A report from the Coulee Dam Race out of Washington, US
Kjell won the race, but as you can read it was not at all the experience he expected. He was bored most of the time on this half marathon course. Amazing! It was a race that did not hurt. Was it therefore a race that didn’t give Kjell the »wow experience«? It is worth to think about it.
The Coulee Dam in Washington
It might sound funny or even arrogant. I had a solid run last Sunday and I won. Usually that calls for some excitement, but I don´t have any of those feelings to share. Starting from the beginning, it was a close call to just get there.
My mom and I drove about 4h from Coeur d´Alene in Idaho USA to the Coulee Dam in Washington State USA. We started extremely early, getting up at 4am and arrived about 10minutes before the race start, at 8:30am. I got lost and during the drive I thought, we never gonna make it. Thinking about it, I was probably not the best travel companion on the way to the race, sorry mom.
We arrived near the Coulee Dam. I registered, went to the bathrooms, changed and the race started, all that in 10 minutes.
I had never the time to really think about the race or anything else. I just ran hard from the beginning and was leading from the start on. It felt good, but the real excitement never showed up. The hill from km 2 to km 4 was tough. Finally running over the Dam was so much fun. The section near the lake was windy, a little lonely and honestly it started to be boring. At the turn-around I had a lead of 7,50 minutes. So I took it easy. I just couldn´t push it harder without anyone there. I jogged home. There wasn´t any need to fight and push it through. The only thing I really needed to fight was the up-coming feeling to quit. I finished in a solid 1:20,21h and won by about 13 minutes.
I learned a lot on that trip and I found this quote that perfectly fits: “Life isn’t about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.” [author: George Bernard Shaw].
The way back was a lot faster and more fun.
