Invisible Man

Last year, I ran the Konquer the Konza 25k run near Manhattan Kansas.  I was training for it, and doing quite well, but on Labor Day, I injured myself water skiing.  The event was 4 weeks later, and I was a little healed, but had slipped on my training and still hurting.  I ran the event anyway.  I felt OK until the last 3 miles, when I really started hurting.  I finished, and felt triumphant about it.  However, the two marathons I was going to run in the following month were put out of consideration.


This year, I signed up again.  I got some kind of cold-like respiratory infection that cut about 5 weeks out of my training, and put me behind.  Then I started really packing on the training, trying to accelerate the process.  I was still behind, but determined to go through with the run.  The weekend before the race, I did a 12 mile training run, and did something to my calf at the 11.5 mile point.  I hobbled around for a week, tried once to run on it, and decided to let it heal and see how I felt.


The day of the race, I felt pretty good.  At the start of the race, about a half mile in, my leg started to hurt, and it didn't seem possible to finish.  I had 15 more miles to go.  I reasoned that I would simply run as long as I could and see what happened.  I figured I could quit at any time.  The pain lessened, but I was not really operating at any kind of normal level.  I accepted a 2 minute per mile drop in my pace and just gritted my teeth and plugged along until it was over.


It was a completely different experience.  My iPod was out of battery (must have had the button pressed while it sat in my luggage - my fault for leaving the switch in the on position).  So I didn't have inspirational music or the audio books I was going to listen to.  I did have my iTunes on my iPhone, but beyond listening to one podcast and two songs, I didn't use it.  For once, I ran just listening to the trail.


People talked to me, but only because I was wearing the t-shirt from the run the year before.  One woman told me "Congratulations sir, I think you're the oldest one out here.  You don't see many people your age doing this." You can't tell someone to fuck off when they think they are giving you a compliment, can you?


Then I noticed something else.  I was the invisible man.  The race volunteers would be cheering the people in front of me on, then fall silent as I ran by.  Then they would cheer the people behind me.  The course photographer did not photograph me.  I finished the race and did not talk to anyone.  I simply left.


What did they see?  What did they not see?  It was an eerie feeling, even to the point of being distracting from all the pain.