Saturday, February 21, 2009

Que Sera Sera (AKA the CIM relay)

Having skipped the CIM relay in 2007 due to the birth of our son (now that would have been quite a scene - me running CIM when my wife went into labor; would have led to my permanent banishment to the garage :-)), I thought I would run it this year. Adding to the motivation was my dad and brother visiting us during that time. Since my dad had never seen me run a race before, I thought it would be good idea. So, I decided to team up with Navneet and run the relay as a 2 person race (half-marathon each).

We left for Sacramento on Saturday morning with Vikranth and Ram (who had kindly offered us a ride). It was a fun trip though Ram was feeling a little under the weather (no doubt due to a Friday night party and subsequent lack of sleep). We reached the expo, picked up our stuff, and were then met there by my brother (who had arrived earlier to visit some of his wife's relatives). My dad and I went along with my brother having made plans to meet the others for dinner that night. Only Ram and Vikranth showed up and my dad and I had dinner with them at an Indian restaurant. I then chatted with Navneet and made plans to pass the chip on to him through Ram (since Navneet was running the first 2 legs and I would run the last 2).

The next morning dawned bright and clear - little did I know what was in store :-) We had arranged to have my brother pick us up at 7 am and drive us to the halfway exchange point. As we got closer, we discovered that they had shut down all of the streets leading to the exchange point. As we drove around in circles (aided by a dysfunctional GPS system that kept telling us to take the same route back again and again), my blood pressure started to rise significantly. Some frantic phone conversations ensued with Kanaka (Navneet's wife), and she mentioned he was getting closer to the exchange point.

After driving around and taking the freeway and getting off a couple of exits later, I decided enough was enough. Navneet had already reached the halfway point. I got off and told my dad and brother to wait at the finish. I asked around and discovered (much to my chagrin) that I was at the 18 mile marker!!! So, I decided to start running against the flow of runner traffic back to the 13 mile marker. Of course, this meant that I undertook some good natured ribbing from the other runners - 'Dude, you're going the wrong way!!', and 'Hey Man - lost your bearings' etc. etc.
I had my cell phone with me and was in constant conversation with Navneet. Finally managed to meet and get a hold of the timing chip. Stopped for a second to put it on - by now, we had lost over 40 minutes and I was pretty steamed. Navneet had run his 13.1 in just under 2 hours and this fiasco had cost us.

I took out my frustration on the pavement - I ran as hard as I could. Shortly after I started, I saw that I had caught up with the 5 hour pace group. I kept pounding the turf into submission and passed wave after wave of runners. The 4:50 pace group, 4:40, then 4:30. I was tiring a little but I kept going (fueled mostly by frustration at this point :-)). I finally rounded the bend and crossed the finish line in 4 hrs 25 mins and change. This meant I had run my 13 miles in 1 hr 45 mins or so (not counting the 5 miles that I ran in the other direction :-)). I looked around for my dad and brother and finally found them a bit further along with the crowd. If not for the delays, we would have finished in around 3:45!

Anyway, a lesson learned the hard way. Next time, I plan to stay in Sacramento (we stayed in Folsom near the start this time) as they have shuttles from Sacramento to the relay interchange points and the start. We had a nice lunch and then headed back that evening.

All in all a fun race - just need to be more aware of road closures next time. It turns out that most of the other Asha teams also had similar problems....

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