Holiday Season Runner Hibernation

I glanced down at my hot cup of coffee, wrapping my hands around it to warm them up, as I sat at a long wooden table near the window.  I had just finished a seven mile run on the Stevens Creek and Bay trails with the Mountain View Area Run Club Sunday morning crowd, with whom I had been running just about every Sunday morning for the last nine months.  The local Starbucks was relatively calm, as Julie, another member of the group sat across from me.  She had finished her run a few minutes ahead me and we were keeping warm inside as we waited for the rest of the group to finish.  After some post run small talk I asked her if she had any races planned for the upcoming year.  "Not right now" she answered, laughing.  "I'm a little burned out on running".  I jokingly gave her with a wide-eyed look before bursting into laughter, but in reality I knew exactly how she felt.  I too have been going through a similar experience.  As much as I love running, with winter setting in, I've been finding it difficult to scrounge together the energy to get out of bed early in the morning to log miles.  My friends and family in my Michigan hometown are most likely rolling their eyes, but there really is such a thing as a California Winter.  We may not have four distinct seasons like the Midwest, but the weather in late December is undeniably different than in late July.  The sun sets earlier in the day, rises later in the morning, and the temperature drops into the mid forties at night and early in the morning.  There are more clouds, more rain, and more wind.  The weather is one factor, but then there's also the holiday season.  Many of us get more days off of work, which makes us instinctively want to rest and sleep in more.  Subconsciously, we know that the end of the year is approaching, which means our minds and bodies are feeling the physical and mental exhaustion of putting hard work into our jobs, personal lives, and our hobbies and interests over the past twelve months.  I went through a similar situation last December and I'll freely admit that some mornings during the last few weeks of the year, it's a straight up battle to get out of bed before work and go for even a three mile run.  And that's with seven hours of sleep.

A few minutes later, some more of our friends drifted into the coffee shop and sat down at the table, having just finished their run.  After hearing that Samantha (Sammy), Garner, Olga, and some of the other members of the group have been experiencing similar sentiments towards running during the holiday season, it put me at ease.  The morning before, myself and another group had congregated at a park in Santa Clara to go for a group run along the Guadalupe River.  Although it was a glorious morning and there was hardly a cloud in the sky as the sun came up, the temperature had dropped into the high thirties overnight, unusually cold for the Bay Area for this time of year.  Only half of the people who RSVP'ed on the Meetup event page showed up.  I've come to realize over the last few years that holiday season runner hibernation, as I've coined it, is quite normal among endurance athletes.  As we sipped our coffee and shared our feelings and stories about lacking energy to run during the holiday season, a sense of relief seemed to spread throughout the group as we realized that none of us were alone in this predicament.  I especially understood Julie's point of view, having completed the California International Marathon three weeks ago, and Sammy's position as well after she trained hard for several months leading up to the Rock N Roll San Jose half marathon.  Their feelings of exhaustion were justified.  Garner on the other hand, despite his year end exhaustion, was still logging two digit mileage during our group runs, much to his credit since he is not doing it for training, but for pure enjoyment.  

Despite the exhaustion that we as runners feel during the final weeks of the year, once the new year kicks in, the proverbial reset button is hit.  Yes it's still cold outside, yes it's still dark in the morning, but the psychological factor has been overturned.  We no longer feel the fatigue of twelve months' worth of hard work.  We no longer feel unmotivated and unfocused.  In my case, it doesn't always happen right on January 1st, and it happens at a different time for all runners, but we know subconsciously that a new year is upon us.  It's time to get after it.  It's time to use the next twelve months to evolve as runners and people.  Some people sign up for races in advance at the beginning of the year as a form of motivation.  Others take it as it comes.  I tend to do a little of both by signing up for races to motivate myself, but also "winging it" throughout the year as a method of creating an element of surprise to keep life interesting.  There is no right or wrong way.  But one thing is for sure; holiday season runner hibernation is a completely normal occurrence that many distance runners contend with during the last few weeks of the year.  While it can feel dismal at times, the good news is that for many of us, once the new year hits, the proverbial clock is reset, and it's time to get back at it.  And we all have that to look forward to! 

      

It's Not Okay

We've all been in this situation before.  For some of us, it goes a little something like this; it's a typical day at the office and we're sitting at our desks in front of our computers working away, or perhaps sitting in a meeting with our colleagues when, out of nowhere, that email pops into our inbox.  Or, from a different perspective, we walk into work and head to the back room to prepare for our shift.  As we're clocking in, we look up at the announcements board and see that flyer plastered on the wall.  We open the email and we read the flyer: Mandatory sexual harassment training on this day at that time.  All employees MUST attend.  So, we reluctantly attend the meeting (because it's mandatory), with the expectation that it will likely be a waste of time, since many of us clearly know what constitutes as harassment and that it's wrong.  I understand why these meetings and training sessions are required in the workplace, but I think it's a shame that we live in a world where these sessions are necessary.  We're supposed to be grown adults.  This shit isn't rocket science.  Don't harass people.  Don't make them feel uncomfortable.  It should be common sense.  You'd think that people would know better, but unfortunately this is not the case.  Even in this day and age, and even after all the stories that have gone viral over the years, sexual harassment, sexism, and sexual abuse are still, to put it bluntly, big fucking problems in our society.  Sorry for the rude word, but it's the truth.

