Run like a girl

The astronaut’s guide to a tough race on earth

~ Amy Friel ~ Leave a comment

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Al Bean was history’s ultimate anti-climax. An Apollo astronaut, Bean became the fourth man to walk on the moon as the lunar module pilot of Apollo 12. If you’ve never heard of him before, count yourself in good company; his just-shy-of-the-podium moonwalk didn’t quite sear itself into the pop cultural psyche the way Neil Armstrong’s one small step did.

The 24 astronauts who flew to the moon as part of the Apollo program are truly fascinating people. They left this earth as adrenaline-junkie test pilots, and returned philosophers. Their experience, gazing back upon earth from the heavens, was transcendent, throwing into relief both the fragility of our world, and the trivial nature of our terrestrial struggles below. But while astronauts like Michael Collins or Buzz Aldrin waxed poetic about this epiphany, Al Bean tended to speak a little more plainly.

One particular observation of Bean’s has been rattling around in my mind in the wake of Saturday’s Canadian Cross-Country Championships:

“The great thing about the universe is that it’s fair.”

I have tried, with varying degrees of success, to remember these words when things get tough. Our lives, no matter how lucky we are, will be filled with setbacks. No matter how loved we are, we will inevitably experience loss. None of us is immune to pain and disappointment. And for me this Saturday, pain and disappointment was the order of the day.

The senior women’s field at the Athletics Canada Cross-Country Championships (ACXC) this year was a force to be reckoned with. Going in, I had no illusions about running some breakthrough race, or earning any noteworthy placing. The depth of talent was formidable, and I’d be lucky if I could hold my own in the field at all.

A considerably larger field than the Ontario Championships, ACXC gave me more girls my own pace to work with. I went out right in the heart of the pack, pushing myself, but feeling strong.

That didn’t last long.

About three kilometers into the race, the wheels came off. Not long after, on a muddy hairpin turn, one of my spikes did too. (I was cursing New Balance’s name, but as I learned from one of the girls afterwards, I hadn’t tied them properly – a rookie mistake.) I spent the latter half of the race just praying I didn’t get lapped. I didn’t feel like a fighter; I felt defeated.

The thing is, I wasn’t.

I looked at the results afterwards: I’d been running about the time I had expected. And the handful of girls I’d somehow managed to outrun were no slouches, either – Mary Unsworth, a former Harvard collegiate runner and all-around badass, caught me in an all-out sprint for the finish, and I’m pretty sure the 0.1 second difference in our official times was decided by a nose. Unsworth is a phenomenal runner and fierce competitor; it took everything I had to keep pace with her at all.

It’s not my result at ACXC that disappointed me – it’s the way I felt in the race. I couldn’t push my body the way I did in my fall road races. It felt like the engine just wasn’t running quite right – a nutritional issue that’s making itself increasingly clear. But more than that, I felt so discouraged, so spiritually depleted out there on that course.

The thing is, the universe is fair.

I ran with a lot of incredibly talented, hard-working athletes on Saturday. These girls take their running seriously. They trained hard. They fueled properly. They came prepared. And at ACXC, the ones who beat me did so because they deserved to beat me, because they were better athletes on the day. That’s fair.

I was lucky enough to run two incredible breakthroughs on the road this fall. That moment when I found my dad in my post-marathon delirium and got to tell him my finishing time was, far and away, the best moment of my life. Not every race can be like that.

It’s never easy to come up against your own limitations. But if you want to grow as an athlete, it’s part of the process. If the goal of my 2015 cross season was to gain experience, then I can safely say that the goal was accomplished. Sure, it’s left me with a bit of a bruised ego, but that was bound to happen. Some races galvanize you. Some races inspire you. Others just humble you.

And that’s okay. The great thing about the universe, is that it’s fair.

Chase big dreams.

The War of Attrition: One marathon of a race recap

~ Amy Friel ~ 5 Comments

slides15_congratsrunnersSix months ago, partly by fluke and partly due to my ever-growing social media addiction, I had the good fortune of being selected for the Digital Champions team for the Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon. I had been on the fence about running another marathon; my debut marathon (at Scotia, the year before) could more accurately be referred to as a death march. I didn’t run my first marathon in 2014; I survived it.

