verbicide | the oakland trip: part 3, bay to broken

First of all, I'm not sure what demon possessed me to sign up for the Danskin Triathlon in August. But having committed to that, I'm not sure why I thought a 12K now would be a good idea. Crammed into an overly packed weekend. Clearly, I've just lost my mind.

Bay to Breakers follows a course from the San Francisco bay. From the Embarcadero at sea level, the course rises steeply along Hayes Street Hill. Around the 2.5-mile mark runners (in our case, walkers) climb an 11.15% grade between Fillmore and Steiner, bringing them to the highest point in the race, approximately 215 feet above sea level. It ends at the breakers of Ocean Beach.

My biggest fear was the steep hill. Would I survive the Hayes Street Hill? And it turned out...mostly fine. It was hilarious to see the insane (and generally raunchy) costumes. I loved the Salmon, who start at the finish line and 'swim' upstream to the start. There were random naked people, always entertaining. The hill was steep. It was very steep. So I charged up it as fast as I could to get it over with. (My knees still aren't speaking to me.) Once it was over, I thought the rest would be simple. And for the most part it was. By the last mile, though... I was really tired. I hadn't slept properly in days. I hadn't worked out last week, so I felt more out of shape than usual. And now, my legs were just plain sore. My feet hurt. I wanted to just not be there anymore. I wanted it to be over already.

We eventually crossed the finish line and I felt oddly deflated. I thought I would feel triumphant or at least proud. I didn't. I was just very tired and very annoyed that the bus lines were another mile away, up another hill. I waited in line while Amy went to pick up our tee-shirts. We rode the crowded Muni back to Embarcadero and stood in line, on aching feet, forever at the BART station. It took forever to get back to the South Hayward stop, we drove immediately to La Piñata (yes, again, cause omg so good). We scarfed down the best rice/beans in the universe and went back to Amy's so I could pack.

But I'm glad I did it. I'm glad I didn't let the insanity of the weekend get in the way of my plans, however crazy those plans may have been.