Grab your Dream by the Throat and Don’t Let Go

Something lovely happened over the weekend. Mary Ito, the host of CBC’s Fresh Air, gave a great plug for my book.

I didn’t hear it, but friends did. They told me that a woman who’d heard my interview with Mary a couple of weeks back sent an e-mail to the show. She’d given a copy of “Ultra” to her 11 year-old grand-daughter. The grand-daughter devoured it in, like, 2 days.

You have no idea how happy this makes me. Not that Mary read the e-mail (though that was nice too), but that an 11 year-old girl actually liked my book!!!

I spent twenty years writing short stories and novels. They were awful. Then, suddenly, a couple of years ago, a different kind of story burst out of me; a story about the most unlikely of subjects – a 13 year-old boy who runs a 100-mile footrace. And it got published. And now kids are reading it. Not just boys; girls too. That’s thrilling. Better than thrilling. It’s a dream come true.

Which is funny, because that’s what the novel is about too. Dreams coming true. Oh, I know there’s a big, fat running shoe on the cover, and I know the novel is called “Ultra” – as in ULTRA MARATHON, but at its heart, the book isn’t really about running. It’s about something far more universal.

It’s about grabbing your dreams by the throat and never letting them go.

You probably won’t ever run a 100-mile race. That’s okay. Actually, that’s good! 100 mile races aren’t for everyone. It’s an extreme sport, and I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone – unless they’re into blisters and hallucinations and smacking into bears in the forest.

But here’s what I DO recommend. And here’s what I hope readers will take away from the book. Ready? Here goes. You too can achieve your dreams.

Simple isn’t it? Totally doable. Doesn’t matter what your dream is. Want to write the perfect pop song? You can do it. Want to study at the Cordon Bleu cooking school? You can do it. Want to save Blackberry from extinction? You can do it. Want to become a marine biologist and swim with the dolphins? You can do that too. You’ll get wet, but you can do it.

Figure out your dream, then HANG ON TIGHT. As tightly if you were riding the back of a whale.

Keep chasing your dreams. I know they move fast. But trust me: You are FASTER!!!!!

Running Through the “Stupid Wall”

Ever heard the term bonehead?

Ever wondered what it really means?

A bonehead is a guy who puts a can of Diet Coke into his knapsack along with his beloved iPod Nano, and then runs home wearing the knapsack. Later, he is legitimately surprised when the tin of Diet Coke springs a leak, utterly destroying his Nano.

But wait! There’s another type of bonehead!

This second variety of bonehead will, two weeks before a marathon, in an effort to save money, attempt to chop up a pile of used bricks with a sledgehammer, hoping to re-use them as gravel in his driveway. He will do this without wearing any type of leg protection, will in fact wear nothing but running shorts. In spite of this obvious idiocy, the bonehead will still be surprised when a sharp chunk of brick flies with great velocity towards his bare shin, instantly releasing a tide of red.

At first, this turn of events will strike the bonehead as amusing: the blood splashed across the railway ties, the undignified staggering through the house towards the bathtub. But then his thoughts will take a more serious turn. Does he think of the fact that he hasn’t had a tetanus shot in years? Does he pause to consider the carpets that now need steam-cleaning? Of course not! Instead he thinks: How will this impact my marathon? And: can I still run into work tomorrow?

To answer your first question, yes, I went to the doctor. She looked at the wound, cleaned it, and then peeled me off the ceiling. “The brick sliced through the layer of fat, but it didn’t hit muscle,” she said. “I’ll give you some stitches. You’re lucky, really.”

And my marathon in two weeks?

“You’ll run it, no problem.”

The doctor froze the tissue around the wound. While we waited for the freezing to set in, I decided to show her the weird bug bites on my chest.

“Those aren’t bug bites,” the doctor said. “That’s Shingles.”

Wha???

“Shingles. Did you have Chicken Pox as a kid? Thought so. Have you been stressed lately? Any reason your immune system might be down?”

Well, ah, there was that little 100-mile race I ran the other day.

“You can tell it’s Shingles because of the pattern,” the doctor said. “It’s only on the one side of your body. The virus travels down nerve axons. Does it hurt? Feel itchy?”

“It itches a bit,” I said. “But it doesn’t hurt.”

“You’re lucky. With older people, it can be quite painful. It’s probably not so bad for you because you’re youngish and healthy.”

Young-ish? Did she say young-ish?

“You can relax,” she said. “It’s on its way out. You’ll be okay. Now, put your leg up here.”

It is a testament to my boneheadedness that, when I heard this news; i.e. that I had a weird strain of the herpes virus, my first thought was not, Oh my God, what can I do to get rid of this foul disease? Instead, I thought: WOW – I ran a 10 k race 3 days ago AND WON… It was the fastest race of my life, and I ran it with a case of shingles!