I love long runs. I can lace up my shoes and get lost out there for hours. In training, the miles never wear me down – they just melt away. As a result, I had always thought the marathon was going to be my distance. But at Scotia 2014, it gutted me, and the idea of lining up for a redemption marathon became terrifying.

When I applied to be a Digital Champion for Canada Running Series, I thought I was letting fate decide. I reasoned that if they picked me, it was a sign. If they pick me, I’ll run.

They did.

11324212_914700058592827_335736508_nTerrified, but feeling I was in no position to argue with the whims of fate, I enlisted the coaching of the best runner I know: my dad. Vince Friel has been a dedicated distance runner for the better part of my life. He’s represented Canada in the World Masters Track and Field Championships, clocked a 4:02 1500m, and run under three hours in the marathon.

But more importantly, he raised me, and is intimately acquainted with the fact that I am (to put it bluntly) a massive wuss. I have a fragile little ego that doesn’t respond well to “tough love” coaching. I can’t be pushed to face a challenge; I need coaxing, encouragement, and positive vibes. And my dad is one of the most ridiculously positive people I know.

Armed with the Coach Vince training plan, I’ve spent the last six months preparing for October 18th. My easy runs became easier, my long runs longer, and my speed work… existent. Apparently if you want to run fast, you have to practice running fast. Who knew?

With Coach Vince adding structure and accountability to my training, the workouts began to feel increasingly comfortable. In the final few weeks leading up to the race, he had me running tempo runs at marathon pace, and to my surprise, they rolled right off my back.

1743748_377331395768072_6768686855622296579_nBut I hadn’t survived the marathon death march of 2014 without learning a thing or two. It wasn’t enough to be well-trained: I knew I would need a racing plan. For that, Vince reached out to one of Canada’s best marathon coaches, Timo Uuksulainen. Timo is one of the founding members of the Longboat Roadrunners, and used to run with my Grandpa Jack Friel back in Jack’s marathon glory days.

“The marathon is a race about attrition,” says Uuksulainen. “It’s not about who speeds up the most, but who slows down the least. So I would try and run the first 10-15 km with the least amount of effort, while remaining close to the time you want. You can work your way to that pace. You want to be on pace no later than 15 km, and then lock in and just try and stay relaxed and focused while knocking off those splits. As the race progresses, the effort to hold that pace will start to increase incrementally over the final 45 minutes, so be prepared to dig in and work.”

My strategy was simple: I was going out there to run three consecutive 10K tempo runs. I was going to stay on pace until 30K, after which point I had permission to race as I pleased.

I will tell you this much: staying locked into my planned 4:42/km pace from the gun was not easy. In the first two kilometers, it felt as though the entire red corral passed me. I felt like I was going way too slow – until I ran through the 1K marker and caught my first split: 4:21. Way too fast. I resolved to tuck in and run easy, clearing the next few K-markers right on pace.

When I hit the 10K mark, I stopped my watch, re-set it, and started again from zero. This idea came from an interview I had read with Canadian record holder Lanni Marchant, when she talked about taking the marathon 10K at a time. After the pain of last year, I couldn’t face up to running the full 42.2K distance, and in my mind, I wasn’t; this was just another 10K tempo run. Just like in training.

The first 20K breezed by; between the neighborhood cheering squads out there on the course and the excitement of watching the elites blow by at the turn-around points, I was able to stay on pace and keep my mind off of the miles to go. When we reached the bottom of Bay Street, and the half-marathoners split off to run for their finish line, something incredible was waiting for us: the Parkdale Roadrunners cheer squad.

12120268_125027967854344_949006577_n(1)There’s a special place in my heart for the people who come out to watch marathons. It’s a thankless spectator sport, and yet there they are, lining the streets in the freezing cold, shouting encouragement at a stranger. The cheering stations on the Toronto course are always amazing, but let me tell you, that Parkdale Roadrunners cheer squad was something to behold. Running through a vortex of screaming, cheering, cow-bell-ringing crazies, holding hilarious signs and throwing confetti, I felt like I was an elite running in a World Marathon Major. It was some serious, next-level awesomeness.

