My First (and Last) Trail Race

By Guest Blogger Jennie Sparrow

“What kind of gloves are those?”  I said this without even trying to hide my “what kind of idiot are you?” tone.  “You’d honestly be warmer wrapping a single layer of saran wrap around your hands; those are the thinnest things I’ve ever seen, “ I told her as we sat shivering.  We were in my friend Holly’s 20 year old BMW, a used car she’d had since we met at freshman orientation at Agnes Scott College in Atlanta.  We were awaiting the start of a trail half marathon in November in Athens, Georgia.  Unfortunately for us, it had been extremely cold and raining the entire week prior and we were in for a misty and cold running experience.  Holly explained to me that when she went to pick up her bib that morning, the chipper woman at registration asked, with the enthusiasm of a high school cheerleader, “Are you pre-registered?”  “’I wanted to tell her, ‘ Holly would later recount, ‘Would I BE here is I WASN’T?’ “ It was that cold and miserable. 

We looked at her gloves some more, with the curiosity of archeologists who had just stumbled on a rare find.   “I found them at my mom’s house last week.  I think I’ve had them for about 20 years, “ she said with a touch of pride.  As I thought about where I was 20 years ago, it came to me.  “BAND GLOVES!  Holly, are those the gloves you wore as a flag girl in marching band?”  She cracked a smile and yelled triumphantly, “YES!”  So here we were, sitting in a car and shivering, trying not the think about the fact that this was the most comfortable we would be in the next 3 hours, and all my friend had to keep her warm was band gloves.  It would be a long day.

About 6 weeks prior, I came across the advertisement for this race, an inaugural trail half marathon the weekend after Thanksgiving.  The registration fee was $25 and the race was 15 minutes from my house, a drive that involved exactly one turn.  Anyone who knows me knows that two words that describe me best are cheap and lazy.  The price and location were right, so I called my old college friend and encouraged her to drive down from Asheville, North Carolina, and do the race with me.  We were both recreational runners, but were running mainly shorter runs.  “We can do this, “ I told her with a confidence that bordered on arrogance.  “We’re running shorter runs now; we just need to build up to one long run of 10 miles in the next few weeks and we’ll be fine.”  This would be her first half marathon and my first trail race.   I thought back to my misplaced confidence as we were shivering in the car. 

Once we realized that the race was about to start with or without us, we got out of the car and headed to the starting line with the less than 100 other, obviously pre-registered, questionably sane people.  Will Chamberlain (not to be confused with Wilt, who was famous for other feats of endurance), the race director for all the races in the area, told us about the route.  As usual, I tuned out, because, let’s face it, unless you are planning on leading the race, you don’t really need to know where you are going.  And then he said what he said before every race, “Have a good race.  Have a safe race.”  And we were off.  (When Will died unexpectedly several years later, I would feel a sense of loss that took me by surprise.).

I gave Holly some last minute advice.  After all, it was her first half marathon.  As we headed into the woods and onto the single track trail, I had a terrible realization.  I.don’t.run.trails.  Somehow this fact had eluded me when I was filling out the registration form, doing my training exclusively on the roads, and even sitting in the car that morning.   I am horribly uncoordinated, not at all agile, and terrified of falling.  Not a good recipe for a trail runner.  I knew this would be a long day as I walked sideways down the first hill.  Holly, on the other hand, was not quite as fit as I was but a much better athlete.  She jogged along happily in front of me listening to her ipod.  She turned around and grinned, “Justin and I are bringing sexy back!”  I smiled back, “Good old JT!,” I said, trying to hide the fact that I was way out of my comfort zone. 

We froze, jogged, and occasionally walked sideways along that wet double loop for over 2 ½ hours.  We finished the race exhausted and beaten down, but in 3^rd and 4^th place in our age group!  If you ask us now, we may even admit that there were only 4 people in our age group.  I wish I had some sort of epiphany or life lesson to share, but I’m guessing you have to pay more than $25 to get one of those.   Although this was years ago and Holly and I are now thousands of miles apart, we still get a good laugh and will be forever bonded by that race that “seemed like a good idea at the time.”  On second thought, maybe I got my $25 worth after all.