Cooking Some Hamburgers

This blog is going to be about our little race, "The Road Kill." More than that though, it will be about running, and training, and life. There might be a whole lot more of life than there is about this little race. We don't know for sure yet, though. It might be a bunch of photos of unfortunate animals, just trying to cross the road.

Why "The Road Kill?" What is this nonsense, anyhow? The race was a natural extension of our running group, the Washita Valley Running Club. It fills a training need. It's close. There is a lack of road races other than 5k. There was a lack of a running group. So Andreia made the group. Then we made the race.

We started talking about, "what have you seen on the road lately?" There is plenty of trash. No runner loves to see that. There is occasionally money. A lone shoe. Three little piggies. Contraceptives. Pregnancy tests. But most of all, there is roadkill.

We remember the location of each dead animal on our regular routes. We runners avoid it and note the rot, the crows, the flies, the smell, and then (hopefully) thank the road crews when they clean it up. Sometimes we feel like dead animals ourselves, out there, alone on the road. Close to death and alive all at once in a sweltering 20 mile run out in the country. Sometimes the effort in a race feels like the kiss of death that you urge upon your own body.

Like the fragrance of the real thing, we want to make The Road Kill an event that you couldn't forget. An event that you will remember whenever you see some roadkill. We want it to be rewarding on many levels, a challenging but runnable course, good competition, good prizes and trophies. But as any runner knows, it's all about the finish. That's the best part of racing. We hope you all will stick around to enjoy a cookout and some refreshments with us after you run. In short, we wanted to put on the kind of event that we'd want to attend ourselves.

Training is now, though. I train, I run. It's just like life, I suppose. We aspire to the gourmet meal, and we end up cooking some hamburgers. And you know, the damn things are pretty tasty. I ran 145 miles this week. It's about all I could do. There was not much "quality." There was nothing remarkable. Just miles. But now I am tired. Just cooked some hamburgers. Time to eat.