I had expected to come through the halfway mark just north of 1:39; a small PB for me, but not entirely unexpected, given how infrequent and under-prepared my half-marathon attempts have been this year. I ended up clearing it in 1:37:53. I was excited (especially since, thanks to the Real Time Run Tracker, I knew my family at home would catch my split), but also vaguely worried.

In the marathon, you can bank effort, but you can’t bank time; running faster than your goal pace early in the game is only going to cost you twofold on the back end. I learned this the hard way last year, and was not about to make the same mistake again. So I tucked in and resolved to run easy up and down the “pretzel” section of the course on Bayview Drive.

When I hit the 30K marker, I once again re-set my watch. The tempo runs were over! This was the point in the race that I had been pacing myself for – after 30K, I had given myself permission to start racing. Only now, I didn’t want to.

Timo was right: the 4:42/K pace, which had felt easy, almost pedestrian in the early kilometers, was beginning to take some effort. My body was holding up, but mentally I felt fatigued. I was no longer in the frame of mind to race. So I did the only thing I could think to do: I started my watch again and zero, and tucked in for another 10K tempo. Just like in training.

2015-05-24 | 2015 Toronto Women's Half Marathon/5kMy left foot was the first to go. My right quad started to ache; the left one quickly followed. At 34K, my core was shot. At 36, my neck sort of rolled back on my shoulders, and my head started bobbing with every step. I must have looked ridiculous. Actually, I’ve seen my race photos, so I know I looked ridiculous. With every kilometer, the effort needed to sustain my pace seemed to double.

But something incredible was happening: I was holding the pace.

I was hurting. I was fighting. I was running like some kind of demented marathon zombie, and I think at some point I might have peed a little. But I was holding on. Somewhere in all those months of training, something deep within my physiology had shifted, and I realized that this course, which had gutted me the year before, just couldn’t break me anymore.

By the time I hit 40K, I couldn’t make sense of my splits anymore. My body had given out, bit by bit, and now my mind was starting to go. I vaguely registered the 3:08-something on the clock, and knew I was within the Boston Qualifier window, but I didn’t trust my body to hold out over the next 2K. Nothing was certain until I crossed that finish line.

At the flatiron building, my sister Alex and roommate Ashley, both amazing runners in their own right, cheered me past. Ashley screamed something at me about 3:19, and I was elated. If I was at 3:19 right now, that means I’d bring it home somewhere in the low-3:20s.

The run up Bay Street in that final stretch to the finish was a vortex of screaming, cheering, electrifying loveliness. One of the coolest features of the Toronto Marathon is the slight bend in the road about fifteen feet from the finish line, which obscures the finish clock from view until right before you cross. As I rounded the bend, I realized that Ashley hadn’t been shouting my time at me – she was shouting my projected time.

12144025_983537711718495_885969964_nI crossed the line in 3:18:33 – a PB of more than 20 minutes, a Boston Qualifier, but most importantly, a race effort I could be proud of. I started to cry in the finishing chute, which seriously creeped out a lot of the race volunteers. I couldn’t help it – like I said, I’m a giant wuss.

It’s not often you get the opportunity to go back and rewrite your past mistakes, but it feels like that’s exactly what I did on Sunday. The 2014 marathon defeated me in every way possible – mentally, physically, and emotionally. In 2014, I ran out of my depth, without a plan, without proper training, and I ended up broken. In 2014, I gave up.

This year, I came prepared. I trained hard, ran a controlled race with a clear strategy, and didn’t let my ego get in the way. And more than that, I had fun. Even when I was hurting over those last few miles, I really was having the time of my life.

boston-marathon-finish-lineIt’s going to be a while before I return to the marathon. Boston 2017 is on my horizon, and until then, I’ve resolved to focus on the short stuff. But I’m happy knowing I was able to make such a positive memory with the marathon distance. I’ve always known that I was born to run the marathon. Last year made me doubt all that, but after Sunday, I feel like I’ve finally managed a passing grade in Marathon Theory 1000.

Second time lucky, I guess.

Chase big dreams.

