How steep is the hill in front of you?

The last few days I have been bumping up against the challenge I accepted to run the Leadville trail 100 in 2010. With an only 40% finishing rate, I can’t even say I have even odds of being successful. That hill looks pretty d@mn steep.

You know, an Ironman was supposed to be my big goal this year (Beach 2 Battleship in Nov.). I am finally going to do one, after wanting to try since I was 8. A dream 26 years in the making. That’s big, right? There aren’t a lot of dreams that have stayed with me from childhood. But this one has the same appeal, maybe stronger, as it did back then.

I imagine my race calendar as a trail I am following, the races being hills. It’s fitting, considering the place I now live. Some hills are bigger than others. The B2B mountain is just beyond the foothills of the Jemez 50K/SF100. In fact the B2B mountain has a twin just beyond it, the IMUT in May. But now in the gray distance, there’s a 14er. I think I knew it was there all along. My PhD professor told me in 2002 that I’d do LT100 one day, and his mention of it was the first time I heard about the race. I think my jaw hit the floor. I protested, “No way! That is crazy. Do you know how far that is???” – but like anything, if someone tells me it’s hard, deep down, I want to try. But I thought it was much farther away. Like maybe when I turn 50.

Leadville pops into my head without warning. Strange tangents to everyday thoughts: cracking open a coke provokes “maybe I should give up coke because I’m doing Leadville. “hmm, my foot hurts. Better not be serious, because I’m doing Leadville.” Crunching numbers at work drifts into “At Leadville at mile 86, I’ll be lucky to be able to work out that 2+2=4.” Sometimes anxious, sometimes just curious.

It’s very reassuring to me to have friends around that have done and are doing the race, and friends that have told me they think I can do it. With a friend next to you, the hill looks less steep.

Even the NY times agrees: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/21/health/21well.html?_r=1&em
“Last year, researchers studied 34 students at the University of Virginia, taking them to the base of a steep hill and fitting them with a weighted backpack. They were then asked to estimate the steepness of the hill. Some participants stood next to friends during the exercise, while others were alone.
The students who stood with friends gave lower estimates of the steepness of the hill. And the longer the friends had known each other, the less steep the hill appeared.”

The backpack may be heavy, friends, but that hill isn't too steep after all.