If I had to name my 30k race yesterday it might be something like that. It was a rough, rough, bad, slow, tough, completely disheartening, tricky, soft, squirrelly, draggy, wet, snowy, drizzly, awful nightmarish day. Struggled again with classic skis…just can’t find a pair that I can kick very well and they weren’t terribly fast either.
At about 1.5k I poled between my legs while trying to change tracks (my ski got stuck in the powder so I couldn’t put it where I wanted to right as I was double poling) and crashed hard. Starting about .5k after that (2k mark) I was pretty positive I should drop out. I have never once in my life DNF’d, and boy have there ever been some terrible, terrible races that I finished somehow. But I really thought yesterday would be my first. I just couldn’t see ANY reason for continuing, at all. It didn’t seem like I was going to learn anything in those conditions with those skis and the way I was feeling (physically not good), with hardly any skiers around me to even try to hang with and learn from…it seemed like I was just wearing myself out for the sprint race on Fri.
But for some reason I just never stopped. Maybe because I’ve never stopped before and I don’t really know how to do it. Maybe because Ben was in the stadium every time the course came back through there yelling very enthusiastically. Maybe because everyone had put so much work into my skis and I had put so much work into training all year and had been really hoping to do well in this particular race. Maybe because I would occasionally feel ok and ski ok for 2 or 300 meters (quickly followed by either feeling absolutely spanked or else just completely running out of any traces of motivation to continue.)
I am not proud of how I raced. I value giving it 100% much more than I value the rankings at the finish line. It would be one thing if I finished 36th, over 11 minutes out and had given it absolutely everything. However I wasn’t even close to giving it a decent effort let alone everything. It was a mental battle - no, battle is too strong a word - a dazed and confused hopeless wander around 4 brutal laps in some of the worst classic conditions I’ve raced in in a long time. At times I found myself coming to almost a complete stop for no reason other than that I just had no idea why I was out there and had no desire to even try to do my best. I would think “okay, I definitely need to drop out, this is just stupid” and then a little later “well, just on principle I should take this opportunity to try to work on classic skiing as best I can in these conditions” or “maybe if I keep it going I will reel some people in on the 3rd or 4th lap and do somewhat ok” or “maybe it’s helpful for the guys behind me if I don’t drop out, that way they have someone to chase…or I can make the people in front of me feel good by beating me…” At one point NMU’s top skier caught me after I’d been not-even-half-heartedly blundering around part of the second lap…skied behind him for awhile and then put 15 seconds or more on him when I started trying a little more earnestly for awhile. Then on the third lap I really decided once and for all that I was definitely going to drop out as soon as I could get back to the stadium. I had just totally had enough, felt bad from the very very start of the race, had bad skis, just not my day, etc. etc. Up the biggest hill I just started walking - and when I say walking I really mean more like taking a step every once in awhile, my grandmother could have easily kept up even though going up or down one flight of stairs is the most exercise she gets in a week. I totally let a pack of 5 or 6 guys just go right by me that I easily could have held off. Then for some reason I decided to chase them down again so I put in a big sprint (after they’d gotten 10 or 15 seconds on me) and got back up to them heading into the 4th lap, where again I really stood up and wondered if I should drop out….
I eventually finished in a cold, wet daze and noticed I was pretty hungry, ate about 5 or 10 cookies, 4 cups of citomax, a cup of chili, 2 cups of hot cider, a few gu’s, a protein drink, and I can’t remember what else (and didn’t feel full afterwards.) I talked to my sister after the race (a former top-4-in-the-US xc ski racer). I told her I thought I really should have dropped out at 2k and was stupid for doing the whole race and had no idea why I kept going. She said something like “yeah…but once you drop out of a race, it is SO much easier to always be thinking about it in every race after that that isn’t going perfectly…”
So, the one clear lesson I learned and will remember from this race is that if I ever take one step after the gun goes off, I WILL FINISH THE RACE NO MATTER WHAT. I’m deciding now, so that next time I’m in a race, I don’t have to. Not to say I won’t sometimes choose not to start, right before start time, but if I do, then the decision to finish is made. That is something that would have saved me at least 3 or 4 minutes in this race.
Now it’s time to get ready for the final race at nationals: a 1.5k classic sprint. I know for sure I will give it everything no matter what!