Running down Rio: Why Lanni Marchant’s Olympic qualifier matters

~ Amy Friel ~ 1 Comment

ath-marathon18sp1If you were lucky enough to be in Toronto yesterday morning, then you cannot have missed the electrifying excitement that is the Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon. The flagship event of the Canada Running Series, the marathon has distinguished itself as Canada’s biggest and most prestigious race weekend. And while the home-grown competition at Scotiabank Toronto is always of a high caliber, this year saw Canadians Eric Gillis and Lanni Marchant running for the 2016 Olympic standards on the notoriously flat and fast course.

Two-time Olympian Eric Gillis famously ran his 2012 London Olympic qualifier at Scotiabank four years earlier, squeaking under the 2:11:29 standard by a margin of just one second. He finished yesterday’s marathon in a less nail-biting fashion, with a time that was more than a minute under the more relaxed 2:12:50 standard, qualifying for his third Olympic games in Rio 2016.

Gillis now joins Speed River training partner Reid Coolsaet on the list of Canadian men with a Rio-qualifying time on the books. But while Rio represents yet another Olympic games for both Coolsaet and Gillis, the real story in yesterday’s marathon was a Rio-qualifier for Lanni Marchant.

Marchant, who shattered Sylvia Ruegger’s 28-year-old Canadian marathon record on the Scotiabank course two years earlier, ran a 2:28:09, just a few seconds shy of her own Canadian record, but comfortably under the 2:29:50 qualifying standard for the 2016 Games.

That Marchant was able to bring home a 2:28:09 marathon yesterday morning isn’t especially jaw-dropping, given her past strong performances. What is noteworthy is that both Marchant and fellow Canadian marathoner Krista Duchene are now set to become the first women to represent Canada in an Olympic marathon in two decades.

Both women had achieved the IAAF qualifying standard for the 2012 London Olympic Games, but fell short of the more rigorous “A” standard required by Athletics Canada. Marchant and Duchene petitioned to be named to the Olympic team under the Athletics Canada  “rising star” provision, but both their petition and subsequent appeal were denied.

As a result, Canada went unrepresented in the 2012 women’s Olympic Marathon; just over a year later, Marchant shattered the long-standing Canadian record with a blistering 2:28:00 finish at Scotiabank Toronto, with Duchene hot on her heels in 2:28:32.

That Marchant and Duchene are now poised to represent Canada at the Olympic level is no small thing. Though the Canadian men’s marathon elite have enjoyed representation on the world stage in decades past, the women’s marathon has been consistently brushed aside. But in the three-plus years since she was left off the London 2012 team, Marchant has proven time and again that she is a world-class athlete who belongs on the world stage. After running to a strong 4th-place finish in the 2014 Commonwealth Games marathon, the Canadian went on to win bronze on home soil in the Pan Am Games 10,000m.

Fielding a strong pair of female marathoners in the first Olympic Games since Atlanta 1996 marks a turning point for women’s distance running in this country. And with even more rising stars, including Natasha Wodak, Rachel Hannah, and Natasha LaBeaud clocking world-class marathon times, it’s beginning to look as though Marchant and Duchene have lead the charge in the resurgence of the Canadian women’s marathon.

“It was disappointing not being selected to the (London 2012) team, but it helped motivate us,” Marchant says. “Hopefully this lays the groundwork for girls who come after us, so things might be different.”

If yesterday’s result is any indication, the revolution has only just begun.

Chase big dreams.

Kiplagat and Kastor triumph on the streets of Chicago

~ Amy Friel ~ Leave a comment

Eight years ago, while I was living on Canada’s east coast, a friend of mine dragged me to watch my first rugby game. Knowing little of the sport and how it was played, I expected to be bored, and was pleasantly surprised to find myself engrossed in the action. That’s because rugby is a spectator sport: it unfolds intuitively, accessibly, and offers entertainment value to those who might not be well versed in the finer points (or in my case, any points) of the game.

The marathon? Not so much.

Distance running in general, and road racing in particular, can be a little thankless from a spectator’s point of view. Improvements to the viewing experience from televised coverage, colourful commentary, and the recent introduction of drone footage, may have enhanced the entertainment value, but the sport remains one of subtlety. At its best, it’s nuanced; at its worst, dead boring.

This morning marked the first time in 26 years that the Chicago Marathon has been run without elite pacers, resulting in a slower field than previous years, but one characterized by the sort of cautious, tactical strategy typically reserved for championship racing. Instead of an optimized time trial, viewers were treated to an old-school foot race, with elites vying for place instead of time.

