Wedgie Shrugged

Quick story about a little encounter I had this weekend...

First of all, you should know this: I haven’t been training much. I ran 8 miles of the IMAZ course in November when I still had some Kona conditioning, then I ran 3 miles about a week ago. Not good. Yesterday I went out for a 5-mile run.

A guy passed me along the trail. Nothing special about that, I get passed frequently, but I did notice this guy was wearing a black tri-bib outfit with a white long-sleeved shirt over it. This is Los Angeles in January, and it was about 80 degrees when I was out there. And I remember thinking “dude, seriously... you are WAY overdressed.”

About a mile down the trail, he had turned around so I saw him again. He stopped me and asked if he could give me some “advice.” He was probably a little younger than me, certainly in better shape but it’s not like he was Stuart Anderson or anything. (Laura, that’s for you.) So I just told him “sure.” Then I noticed that he was wearing an Ironman World Championships finishers cap (2007) so I felt this instant connection and thought he might give me some super-secret training tip.

Instead, he told me that I was shrugging my shoulders and looked like I was too tight as I ran. He also said that it looked like I was in pain. These are rookie mistakes and to be honest I felt a little embarrassed to be called out about it. I should have just said “thank you” and moved on, but I was also a little defensive. I've been feeling a little insecure lately so for some reason I felt the need to both build myself up AND provide excuses. So I pointed out his hat and said “you did Kona? I did it back in October and I really haven’t done any training since then and I’m just starting to get back into it so I'm a little rusty."

Well apparently he didn’t feel any bond or connection because he just repeated “yeah well bring your shoulders down, you’re too tight.” I told him “thanks, have a good run” and left.

Now you may ask yourself, “well Wedgie, WERE you in pain and shrugging your shoulders?” THAT’S NOT THE POINT! Did you ever think that maybe I wouldn’t be so tense if people didn’t tell me I was running incorrectly? So there.