My brother Brendan has always wanted to go to the NFL Draft, so when I found out last year that it was going to take place in Philly this year, we began making plans for him to come down for it. Those plans morphed quite a bit between then and now, but the one thing that remained the same was that he'd be here on Thursday and Friday. I thought I might be able to sneak in for the noon express class on Thursday, but that didn't work out. And given the fact that I haven't been to a weekend class at KOP in forever, I was pretty certain that Wednesday night would be the start of my Crossfit weekend.
It turned out to be a fairly active weekend for me though and there was enough "athletic" activity involved that I felt like it deserved its own post. Let's start on Thursday, the opening night of the NFL Draft. Brendan and I arrived downtown on the early side so that we could take part in the NFL Experience. As we walked along the Ben Franklin Parkway, we saw all sorts of exhibits set up by the NFL, but there was one that seemed to have a lot of buzz around it. It was called the "40 Character Dash". Somewhere else in the NFL Experience, you could run the 40 yard dash just as college athletes do at the NFL combine. This was a little different. There was a miniature football field on a stage with letters and symbols along each side. There was also a video screen on the back of the stage. The video screen showed the 40 character phrase you had to type out with your feet (make sure you type spaces between words and use the correct punctuation!). As kids and adults alike zig-zagged across the field, the spectators would yell out the next letter and point to where it was located. The players had a minute and 30 seconds to complete the message in order to win prizes. A grand prize would be given to the fastest typist of the day.
The line was slow-moving and just when I got two spots away from taking the field, one of the letters began malfunctioning, causing another delay. Finally it was my turn to go. The top time of the day was 1 minute flat. I had memorized the phrase ("Draft Day In The City Of Brotherly Love!") and watched enough people run the course to develop a plan for what I thought would be the fastest way to type out the message. Each end zone was a space bar and it was important to run to the closest one if you were going to save time. The space bar needed to be hit more than any other character, but a lot of people lost time running to the front end zone every time when they could have used the back end zone. Right as I was ready to go they had another technical issue (hence the delay during the first 26 seconds of the video below). After fixing it, I got a 3 second countdown just like I would get in Crossfit. Here's how I did:
Friends don't tape friends falling off the stage
Yes, that was me tripping and falling stage right at the end of that video. I might have gotten a little too excited by the exclamation point. For my troubles, I ended up with a large bloody scrape on my left knee. I thought I had gone really fast and might have beaten the top time of the day, but as I laid on the floor to the side of the stage, I was told that my time was 1:14. I received some sunglasses and a gift card for staying under 1:30, but I was bummed that I wasn't all that close to the best time. Then I watched that video again. You can time it for yourself, but I'm pretty sure that I completed my run in 47 seconds. I'm calling shenanigans.
On Saturday, Jenn and I headed to a friend's house for our first ever crawfish boil. It was a cool idea, but crawfish are kinda difficult to eat. You also don't get much bang for your buck when eating those little suckers. The host had prepared brisket, hot sausage, potatoes, and corn as well, so there was plenty to eat even when I got tired of peeling crawfish. It seemed like a low-key affair, but then an announcement was made that beer pong was starting. When the line for beer pong became too long, the game became flip cup. Now I know what you're thinking: beer pong and flip cup do not constitute "athletic" activity. I don't disagree. Especially if you saw how bad I was at flip cup. But the athletic event was being saved for last. I went inside to use the bathroom and when I came out, I saw that flip cup was over. There was now a limbo contest taking place. I couldn't be nearly as bad at that as I was at flip cup. The bar started off fairly high, but when it was clear that no one was getting knocked out of the competition, it was dropped considerably lower. There was one girl who was barely getting underneath the bar, but she refused to fall down. There was another girl who looked like a sure winner. She was very flexible and moved under the bar gracefully. Then there was me. I did not move gracefully. The rhythm I employed as I approached the bar would be called herky-jerky at best. But all of the pistols (and various other squats) I've done at Crossfit have made my legs strong and given me a lot of ankle flexibility. Everyone was expecting me to fall, but I kept bending my body under the bar, coming out on the other side without a grass stain on me.
The bar moved lower and the first girl got knocked out, but my incredibly flexible rival still looked unbeatable. She didn't appear to be straining at all. Meanwhile, when I made my attempts, everyone had their phone out, ready to make the inevitable 911 call. But I hung on. The crowd grew restless and the bar was dropped even lower. The limbo queen went first. She was almost through when she suddenly stopped. A second later, her knee was on the ground. I could win this! I got ready for my turn and looked at the bar. It seemed impossibly low. I wasn't even sure how to get close to it without touching it. At a certain point, I just went for it. I started to slowly creep under the bar. My knees passed underneath. My hips passed underneath. My shoulders passed underneath. And then I fell. Dammit! I was so close! Because we didn't have a winner, the partygoers told us to each make another attempt. I went first this time and didn't do nearly as well as I had on try #1. That set the stage for my opponent. She stopped at about the same point as she had last time, but on her second attempt, she held it together and claimed the win. As a consolation prize, I was declared the male champion of the limbo contest.
