Today (by the time anybody sees this) is the Big Sur Marathon, which must be one of the most beautiful in the World and is as likely to be one of the most popular. I know several people running it, among them my #1 favorite amateur athlete and her sister -- Annie is in town to run Big Sur with her wedding-party-of-one big sister Elisa. Annie decided to do this in lieu of a bachelorette party. But by the time that she had this adorable idea, the full marathon distance had already sold out. I was not kidding about it being probably one of the most popular marathons, and this was based on having heard that it is among the fastest to sell out. So they are doing the 21-miler. For some reason, Big Sur has a bunch of random distances, like 9, 10.6, and 21 miles, in addition to the full marathon and 5K. The half is its own race in like November. Weird, right? Why not use that permit space for the popular full distance? There must be a practical reason, most likely maximizing profits or stipulations of the permit. But that is the way it is, and the Park sisters are running twenty-one miles.
The Monterey Peninsula is, as far as I can tell, one of the most spectacular chunks of planet on Earth. The California coast is breathtaking, and this is one of the nicest pieces of it. Running 26.2 miles on a point-to-point course must be the coolest! I would not know, since I have not run it yet and did not get in this year. I saw the Big Sur booth at the SJRNR expo and tried to register, and that is when I found out it was hella popular and had already been sold out since like forever. So I will have to wait until at least next year to cross Big Sur off of my marathon to-do list. Another thing I am discovering as a very new runner is race envy: that selfish feeling of being left out when "everybody else" is running a race you want to be running. I had it for CIM, Lake Sonoma, Boston, and almost certainly others. The latest edition is Big Sur. While everybody is waking up early and hanging out with the badass sweethearts and getting medals and tech shirts and free carbs and electrolytes, you are paralyzed by the jealousy with which you watch your more fortunate comrades on Facebook and results pages. They are competing (or at least completing), while you sit and watch from the sidelines. You keep forgetting to be excited for your friends in the event, because you are so pissed you are not in the event. That is race envy.
Good thing I have my own run tomorrow. Jill and I are doing another course tour of Quicksilver with Robert from SVTC. Robert is also running the 50M at Quicksilver in a few weeks. Coach Erich said he would join us too, since he will be running more trail in the XTERRA tri season and has some interest in ultras. He lives in Almaden, so he can jog over. We will do the red section (first 25K) of the Quicksilver and back to Mockingbird for about seventeen or eighteen miles. If not for that, I would sit at home and pout and watch results online or something like that. Either way, I will be anxiously awaiting a text report from Elisa about how her and Annie do on their run. Annie confessed to not having trained much, but those girls seem to be able to run well cold. I know from experience and firsthand account that Elisa can, and have heard sister has the same trait. They may not be super fast, but they are relentless. The slower pace will help with taking in the views and hopefully getting some pictures.
My next bout with race envy will be next weekend at Miwok. That will be my first experience as an aid station volunteer. I am not sure how volunteering will be for race envy. It seems like a great way to cope with it, but it could also be painfully close to the action. Since Miwok is a lottery, and volunteering gets one an extra entry, there is a proactive element to volunteering for maybe avoiding Miwok race envy next year. It will also be tempting to just take off and start running around the course like a jerk. That is a hard area for me not to be running anyway. After that, I have Quicksilver and Ohlone on back-to-back weekends. Then I can go back to being justifiably self-absorbed, which seems to be a sweet spot for an ultrarunner.
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