synthetic wrote:
Who else suffers from severe race anxiety?
I never worry if my training has been on point or not in the week or so before race-day, as there's nothing you can do to fix it at that point, and the only way to fuck up is to go & get yourself injured
My biggest anxiety is always
getting there on time; once I'm there, I'm fine
I've had a couple running races where I arrived and got my stuff into bag check just as the gun went off, so I've had to zig & zag around & through the walkers at the back
Several years ago - nevermind how many exactly - I raced a Summer Evening 10K on Kelly Drive in Philly. I arrived at Lloyd Hall around 7:15, to give me time to warm up before the 7:30PM start. However, as I walked toward the staging area, I was alarmed to see that was NO ONE around
"The raced started at 7:00" I was informed ['dumbass' was implied]
I did some quick math: 'the folks at the back will probably do 10-12-minute miles, so they'll take about an hour; I should be able to do this in about 45 minutes* ... let's go!'
I took off with no one in sight to chase down
It was an out & back course, so it wasn't long before the leaders started coming towards me on their way back to the finish line. I just had to wait until the last person came by before the turnaround & I'd know how much I'd caught up, if at all, and who I'd be looking for to catch the end of the race
I forget now what the gap was at the turn, but I can remember that I finished 4th from last
* as I said, this was a while ago, when I was younger & much faster than I am now
"What's your claim?" - Ben Gravy
"Your best work is the work you're excited about" - Rick Rubin