Still waiting for a recap of something truly athletic, Dave! Okay, okay, here you go. One of my 10 goals for 2017 is to run a 5K in under 25 minutes. This was inspired by my so-so Turkey Trot run on Thanksgiving last year. My time for that 5K was over 27 minutes. Could I cut over two minutes off of my time this year? I should be able to. After all, way back in the day, I was a fairly decent runner:
That's me...speedy David Nicklos (note the team record)
That was taken junior year of high school. I believe my best cross country times came at the end of my junior year season, with my fastest 5K being 18:06. Yeah, like I said, that was way back in the day. A minor heart problem in college derailed me from running, but I've always been able to run a couple of miles if I put my mind to it. I'm toting around a lot more weight these days, but I think the muscle memory from high school hasn't faded. So doing a random 5K on Sunday morning didn't seem like the toughest challenge.
I readily admit that beer pong and flip cup sounds like the way Matt Harvey would prepare for a 5K, but I wasn't feeling the effects of those games when I woke up early on Sunday morning. What I was feeling was the effect of the limbo contest. My lower back felt sore and I considered just staying in bed and skipping the 5K. However, I knew if I let myself skip this 5K, I'd probably find a way to skip the next one too. I dragged myself into the shower and let the warm water wake me up.
I drove over to the neighborhood where the 5K was taking place, found a place to park, then walked to the elementary school where the race was starting. The first person that I saw was Coach Tim. He was talking with one of the people organizing the race, so I walked over to an uninhabited area and began to stretch. With his conversation over, Tim began walking towards the school and saw me over on my own. He came over and had a chat with me. We talked about Endurance a little bit. I wasn't sure if he was taking part in the race and we had this exchange:
Me: Are you running today, Tim?
Tim: Does it look like I'm running today?
Me: It always looks like you are running, Tim.
He wasn't wearing a number, but he was dressed like someone about to run a race and he was bouncing around like he had all the energy in the world. I simply may not be able to tell the difference between "racing Tim" and "non-racing Tim". Tim let me know that he was there to walk the runners through the pre-race warmup. As he got ready to leave, he said to me with a very serious face, "I hope you win today, Dave." I stared directly at him, unsure how to respond. My initial reaction was that he must be joking (it's possible that I am unable to tell the difference between "joking Tim" and "non-joking Tim" as well), but he seemed to be serious. I meekly responded "thanks Tim" as he ran off to organize the warmup.
I had no expectations of breaking 25 minutes in my first 5K of the year, but I was hoping to put up a time close to what I had run in November. The organizers of the race got us lined up at the start and I took my usual place near the back of the pack. Tim might have envisioned me breaking the tape first, but I certainly couldn't see things playing out that way. A horn was blown and the pack began moving on to the course. I wasn't worried about being far back because the race was being chip timed. I'd find out my real time at the end no matter what.
The toughest part of this 5K was that there were no mile markers along the way. If I had worn a watch, I might have been able to guess how far into the race I was, but I was flying blind for the most part. The longer I ran, the more I kept hoping someone would say "the finish is right around this corner". Instead I was told I was "almost there" by volunteer after volunteer. The first lady who told me I was almost there must have been at least a mile away from the finish. I was definitely not almost there. Hearing that phrase over and over again gave it less meaning and as I started to shorten my stride, I thought about walking for a bit. I had no way of knowing what my pace was, but I was guessing that my time was going to be in the 29-30 minute range. A short walk wasn't going to affect my time that much.
I decided not to give in to that urge. I wasn't running all that fast, but I convinced myself that I was honestly and truly almost there. We finally reached a corner where a volunteer provided some clarity. "Around this corner and straight ahead to the finish." Oh thank God! It was a long run up the block to the finish, but I could at least see the finish line and gauge how much further I had to go. I didn't sprint, but actually seeing the finish line gave me the motivation to pick up the pace. I nearly caught the lady who had been pulling away from me for the last half-mile. As the clock came in to view, I was shocked by what I saw. It hadn't reached 27 minutes yet. I crossed the finish line a few seconds under 27 minutes. After getting some water and a banana, I walked back over to where the final times were being posted. My official chip time: 26:45.
That was so much better than I expected. But the best news was yet to come. Once I got my official time, I made my way to my car and headed home. Took a shower, took a nap. Had some lunch with Jenn and caught up on some TV shows we missed during the week. Then I took a look at my e-mail. There was a message from one of the organizers of the race. She was writing to confirm that I got my silver medal at the end of the race. That had to be some kind of clerical error. I was in the 30-39 age group, so I was among the old fogies of my division. How could I have finished second? I went on to the website for the race and clicked on the results. Sure enough, there I was listed as the second place finisher amongst the 30-39 year old men. (Note: Maybe this race was marketed towards those 40 and older because I would have been way out of the top three for the 40-49 and 50-59 divisions. I would have been in the top three for the 20-29 division though. Go figure.) I wrote back to the organizer and asked where I could pick up the medal. The next day, I retrieved this guy:
It's not quite 1st place in the female Novice division, but it will have to do
Maybe Tim was hoping that I won my division. (I just missed the victory by a measly 3 minutes and 5 seconds.) His well wishes were closer to the mark than any prediction I would have made on where I would finish. This was the first time in more than 20 years that I had won a medal for running. The last time I was given one of these was back when that black and white photo was taken. To really put it into perspective, I had hair the last time I won a medal. So yeah, its been awhile.
This run gave me a lot of confidence that I'll be able to break 25 minutes before the year is up. It might not happen in the warm summer months, but I think it will happen by Thanksgiving at least. It would be nice to scratch off another item from my top 10 of 2017 list.
Monday preview: Front squats and sprints on the rower. A new member of the gym makes everyone take notice. I am determined to reach another goal on my top 10 of 2017 list.
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