The great appeal of the marathon is in those transcendental moments it occasionally offers up – moments in which we witness the power of human tenacity in rising to a challenge which can at times appear insurmountable. On the streets of Chicago this morning, the elite women’s race offered no shortage of such moments.

67531c39-069c-4872-8144-294d1d1e908dKenyan Florence Kiplagat ran to a cautious but strategically impressive victory, crossing the line in 2:23:33. The 28-year-old dropped to the ground after finishing, giving an exuberant thumbs up to press and spectators.

Kiplagat ran to a third-place finish in Chicago last year, but was later upgraded to second following then-champion Rita Jeptoo testing positive for EPO.

AT&T USA Outdoor Track And Field Championships - Day 1American record holder Deena Kastor, who won the Chicago Marathon in 2005, bettered her own winning time from ten years prior, running 2:27:47 for a seventh-place overall finish. At 44 years old, Kastor is now the new American masters record holder as well, smashing Colleen De Reuck’s previous record of 2:28:40. Master or not, Kastor’s 2:27:47 is one hell of a world-class run.

Kiplagat and Kastor’s transcendent performances this morning were electrifying to watch. To see Deena Kastor continue to nail out world-class times as a master only reaffirms the prominence of women’s distance racing.

So thanks, ladies – your hard work, dedication, and grit are inspiring a generation of running women, and redefining what it means to run like a girl.

Chase big dreams.

The short stuff

~ Amy Friel ~ Leave a comment

a317f1bf80493e98a61235f03c42bd0bJust over three years ago, in the sweltering heat of my first Toronto summer, I decided to take up running. I had been a runner in my high school days, but I quit completely in college. Coming back to the sport after so many years, I felt like I was starting all over again. I had none of the confidence of my former skinny sixteen-year-old self, who used to tear through hilly cross-country courses with athleticism and guts. I didn’t feel like an athlete anymore. I didn’t even own a pair of shorts.

This proved to be a bit of an obstacle in the sweaty summer of 2012, in a city that, it seemed to me, was designed to trap every bit of heat in the concrete below my feet. But thirty-plus temperatures and crippling humidity be damned – there was no way I would be caught running, in public, in shorts.

The best I could muster was a pair of black knee-length tights. To me they looked “athletic enough” without betraying the pasty-white, shamefully toneless legs hiding underneath. I spent two months of a blistering heat wave, suffering through labored three-to-five-k runs in those tights.

My roommate – a natural athlete who ran on a track and field scholarship through college, while I was eating pizza and doing keg stands – sized me up on my way out the door one afternoon.

“You’re running in that?!” she asked. “It’s like forty degrees outside!”

I knew I was being ridiculous, of course. When I look back at pictures of myself that summer, with that benefit of outside perspective that only comes with time, I can say confidently that my body looked just fine. I had no reason to be terrified of something as innocuous as wearing shorts. But I was.

I remember very vividly they day the heat finally broke me. Even hours after the sun went down, it was scorching hot outside. Something had to give; either the heat had to go, or my body image issues did.

I’ll never know for sure, but I’ll bet you my first run in shorts was a PB. I was so embarrassed, so uncomfortable, so irrationally convinced that strangers on the street were gawking at my totally normal, human-looking legs, that I all but sprinted my usual 4K loop.

I didn’t get comfortable with them overnight, and I’d be lying if I told you I wasn’t relieved when the fall came and I could switch back to running in yoga pants without risking heatstroke. But over time, I’ve made peace with the way that my legs look in shorts.

Over many years, and countless miles, running has made me realize that my legs don’t exist to be measured and judged by the standards of others; my legs are machines, that can carry me places and do things that others simply cannot do.

If there’s one really powerful gift that running has given me, it’s the freedom to appreciate my body on my own terms. I don’t want a flat stomach; I want a negative split. I don’t want a thigh gap; I want a Boston qualifier. And I don’t want to look like Megan Fox, I want… Alright, that’s a lie. I would totally love to look like Megan Fox.

But I’d much rather crack three hours in the marathon.

Chase big dreams.