No Country for Old Runners

“I shouldn’t be in Canada at all. Winter is all wrong for me.”

 Leonard Cohen

I wonder why someone decided it would be a good idea to organize a road race that is held at the end of March, when our wintrified country is just starting to recover from a months-long deep freeze. This is what the founders of North America’s oldest race bequeathed to those of us who ran the 121^st iteration of the Around the Bay 30K race in Hamilton on Sunday.

It might be to weed out the wimpy runners like me who have trained indoors all winter.

The starting line is the last time I saw Duncan.
He was through lunch by the time I  finished.

I have grown less tolerant of cold weather since I was in my thirties. In my first Around the Bay outing in 1991, I wore shorts and didn’t think much of it. Nowadays I wear as much outerwear as I can carry and still move.

My son Duncan was also entered in the race although you couldn’t say we ran the same one; he was finished, at home, and had finished lunch by the time I got myself across the line.

Apparently the registration numbers were down slightly this year, which the race management blames on our record-setting frigid February. I can see this. An ice-clad winter has a direct effect on outdoor training, which is dodgy at best in this part of the world.

I spend the dark months running on the nice bouncy treadmill in my warm, dry basement. There is a water cooler right behind me, the bathroom is ten feet away, and I can watch TV. This means that when the snow is gone and my shoe rubber finally hits the hard road, my body can’t figure out what happened to it. My quads won’t let me walk downstairs for days after my first outdoor long run.

Although the Around the Bay race route features a road optimistically called Beach Boulevard, I didn’t show up at the starting line hoping for a day at one. After a winter at the Club Med of my indoor gym, I wanted all the challenges that come with a start-of-season race.

Weather conditions were identical to the chilly November half marathon that was the other bookend of my winter (sunny, breezy, below freezing), so I dressed in the same outfit, including my torn baggy old tights; the only new addition was a pair of Hoka One One shoes. The Hokas are the opposite of racing flats or motion control shoes; they make me feel like I am running on a pile of marshmallows. For the first time in a long while, I was not constantly aware of my sometimes-dysfunctional feet the whole way, so I call this shoe choice a success.

The first 10K of the race follows gritty industrial streets from downtown to the lakeshore. Unscenic but flat except for the ups and downs of a few overpasses.

The second part of the route goes past sad looking waterfront properties and under the Burlington Bay Skyway. I believe the properties are sad because despite their spectacular beach location, they sit near a wastewater treatment plant, with all the obvious odiferous ambience. As you climb away from the lake, the streets are more residential and prosperous, and the terrain is more rolling. This section always seems to take the most out of me, for some reason.

The last 4K turns back into town, and back into the biting March wind. It was tough going. My quads were protesting with every step. Even though I was surrounded by lots of cheery runners and volunteers, I felt myself sinking into a primal sort of survival Scott-expedition-like mode: head down, jaw frozen in a rictus smile, eyes glassy. At about 28K there is a cemetery, where somebody had posted a bunch of witty signs (“The End is Near”). Yes…one way or the other, I thought gravely.

Old Man Winter finishes Around the Bay

The race finishes indoors, in a hockey arena. It’s nice that the spectators and supporters can stay warm, but for me, the change in ambience from bright sunny outdoors to gloomy indoors is confusing and off-putting. I got out of there as quickly as I could.

This was my third go at Around the Bay. The first time I ran it, I set the bar low. When I raced again in 2008, I was just as slow, but I was elated that I hadn’t deteriorated in the intervening 17 years. This year I thought I would likewise be happy if I didn’t sag too much from my benchmark time 24 years ago.

Despite my polar expedition wardrobe, I managed to get myself to the end - slower than ever, but about as expected for the amount of outdoor training I did. For me, any finish line I cross is a success, and I'm looking forward to a string of successes in the season ahead.