Words by: Angelo Cabrera
Have you ever done something hardcore-insane in your life that you’ll surely be proud of?
I was about 200m near the 10km checkpoint of the RAK Half Marathon course last February 13 when the blisters on my toes started to form and punish me with great verve to the point that I just had to stop running. Not wanting to give it all up to pain and the shame of being a quitter, I took off my shoes at around 10km mark and took on my very first and untrained attempt at running with just my socks on – yeah, that’s how insane I am. So, with my feet feeling liberated and getting the air they needed, I made a dash for it and took on short bursts of sprint from 11km to 14km of the course.
As I draw near 15km, that’s when I started to experience the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad cramping and ache of my lower extremities – it started on my calves, then my ankles, then my entire feet, and then up my quads. It was a mortifying experience I tell you, to have reached your muscles’ limit And you’re still far from finishing the race, but that would also be the point where you’d come to know what you’re really made of; so I said, “@#$& it, I’m not gonna quit now, and I’m not gonna take an ambulance ride back to the starting line. Never. ”
And so, even as my two feet were feeling like they’re gonna twitch into a pretzel, I did some breathing to calm myself down, and mustered whatever strength I could gain and ran as fast as I could on short bursts, not minding the pain nor the runners zooming past me – all I wanted was to reach the finish line.
By the time I reached 17km, I was mostly walking already. Good thing my running partner Dan spotted me and helped me with my shoes (I was running with my shoes in hand before he got to me). But the twitching down my calves and thighs were becoming frequent that I had to cover 1.5km just by speed walking (which gradually turned into inching for a few metres from time to time).
I was nearly in tears when I finally saw that the finish line was just less than 900m away. One last set of deep breaths and I moved as quickly as I could, heaving my legs and stopping for a few times to control the horrendous twitch on my calves and quads and the sense that some of my sinews were about to rupture. It was like that for the final 90m of the race – I crossed the finish line walking, with my pride badly bruised, but still intact (although quite barely).
I finished the race at 2hrs 36mins 51secs, which really hurts because I expected to run my fastest at the “fastest half-marathon in the world”, but in spite of that I’m sure as hell proud of what I had accomplished; whatever race you start in life, you got to finish it, no matter what.
Until next race,
Angelo Cabrera
