akrish

My alarm went off at six AM and I immediately shot out of bed. I’m usually a pretty early riser, but for a college student, six on a Sunday was definitely too early. Yet I was awake and alert, excited for the race I would be running in just a couple of hours. I quickly showered, ate a couple pieces of toast, and jogged to Kroeber Fountain, where all the racers from running club had arranged to meet. We waited there for a bit for our drivers to arrive; I was excited and nervous, ready to start running.

The Banana Chase 5K/10K started at Kezar Stadium in San Francisco, so we drove over there, checked in, and relaxed while waiting for the rest of the team. By way of warm-up, we jogged some of the course, returned to the stadium and stretched, chatted and mentally prepared ourselves. Most people on the team were pretty serious. As for me, I was just excited to be running in a race. I wanted to do well, but it was irrelevant what time I got. The race started at nine AM, so around then we jogged up to the starting line, ready to get things under way.

The race was over pretty quickly (I ran the 5K), but I really enjoyed those 20 minutes. We ran near and in Golden Gate Park, which is a tranquil area of San Francisco, so the route was awesome. Even though it was just 3 miles, I ran it pretty hard (it was a race after all), so I was exhausted afterwards. I was happy with my time, for my first race it was quite good (and vacuously a PR!). More importantly though, I had a lot of fun just being there and taking part in such an event with so many people.

I haven’t been involved in competitive sports for a couple of years, and I realized that I miss the adrenaline and anxiety of athletic competition. Sunday was a great reminder of that, but it was a little different than the soccer matches I used to compete in. First off, here it’s entirely individual, but there are so many people around you, that I got a sense of camaraderie rather than competition. At the same time, I was still energized to compete. On the whole though, it was amazing to see so many different people participating in the race, and it has motivated me to keep training in a race more often.

The Banana Chase was essentially my first race (I did cross country in middle school), and I loved it. Hanging out with the running club was really fun, I enjoyed seeing so many people warming up, socializing, and running, and of course, the actual run was really good too. I’m working on building up my distance, so hopefully my next couple of races will be longer, but this was definitely a good start.

If you’re interested in the race results, they’re here.

Summer’s a great time to do all the things you’ve been wanting to do, but haven’t found time to do during the year. In my case, one of those things was regular, high-intensity exercise. Coming into the summer, I did what I do every year: I said I would devote my summer to serious exercise and try to develop a more regular exercise routine for myself. Every summer before this one, I’d exercise a couple of times, but I’d always get caught up in everything else going on, and undoubtedly working out would get put on the back burner. Something changed this summer, and I actually managed to start running and working out on a regular basis.

At the beginning of summer, I took my brother’s advice and set monthly exercise goals for myself. They were ridiculously ambitious, but it was motivation for me to strive to meet and surpass them. I also decided that since I wouldn’t have that much time to exercise (I’m working full time over the summer), I’d have to make the most of each workout and do very high-intensity activities. I started running on a regular basis, and eventually I’ve built the habit of running at least four or five times a week. It’s gotten to the point where I enjoy running and I actually look forward to my runs each day.

I used to run a bit during high school, but it was only as supplementary training for soccer, and I never really enjoyed it. Now however, I run for the sake of running, and I want to build up my performance so that I can start racing. The hopes of racing and competing is amazing motivation and really helps me push myself during my runs. I also really want to run a marathon in the near future, so I think of every workout as a step towards achieving that goal.

So what made this summer different from all the other ones? I think one of the biggest things is that I’m older and a lot more determined. I’m a lot better at following through with my goals and actually doing the things I set out to do. It also helped that I wrote down my exercise goals for the summer, and I look at them every once in awhile to re-motivate myself. It’s also a lot easier to make exercising a habit, when you have a daily routine that you can just incorporate your workouts into. For me, I had work every day, so I would go running every day before work (also before it got to hot outside). Compared to the last few summers, when I didn’t have to wake up at the same time every day, it was a lot easier to make running a part of my schedule when my schedule was already well defined. The last thing, and I don’t know how much of a factor this was, but one of the other interns at work is a marathon runner, and he has really inspired me to train. When I look back on how different this summer was from the previous ones, it’s easy to understand why I’ve been able to train so consistently.

