Seeing the weekend weather forecast favorable for running, I, only two nights prior to the event, registered for the Viking Dash Half Marathon, held in Fairburn, Georgia, just over 20 miles southwest of Atlanta, on Halloween 2020. I parked my car a quarter of a mile downhill from packet pickup and the starting line and, first walking up through the wet grass route, utterly soaked my only socks and sneakers, not to mention having to walk up, down, and back up right before the run already irritated me for the possibility of unnecessarily wearing myself out. The organizers dealt with confusions with the bibs of those who signed up relatively late, and a cordial lady handing out the bibs initially told me my bib number of 1499, which I knew from the race email, had been given away to someone else and I had to be assigned a new number, which immediately triggered my OCD: “What if my time gets registered to someone else?” Minutes later, the director told her all participants needed their original numbers from the email, after which she gave me my original bib, which she herself was wearing under her sweater for whatever reason.

Second in my age group of 30-39! I look out of place with this shield! 😂

For COVID-19 precautionary measures, every runner was separated about 15 seconds from the next, like a time trial. The race took place in Bouckaert Farm, which resembled a typical cross country course that consists of grass, pebble, typical trails, and hills, in other words, not a fast course. Regardless, I enjoyed overcoming a variety of surfaces for versatility, but aware carelessness could result in rolling my ankles and my right foot to be less than 100% since mid-2019, I focused much of my attention on the placement of my feet especially on the pebble. Towards the end of each of the two loops stood a colossal uphill that stretched about a quarter of a mile, which only moderately affected me the first time but turned me into a tortoise pretending to run with an exaggerated motion, switching gears to be more exact, the second time. My official time reads 1:58:34.3, sufficient for second place in my age group of 30-39. All factors considered, I am content with a sub-2:00:00 half marathon here. The race website states “top 3 in each age group earn a qualifying spot” for the National Championships in Selma, Indiana, on June 19, 2021, so I guess that includes me. Being a national qualifier in anything sounds humbling, but I doubt I will travel that far for a 13.1-mile run.

With moderate loneliness and feeling of purposelessness creeping in and out, I spontaneously considered, to distract myself, participating in a 48-hour event, this time with the objective of running the entire race instead of ending at a specific distance like in April 2017. This plan was unsurprisingly thwarted after prayers, but I was still eager to run a race this weekend to make the most of this rare cool weather in Georgia this time of year. I registered for the Halloween-themed Running Scared 13K, taking place on October 17, 2020, in Dawsonville, only the day before, justifying, “I would run tomorrow anyway. Why not make it a race?”

Individual starts due to COVID-19!

Getting lost has recently become my primary concern in smaller races in which I normally spend a large portion of running alone; therefore, I repeatedly attempted to study the organizer’s course map, which did not help due to the missing of arrows, play option, and any details. Prior to the start, I spoke to multiple people who have been lost here in the past, which worried me even more. This nightmare materialized during the first loop of two, which became especially frustrating because I had been maintaining a swift pace, for me, with an 8:13 first mile. In the middle of mile 3, following the completion of the two extra legs that 13K runners had to complete for each lap, I correctly turned left toward the way I came out to complete these legs. However, when I saw two sets of cones dividing that area and many runners on the other side, I wondered if I was supposed to turn earlier. One lady beside me also running in the 13K did not know either, and I proceeded to ask those nearby, none of whom were signed up for the 13K. Although I was going the right way, I, with the lady, turned around and returned to where the confusion began and asked the young volunteers, who gave different answers. Misinterpreting one of them, I ended up moving likely an additional quarter of a mile, even having to stop for a few seconds, before deciding I had no choice but to return to the route I initially went; the lady wisely did this much sooner than I. Only when approaching the end of the first loop a mile and a half later did I realize I had been running on course the entire time and the puzzlement really stemmed from the lack of 13K participants and the discrepancy in speed among the few of us. Coincidentally, I had a dream a few days earlier of getting lost and frustrated in a running event, almost in this exact scenario.

Other than this mishap costing my race two or three minutes, with my official finish time reading 1:11:42, nothing consequential occurred as a result; the runner who finished one place ahead of me would have easily finished before I regardless, and I caught up to and passed every runner who had passed me while I was panicking and even cussing. One older gentleman and the lady temporarily lost with me both expressed their surprise in my not slowing down in spite of this debacle. Who knows? Maybe this fiasco pumped up my adrenaline and made me run faster than I would have for the remaining miles. How fitting of the event name, as I was quite literally running scared in the short period I thought I could have blown the race. Furthermore, thanks to the unusually cool morning, I had no issue lasting all of ~8.2 miles without a single sip of fluid, thanks to no aid station. I will not brag about my gold in my age group of 30-34 considering I was the sole runner in the category, but nobody needs to know that. 😉