OLYMPIC Wannabe: The Spirit of Boulder’s See and Be Scene

“I so wanna be there,” I comment to Brendan of the Boulder Wave1 at the end of the annual Thursday night West End 3k.  We are talking London, he like me having been recently, with both of us quickly adding “2012 Olympics” to London longings.  Brendan is here hosting Japan’s Yuriko Kobayashi.  I am, despite jet-lag, at the 3k to enjoy my own season-start time trial.

I comment that I wish I was still on London’s streets.  I’m immediately back in my spontaneous 100 meter run (Scene: London’s blacktop with an Olympic marathon backdrop) in a Paula-Radcliffe-esque gait within in a self-mocking marathon effort for my friends.  With each step forward, I feel the mocking subside and the desire to actually see Radcliffe in action on the same pavement underneath me powers over me.  Passing buildings on London’s Exhibition row, I feel excitement rising higher with the active re-construction, the metal gates a symbolic visual portent of starter corrals.  My heart beats faster to the rhythm of the jack saw in the background, the current Olympic noise that rises up around me in waves.

Ah, it would be a fun year to be in London.  But then, standing by Brendan, seeing Boulder’s Pearl Street scene, I’m thinking, it is a fun year to be in the Boulder run community– hub of high-level performances–feeling the spirit of competition, sensing the energy build with training as runners who always have “Olympic trials” on the brain get to rediscover “Olympics” in a new meaning.

The London Olympic shop at Heathrow Airport is ahead of many marketers in their hope for such rediscovery.  In the already crowded store, I had stood in line to buy a “1-year-out” pin in a limited run for the month of July.   While I waited I perused the latest running magazines already headlining Olympics.  “379 Days to London 2012″ says the banner across Athletics Weekly” (always Olympics on the brains of these runner writers for a publication dedicated to the Olympic sport of Athletics).2

I picked up the latest copy of a detailed racing publication (British version of Running Times?) for myself and an invested British runner I know before settling into my airline seat to read British Airway’s Highlife feature article “London 2012: The Countdown is On.”3  Already?!  London’s getting ready.

Is Boulder?

Cliff Bosley, ahead of all of us in Boulder in his forward-thinking about one-year-out, gave a quote back in May about hoping the elites will build his race into their 2012 Olympic prep.4

WIll Yuriko run the 2012 BB?  Does she feel any Olympic build up here in Boulder?

Brendan comments that she’s only here for a few weeks.  And he thinks Boulder is not  acknowledging the one-year-out hype like it could.

Does Bosley wanna be in on building up the Wave’s hype?

Brendan and I consider the questions as we face the street scene.

Even given the time lag, I’m glad I’m here at the race, was glad to see the West End 3k’s Facebook update the hyped news “Yuriko Kobayashi of Japan” running! 4  I am glad now to see her face as she passes Brendan for the 4th or 5th time, passing by me as she has been all night.  Like every other time she’s passed by me, I have the strange urge to give her my Olympics “one year out” pin which I have pinned to the $10 British running shimmel I got at a huge sports store in London, with an Olympic-sized picture of Paula Radcliffe at the entrance.  Why?  [Not why Paula’s picture--I know that is there as obvious marketing draw for wannabes].  Why give Yuriko something?  . . . like throwing a bra (yes, mine would be a sports one) at a U2 Concert . . . what is that about?

It really isn’t about her performance, more her mere presence.  For me, coming off of an Olympic-saturated flight, 10 hours of reading research and composing an essay in my head about the Olympics, the last minute Facebook update that Yuriko would run the 5k was an uncanny connection.  Opportunity . . . ?

So somehow I find myself Thursday afternoon rushing my kids up Pearl Street toward the racing scene saying to them, “I really, really wanna see her!”  I wonder if I will recognize her, and think–what will I do if I see her?

Part of the draw of the 3k, as the marketers of that race well know, is that it is a great event at which to see and be seen.5  We bump into a friend near the registration stations.  He has that same face of delight as he had when pro and Olympian Matt Reed joined in on his routine cycling ride last month.  He tells us he just saw 2-Time Iron Man World Champion Craig Alexander down the street checking out the scene (or being seen?).  Boulder’s fast and famous scene draws out the wannabe in all of us.  We practically giggle in passing as I head to drop my kids with a friend before heading toward the staging area for the master’s wave.

Mingling as myself in the master’s pre-race prep time, I chat it up with old teammates, meet some friends of friends, and just try to make conversation about Boulder masters racing.  I find myself somehow on the receiving end of a belittling comment by another runner–meant, I think, to put me in my place, the comment was definitely “snarky.”  Part of competition?  I hold my own in the conversation, not letting her put down keep me down.  I’ve been training.  Three months ago, the comment might have shaken my confidence.  My lungs (and, apparently, my voice) are ready within aerobic capacity.  I’m ready to race.  I shake off her comments in my warm up, letting the mocking subside with each step I take forward.

During the master’s wave, I have an overpowering urge to power fast (and maybe power past?) the runners in front of me.  I weave my way along the street, cheered by the hype and energy, the “Go, Lisa!” ( . . . Goldsmith, like usual, ahead and in front) and the faces of friends in the crowd that suddenly pop out at me recognizable.

I run fast past the ladies, Snarky in the midst, and feel a wave of thankfulness from behind as I move into third place.  I hold my form until I’m under the finish banner– my first competitive purse win on the same pavement where “many of the area’s best runners show up to test their speed on this very fast, 2-loop, course.”6 .  My face, I felt it, had a hard, huge grin in the realization of something new for me that I really wanted to be–out there in the middle of Boulder’s hyped elite just being myself and having a great time doing it.

