Fear Factor

Today was interval Tuesday - something I look forward as i have found I really relish the challenge of speed work. Since giving up a career in philanthropy ten years I realized I missed being scared shitless at the monthly board meeting with the Chairman and possibly speed work has replaced that as a regular attempt at revving myself up slightly. Of course one person's fear is another person's dread, and I remember Merciless being particularly miserable for the first month of Boston training two years ago at the mere mention of intervals. Today was 9 miles of mile repeats, 30 - 60 seconds faster than race pace - not too bad, but it was 27f and a howling wind. Q-Less remarked that she was less than excited to be about to embark on our latest adventure so we spent some time psychoanalysizing her level of dread. Seems fear of failure dogs us all, even though she is ridiculously talented, and had won states as a High Schooler in the Decathalon with the shakiest of training regimens. However, she was often reluctant to train because of her previous success. Her degree of talent had maybe back fired a little, as it meant she could usually wing it and do better than most of us - the fear of training was that if she actually invested effort in the preparation and then didn't do well it would really suck! Having got that little issue resolved, the miles flew by and we both really enjoyed them - especially the return leg, as we were warmed up despite with the wind smacking us full on in our face; we followed the shadow of a split rail fence each as if we were on train tracks without thinking too much about fear, failure or anything else except how to negotiate the trail.

The run also led me to think about another aspect of fear. I believe your friends are there partially to provide a mirror to your own soul, and I had been intrigued that both Merciless and Q-Less had recently referred to me as 'scary' at an evening out. Being 5ft 5, mousey and with a quite English accent, I was a bit surprised. Even my kids think I am about as scary as a sticky toffee pudding; rather than shaking in his shoes, my 13 year old son usually responds with a bizarre, pythonesque one liner like 'mioua mix' or 'Amontallido'if I shout an authorative directive at him, like 'tidy your room'. Well half an hour into the intervals I had for once given Q-less the job of calling splits, and I had pointed out that the GPS was a bit patchy down at Valley Green, so that we had better use the mile markers instead. By the third repeat and she was still telling me it was only 0.95 of a mile even when we were passed the mile marker I did start hurling abuse at her about her passive aggressive ways......I then realized what she meant by scary...something about running in the wind makes it seem OK to scream at folk.

Highlight of the run was seeing Merciless bobbing towards us complete with baby bundled in stroller, braving the freezing winds for a mile or two, couldn't resist the intervals after all!