Race Report: Victoria Falls Half Marathon

Joni Waldron (NNHS '02) placed 112th out of 300 finishers in the Victoria Falls Half-Marathon, held in Zimbabwe on August 29th, 2010. Waldron was "in the neighborhood," since she was already in Zambia where she is working for six months.

Being headstrong, like her father, she decided to run the race on a minimum of training, Not only that, she suffered a foot injury a week before the race that had her hobbling around wondering if she could run even one mile, let alone 13.1 miles. She travelled many hours to the race with friends hoping for a miracle that would enable her to participate. Alas, the morning of the race her foot was as sore as ever. But... well, I'll let her tell the story from here...

"Honestly, I'm not really sure why I ran. It was really stupid. I'm not even sure why I picked up my race number on Saturday. I hadn't been planning on it, but decided it was worth it for the t-shirt (and in the off chance I miraculously felt better), and then, it turned out they didn't give you your t-shirt until the race finish. So I blame the race coordinators for my stupid decision to run. (and the race t-shirt is just a beer advertisement anyway!)

Perhaps the dumbest part about deciding not to run (and then running) was that I didn't eat breakfast before the race. I had brought peanut butter, wheat bread and bananas, but when I woke up at 5am and my foot was hurting, I thought "no reason to eat that, since clearly I won't be running." It wasn't until I showed up at 6:15 and Shakira was playing on the loud speaker, there were last minute strides, and a marathon start of roughly 100 runners heading down the bridge towards Victoria Falls as the sun just started to appear above the trees that I realized it was worth it to at least stand on the starting line with my friends and run the first mile or two of the race past the waterfall. (The decision not to eat breakfast came back to haunt me at 13.5km when I completely and totally bonked, and decided - a little too late - that drinking the gross-looking red stuff was probably an unfortunate necessity). My friends started slower than was comfortable for me, so I weaved in and out a little bit, thinking - well this is obnoxious - to leave my friends in the dust when I am planning on dropping out - until i settled into a 8:40ish pace. At that point I met another running buddy, and ran near her for the entire first 10km of the race. Perhaps I should blame her for my decision to keep running, since - once again - it seemed very rude to tell her, "actually, I'm planning on dropping out, but good luck, have fun, and don't give up."

The course was brutal - extremely hot, very little shade, and the big climb of the race occured betweek 14km and 17km. Not exactly where I would have liked it! I never thought that 3km could feel as long as they did at the end! Still, when I think of what it was like to run the course, I can only imagine the wheelchair competitors who braved it! Besides the fact that only two of them had modern-style racing wheelchairs, the road was covered in potholes, and there was a 4km stretch on the dirt/gravel road in the national park. I don't think I have ever had so much respect for wheelchair racers. Ever.

In spite of my foot, I was able to keep a more or less consistent pace for the first two-thirds of the race, passing 5K in 26:30 and 10K in 53:20. But I walked 4 times between 14k and 20k (once for a water stop).

Perhaps the most lovely thing about this race was that the last 300 meters was a loop of an elementary school field - running on grass turning tightly along a flagged path. It reminded me so much of xc season - in the best possible way. On the last turn, I realized I had a whole - yet to be utilized, and completely unknown to me - gear, and sprinted past someone who had caught me about 100 meters earlier. It felt great, and if you look at the results, I beat her by 1 second.

There is a very large part of me that is glad that I ran. Perhaps it is because it adds a little bit of legitimacy to the image I have around the office of the crazy mzungu who likes to jog. Now they talk about how I keep fit. I somehow prefer that over being a jogger. Also, I feel like I accomplished a huge mental task. Running through that pain may not give me any kind of credit when it comes to mental ability (clearly not the smartest decision I have ever made), but in a way I proved to myself that ultimately pain affects you how you let it affect you. It is a signal that there is something wrong, but knowing that I can push through that - fully knowing the consequences - is somehow freeing. If I can run through pain in my foot, than what is stopping me from running just a little bit faster when I think I am totally exhausted?

To allay your fears, my foot is (rather miraculously) feeling much better. It doesn't really make any sense to me - especially given the pain I was in Saturday, race day, and even monday, except that perhaps i was right that it was a pinched nerve, and the electric thing-a-ma-jiggy managed to loosen the muscles enough to relax whatever was causing the pain in the first place... Anyway, it is still nagging, and yes, i will continue to stay off it until it is ENTIRELY better...

Strangest things about running in Africa:

• no port-a-potties
  
• wheelchairs
  
• water/red gross stuff handed out in cylindrical plastic bags
  
• post race food was beer, hard cider, and fancy little delicacies like
  mini toast with carmelized onion and fig and bruschetta on mini leek
  pancakes.
  
• no VIP treatment for anybody (while walking to the start, I asked a guy -- also walking -- what kind of time he was hoping to run for the half marathon; his response: 1 hour)
  
• Baboon and Warthog sitings on the side of the road
  

Joni (#385) smiling through the pain