After signing some forms at the announcers booth, I muse that my winnings will pay for my dinner at Pasta Jays. As I head toward the restaurant to meet my family, I stop at an awning to greet fans, here to see who’s to be seen, here to admire–(I point out Yuriko’s presence of course when they asked–did you just race?)

Yuriko, in that moment on the course, passes by me at the forefront of all the ladies.  Its the first time I’ve seen her run and, I’ll say, she was so fun to see.  Her fast form held tight in a perfected gait before awed audience with a palpable wave of respect coming from the group at her back. . . nothing like seeing that scene.

Fast forward to the finish line.  I wait to talk to Yuriko after she is formally interviewed.  I listen in to the answer from her translator still wondering why I want to talk to her . . . what I want to say . . . why I still want to offer her my pin.    Somehow this pin is a connection–to how I wanna connect with her in some way.  I want her to comment on my Olympics thoughts for me.  Meeting her in this moment, admittedly, is wanting her for hyping my web column rather than wanting to listen to her perspective of the scene.  As she turns to face me, I suddenly see her face, and in it her person.  I stutter as I adjust my focus away from objectifying her as fact or theme or race time.  All I could think to ask was Olympic event was her hope pinned on.  “The 5k.” (Duh).

I walked away, shaken, shaking my head at my self-focus on my own importance, put in my place–rightly so.  I turn back and look at her, still wondering, wanting to see her and be seen by her.  What am I really looking for from her? (Besides the Japanese word for snarky?)

It just-so-happens that I then pass Snarky present in a group of kids.  I bend down and look at them and say “Congratulations on your race!”  As I stand and look her in the face, I suddenly get why the snarky . . . the self-focus, self-aggrandizement.  We all wanna be seen and seen as something.  It is easy to get drawn into the hype of competition, comparing ourselves, then going too far in seeing our worth in an objectified race time or performance–yes in the Boulder running community, with elites, all athletes, it’s universal (something to remember as we watch the Olympics one-year-out).  I suddenly see her face, the expression in her eyes, and repeat, “Congratulations” to her, wanting her to see that I see she is not all snarky.

Fast forward to the moment when I did get the real chance to chat with Yuriko face to face, surrounded by kids, mine included, as it happened.  The meeting up came naturally as we passed in the street, Yuriko with her translator and another friend at her side.  I was just being myself in conversation.  My kids had questions and comments too.  We laughed: a connection.

As I watched the faces of my kids respond to her, I realized at the core of how we all see her is in admiration.  Brendan approached, she was ready to go.  I look at her tired, sweaty face and simply say “Thank you,” meaning “thank you for doing what you do in a way that my kids see as admirable.”   I think she, looking at their faces, understood that.   Moments later I wished I’d have added–good luck to you.  But she doesn’t need that from me.  She doesn’t need a good luck pin.  And, no longer do I feel a need to give it to her.

Sure, I had wanted something she has and I wanted to give her something.  In the meeting I wanted something to rub off–for a moment, knowledge of life seen from her perspective, one that is on the range of what I function in but at a place I know I’ll never be.  Do I wanna be?  Honestly, looking that question in the sweaty face?  Not really.  I’m glad I do what I do from the vantage where I do it.  Do I really want to be anyone but me?  I wouldn’t trade my life to be in her shoes.  I like my Brooks that shuffled me into Pasta Jays where I sat with my family whose comments on my race were “Did you have fun? . . . We saw you run by . . . twice” (clueless about the purse win).  Put in my place at the table, facing the street, enjoying a summer race, “It’s a Beautiful Day” playing on the loudspeaker in my mind . . . the scene doesn’t get any better no matter who passes by.

Yuriko passes by again during my post-race chat with Brendan, but I feel no urge to talk to her again.  As happens in the nature of timing–who we happen to meet, famous or not, and when–the things that interested me about Yuriko’s perspective actually came out in my conversation with Brendan.  To my questions about Boulder’s Olympic spirit and comments on Boulder’s spirit of competition Brendan filled me in on runners who are training one-year-out and Japanese training perspective.  He answered my questions satisfactorily for me.

At natural conversation’s ebb, I look at his face, ready for the drink he says he’s ready for.  I say goodbye and “thanks”, thankful for the timing of our talk and, when I think about it, still thankful for my time.

Thankfulness glaring off of the streets with the setting sun, I consider who else in Boulder’s fast and famous running world have I learned something from for which I could say thanks?  I reflect on the question as I walk down emptying streets, “no one here but me.”

I think of a couple of masters level runners not present at the West End, choosing to be unseen, they wanna be out of the competitive scene, not on the receiving end of a snarky comment.  I admire their spirit and am thankful for their attempts to stay positive.

I see again faces of teammates I intuitively like but don’t know well enough to knowingly admire.

Any other Boulder runner I would like to be more like?

I consider . . . .

. . . the me that chooses to make time to look into kids faces instead of rushing them or rushing past them, the me that receives snarky comments with a genuine smile unfazed, the me that approaches respected former coaches with slaps on the back in a unifying spirit of camaraderie . . . . feels compelled to seek out each runner just ahead and behind to offer encouragement . . . anything in a positive spirit . . . .

I wanna be more of her.

© 2011 Lisa E. Jackson

1. Reilly, Brendan.  President, Boulder Wave.  www.boulderwave.com.

1. Athletics Weekly, July 14, 2011.

3.  High Life, British Airways, July 2011.

4.  Thorburn, Ryan.  “Bolder Aims for More Elites,”  Boulder Daily Camera,  5/31/2011.  www.dailycamera.com/bolderboulder/ci_18180575

5.  West End 3K, The Run Boulder Series as found at boulderroadraces.com (including Facebook page popup).

6.  West End 3K, The Run Boulder Series as found at boulderroadraces.com (including Facebook page popup).