, I was starting to wish I was the only person left in DC. There were literally hoards of people out wandering around with children, babies, and dogs crowding up the path. It also now was about 85 degrees outside and with a perfectly clear blue sky. I (an easily agitated New Yorker with a mild temper) was not feeling the heat or the crowding, so I headed over to the volleyball sand pits near the Lincoln Memorial and hoped to God that my friend Jessika was still playing volleyball and would share her water. She was and did, and I was incredibly thankful. That little bit of water perked me right up for the second half of my run. Let it be a note to any and all runners out there that hydration (surprise, surprise) is INCREDIBLY important on long and/or hot runs. So having a bit of pep back in my gait, I headed over the Memorial Bridge. I should just take a minute here to say that I love and hate this bridge. I hate the little hill that seems to eat your hamstrings because you’re already most of the way into your run and you’re tired and the last thing you want to do is run UP any kind of incline, but I do love the view. I kid you not, every time I run over this bridge I imagine the scene from West Wing (yes, dork moment coming on now) where Deputy Chief of Staff Josh Lyman and the Vice President Hoynes go for the run where Hoynes asks Josh, if he’d listened to him all those years ago if he’d be President now, and Josh says, “I don’t’ think so sir, I know it.” Yes, I recalled that from memory and feel free to make fun of me for it, I won’t pretend to hide my love for shows like The West Wing and NCIS. Anyway, while imagining that scene, I ran over the bridge with airplanes flying overhead and sped off toward Arlington National Cemetery.
The route back past the cemetery and past the Iwo Jima Memorial was quieter because not as many tourists realize you can walk on that little path from one to the other and so I could move along at a comfortable pace again. I still felt disconnected when I came up to the hill by the front of the Iwo Jima Memorial. I took a minute and kneeled down quietly in front of the Memorial for a moment to think about everything that has happened in the last several years. Back in high-school and college this would have been the last place I would have expected to find myself having an emotional moment. But there I was, at my favorite memorial hoping for a moment of comfort and peace. In that moment, I suddenly came back to myself and realized that though there will be hard times ahead when I feel alone, each day is a new day and I’m the one who chooses my mood. Just got to take it all in stride, and face each day one at a time. After that I began to feel a bit more positive. I felt the strongest I had all run in that last mile and a half back to my truck even with the oppressive heat.
I am convinced that the heat brings out the pain in any and every workout I do. I may have a hard workout ahead of me, but if it’s hot I’m going to cripple myself. I decided to honor Day 500 by doing an especially hard work out. And clearly the universe saw it fit to bring the heat and make this hard work out even harder, and I started this workout before 7am! Anyway, my session today was to be a 1.5 mile run down to the Iwo Jima Memorial, then head over to a grassy field near-by and do 100 pushups, 200 crunches, and 300 air squats, and then run back up the Rosslyn hill 1.5 miles to work. Maybe to you this doesn’t sound too bad, well now let’s tack on the fact that it was easily 80+ degrees out already with the humidity at 60-70%. Yeay!
So the run down was fine, but when I reached the Memorial, I was drenched in sweat. But I got a surprise look at the USMC silent drill team practicing for the outdoor concert later that evening. I stood there and watched them for a bit and then headed over to the field to start the crossfit part of my workout. I chose a spot by a bench that was in the shade of a huge looming tree and began. I decided to do each workout cycle in 25’s on rotation without stopping. So it went 25 pushups, then 25 crunches, then 25 air squats, repeat. Once I hit the first hundred, I stopped doing pushups and only did the 25 crunches and 25 air squats on repeat. When I hit two hundred, I dropped the crunches and just did 25 air squats, break for 15 seconds and repeat, until I had hit 300. At this point I was pretty sure my legs, arms and core were shot, and I was going to puke. I was also covered in dirt and grass from doing my workouts in the lumpy field. What a sight.
But surprisingly, my legs held up as I started my run (more like a jog really) back to work and a shower. On the run back I found that my mind was completely blank and quiet. Like a dog, I had worn it out and it was ready for a nap. I love when I can do an activity that just completely hushes my brain, so the morning’s workout was 100% success. Even though I was tired from the workout, my legs sore, and I was going uphill on the way back, I still made it in 13:30 minutes (1.5 mile) which I was fine with. And the best part was that I felt okay and not too beaten to death. Crossfit is an interesting thing in that it kills you while you are doing it, but after you feel like a million bucks. :)
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