Once you make running a habit, it’s actually really easy to get better and keep it up. I’ve been really happy with my improvement, and it just motivates me to run even more. One of the most important things, though, is that if I stop for even one day, it becomes really hard for me to start up again. So last week, I didn’t run at all until Thursday, because I took a day off the week before. On that Thursday, I decided to just go out for a slow run just to get back into things, and now, I’m back into my regular training schedule. Even if I go for a short or slow run, just running every day makes it so much easier to motivate myself.

When school starts in about a week, everything is going change. For one, my life isn’t going to be so nicely scheduled. On top of that, I’m going to have a lot more work outside of class, and finding time to exercise is going to be a lot harder. My hope is that I’ve made running enough of a habit that I’ll keep it up during the school year. Looking ahead, as my schedule becomes less rigid, I’m going to have to somehow incorporate running into my daily routine, so that I don’t lose the habit and have to start all over again.

Every so often, I’ll get a phone call from one of my friends inviting me to come over and watch “the game.” If I’m not terribly busy, usually I’ll comply, not because I enjoy watching sports, but because I enjoy hanging out with my buddies. Recently, I only watch sports when I’m with my friends, in which case I view it as doing something with my friends rather than just killing time watching TV. So when I do watch sports, I don’t get very emotional about the game and I don’t really care about the outcome. That team X wins this championship really has no effect on my life, so why do I really care?

Almost all of my friends have a completely different take on spectator sports. They have favorite teams and favorite players, and are willing to defend their favorites from any attack. I just don’t understand where this fierce loyalty comes from. What have these players and teams done that merits your support? They haven’t protected and cared for you like your family, friends, and maybe even politicians or soldiers. They typically aren’t even people who you’ve met and found warm and friendly. They’re pretty much complete strangers who’ve miraculously earned your unconditional support. Please correct me if I’m wrong here.

What’s worse, is that people are (for some reason that I can’t grasp) emotionally attached to their teams and their moods change as their teams win and lose. I was with my friends watching when the L.A. Lakers lost in the playoffs of the NBA championship earlier this year. A lot of them are Lakers fans and they became pretty depressed for the rest of the day. It was really strange to see how my friends could get so affected by something that (in my view) meant nothing to them. However, there is the flip side, where my friends will be excited and energetic when their team wins, which is definitely a postive of watching sports. But I don’t even understand how someone can feel so close to people and things that they’ve never actually seen in person.

At any rate, I’ve never been that loyal to any particular team. I’ve never considered myself a devoted fan to any franchise or club. I’ve come across athletes that I enjoy watching but it’s mostly because they’re talented or fun to watch (i.e Rafael Nadal). When I watch sports, I enjoy the competitive atmosphere and the high level of talent in the players. I don’t really care who wins or loses, but that doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy a good game.

When I was playing soccer competitively, I used to love watching televised soccer games. This wasn’t because I felt attached to any team (I would watch pretty much any game shown on TV regardless of who was playing or even what language it was in) but because I felt like I could actually learn about the game and become a better soccer player myself. To some extent I think this actually worked. I found myself trying to play like the athletes that I’d seen on TV, and in some aspects my soccer game improved. This made watching sports not solely about entertainment but also about self-improvement and gave me a motivation to watch.

I find it ironic that among my friends, I’m one of the more athletic ones, but one of the least interested in watching sports. I find it really strange how some of my friends will put off playing basketball until after the games over, when I’d much rather be playing basketball than watching other people play basketball. When I do watch sports, It’s usually not entirely for the entertainment, but also for the social experience or educational experience that comes with it. Either way, I’d much rather be doing something than watching other people do it for me.

Added: July 23, 2007: Prashant wrote a response to this article. Read it here