I remember when I first decided to run Around the Bay, TFM sat me down and gave me several important words of wisdom
I was relieved that none of them had anything to do with clean underwear, that would have been just a bit awkward. But what he did tell me still has meaning now, two years later. So I thought I would share them with you.
The first Around the Bay road race that I did came a month after arthroscopic knee surgery. If I look carefully now, I can still find two or three of the scars my surgeon was so good. But I was still dealing with a knee that would talk back on occasion, so running a straight 5 km was out of the question.
I was going to do a run walk to get me from start to finish. TFM said to me, when you run keep to the right side of the road. And when you are going to stop, make sure you are as far over to the right as you can be. It didn’t make sense at the time, but when I ran the race, people were passing all over the place.
The other thing he said to me was it didn’t matter how many times I walked in the race, I needed to make sure that I ran across the finish line. When I turned onto York Blvd. I knew the end was in sight, so I kept running past the time on my stop watch. And when the camera guy caught me in his sights, I made sure I had the biggest smile my laboured breathing could muster. Everyone in Copps Coliseum saw my silly grin, which got even bigger when I crossed the line.
But the best thing he said to me was run my own race. I still use that piece of advice to this day. While others are fretting about their time, I figure any day I can put my runnings shoes on and lace them up, put one foot in front of the other is a good day. It doesn’t matter what anyone else does, what does matter is what I do.
So next Sunday I will keep to the right, run across the finish line and will remember to smile the biggest smile I can when I see camera guy. And keep true to myself.
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