Sadly, these issues are ever present in today's world, including the world of endurance sports.  Over the years I've heard numerous stories from my former wife and female friends about being harassed by men while running and hiking alone.  Even on social media, men have the audacity to make offensive and disgusting comments on girls' photos, which is not only idiotic, because they're making themselves look like complete dirt bags to hundreds of millions of people, but more importantly, it's just plain hurtful.  Several female public figures in the endurance sports community have spoken out about being harassed by men.  Catra Corbett once spoke on social media about some guy on Mount Whitney telling her that she was "inappropriately dressed to summit" in reference to the running skirt that she was wearing, while not saying a word to the men on the trail wearing shorts.  This moron clearly didn't know who he was dealing with.  Catra Corbett has summitted Mount Whitney numerous times and has run over two hundred and fifty ultramarathons.  In "Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail" a novel written by Cheryl Strayed, she discusses her experience of being harassed by two male hunters in the California wilderness while attempting to purify water for drinking.  According to the book, the encounter made her so uncomfortable, she feared for her safety.  There is a section of the novel "Born To Run" where author Chris McDougall recounts a particular year at the Leadville 100-miler where several Tarahumara men participated.  Throughout the race, the men all referred to Ann Trason, who was also running the race, and is arguably the most elite ultrarunner of all time, as "La Brujita" (the little witch) because they were jealous of her talent.  I understand that this is a story, and it could have been exaggerated for entertainment value, but I don't care if these guys are amazing runners.  They shouldn't have acted that way.  And by the way, Ann beat all of those chumps and gave the following statement to the press at the finish line: "Sometimes it takes a woman to bring out the best in a man". 

While these stories are upsetting, what happened in Georgia earlier this month is downright appalling.  For those who don't know the story,  a young female reporter who works for a TV station in Savannah, Georgia was covering live footage of a local community 5K race.  As she stood on the bridge and spoke into the microphone on the side of the road, runners came up behind her waiving at the camera and cheering.  It was all in good fun until some guy ran up behind her, slapped her on the butt, and kept running as if nothing happened.  She was visibly upset and embarrassed, but to her credit, she only paused for a couple of seconds and looked off in shock before continuing to speak to the camera.  The less humanitarian side of me would have loved it if she dropped the microphone, ran after this guy, and beat the living hell out of him for what he did.  But that would not have made this situation any better.  Instead she did the more rational thing, and later that day, she addressed the incident on her Twitter account and hundreds of thousands of people expressed their sympathy and support for her on social media.  Thanks to the video footage of the inappropriate act, which has now been viewed over eleven million times on the internet, and the help of people within the community, authorities were able to identify the man, and he has now been arrested and charged with sexual battery.  Do I believe he deserves what he's getting? Absolutely, 150%.  I have no idea what this guy was thinking about, or why he thought it was okay to do such a thing, but I can't grasp how brazen, foolish, and disgusting that was.  I'd also like to add that this guy is forty-four years old.  Old enough to know better, and almost double the age of the female reporter.  And, to all the idiots out there who are defending him, I suggest you get with the program and wise up to the way the world works.  Stop living in your little fairy tale of a world where you believe he was just "being friendly" and "joking around".  Get over yourself.  What he did was not okay and beyond inappropriate.

Some people may wonder why I feel so strongly about this.  Why do I give a damn about this so much that I would write and publish a blog post about it?  Well, there's a couple of reasons.  The first and simpler reason is I grew up with a lot of awesome women in my life.  These women include my mother, who passed way fourteen years ago and I miss everyday, my younger sister, several girl cousins, several aunts, and two grandmas, at least for part of my life.  So needless to say, I learned very early in life to always be respectful.  Even despite the fact that my former wife and I are no longer together, we still remain on good terms.  The second, and perhaps more complex reason is this;  life is full of obstacles and setbacks.  Living life is overcoming them.  Given what I've been through in my life, this statement could not be more relevant in my situation.  Millions of people around the world share the same sentiment.  We all work hard every day to be get over the struggles in our lives, whatever they may be.  We all work hard to be happy and live our best life.  Nobody.  I repeat, NOBODY should ever get in the way of someone else trying to be happy and enjoy life.  Perpetrators of sexual harassment, sexism, and sexual abuse are putting a significant damper on their victim's happiness level and quality of life.  And, quite frankly, that angers the hell out of me.

The bottom line is we, as a people, need to put a stop to all of this.  These issues have been going on for far too long, and it seems people aren't getting the message.  So I will say this;  anyone, woman or man (because it happens to guys too, it just doesn't get reported as often) who has experienced such treatment at work, while running, hiking, or anywhere else, please speak up.  Share your feelings and your story.  Raise awareness.  Many of these incidents go unreported and a decent percentage of the public likely doesn't know the severity of these issues.  After the race was over the reporter posted the following message on Twitter: "To the man who smacked my butt on live TV this morning: You violated, objectified, and embarrassed me. No woman should EVER have to put up with this at work or anywhere!! Do better."  Well put.  Do Better.  The next time people think about saying or doing something inappropriate to someone of the opposite sex, I would encourage them to stop being impulsive and think about what they're doing.  Think about how this will affect the other person.  What if someone said or did something like that to your mother, daughter, niece, or sister?  If something seems like it's inappropriate, just don't say or do it.  Period.  Be kind to one another.  Support one another.  To put it simply, just don't be a slimy douche bag.  Thank you!