I mentioned this to the doctor. I suppose I bragged a little bit. “Just imagine if I’d run it when I was totally healthy,” I gushed. “I might have finished under 38 minutes!”

The doctor snapped on her rubber gloves. “Don’t get too proud of yourself,” she said. “You’re about to get stitches because you were chopping bricks with no protection.”

Right. Point taken.

“Lie back,” said the doctor. “You may not want to watch this part.”

“Ultra” on the Radio

On the off-chance you weren’t up at 7:30 last Sunday morning, and missed my CBC Radio interview, in which I discussed falling asleep while running, running into trees, and running into hallucinations that look a LOT like giant teapots, you can catch it here… (Follow the link below, then click on “listen”):

http://www.cbc.ca/freshair/episodes/2013/09/29/sunday-september-29/

Who told Tyler Heggie about my book?

Truth is stranger than fiction. Younger too.

Recently I wrote a novel about a 13 year-old who runs a 100-mile ultra-marathon. I know what you’re thinking: No WAY could a kid do that!

Wrong! An 11 year-old just ran 273 km – all the way across Prince Edward island!

Tyler Heggie

Prince Edward Islander, Tyler Heggie, spent seven days running the island from tip to tip. He covered the equivalent of a marathon each day, running with family and friends along the Confederation Trail.

Heggie did it to raise money and awareness for Multiple Sclerosis research (his Mom was diagnosed with M.S. two years ago).

Heggie finishing his run with friends

Heggie has run long distances before. At age 9, he successfully competed in the Charlottetown marathon. Later this fall, he’s scheduled to run the marathon in Toronto – where roughly 20,000 fans (including me!) will be lined up to meet him.

Real Life Superheroes, Part 3

Heroes are everywhere – in comic books, movies, and of course my novel. But real-life superheroes pop up in some pretty surprising places. Like the running track, or even the basketball court.

Check out this video that’s been making the rounds:

So often these days, sports stories have to do with money, or winning-at-all-costs, or banned substances (yeah, I’m looking at you, Lance Armstrong).

But that’s not the whole story. Here’s an entire football team of real-life superheroes:

It doesn’t take much to be heroic. You don’t need X-ray vision, or six-pack abs. All you need is a little kindness.

Here’s What Happens After a 100-mile Race

1) You collapse into a vinyl chair beside a campfire. Think: I AM NEVER DOING THAT EVER AGAIN.

2) You attempt to stand up. Discover that you can’t. Wait for your legal guardian to arrive and pull you to your feet.

3) You hobble to the shower or bath. You groan as you step over the edge of the tub. You scream when the water hits your battered feet and, er, soffets. You watch your blackened toenails swirl down the drain.

4) You eat something and discover that you’re starving. Your appetite is on steroids. You devour soups, stacks of pancakes, roofing shingles.

5) You go home, letting someone else drive. After all, you’ve been awake for 40+ hours. Also, a sudden charlie-horse in your braking leg wouldn’t be fun on the 401. WHOA – CHIP TRUCK! Pull this puppy over!

6) You try to sleep, but fail. Your muscles won’t stop twitching. And your brain is more hyperactive than a David Fincher film, flipping through millions of images from the trail.

7) Still awake at 3 a.m., you check the internet for race results. You already know your time; it was announced at the post-race lunch. Still, it won’t feel real until you see it online.

8) You self-medicate. Robaxacet, A-535, Dalwhinnie.

9) Suddenly, without warning, you fall asleep. But it’s deeper than sleep. It’s more like enchantment.

10) 10,000 years later you awake and resume your life. You take the kids to school or walk down the street to buy coffee. At some point you hear a bad song by Phil Collins on the radio. You suddenly realize, it’s over. You’re back in the real world. It kinda sucks.

11) Far too soon, you attempt to run. You get a kilometer, maybe two, before giving up and limping home. Your hip flexors hurt, or your knees, or your feet. You worry that you’ll never run again.

12) After three days with no running, you begin to feel fat. You stare at your bloated self in the mirror and weep.

14) Once again, you turn to the world wide web. The race results are up now. Also: plenty of pictures. You stare at the faces of the people you ran with. You miss them more than you miss your mother’s womb. All those fascinating conversations about shoes, mileage, poop.

15) While downloading the latest Flash Player update, you suddenly think, HMMM I’D LIKE TO DO THAT RACE AGAIN. You mention this to your legal guardian, which may be a mistake. Mental health brochures start appearing all about the house.

20 Years of Ultra-Madness

Well, that was something!

The 20th edition of the Haliburton Forest Trail run was held this past weekend. For two decades and counting, race director Helen Malmberg and her crew of unimpeachable wits have put on the best trail race this side of the Rocky Mountains.

Here’s what the starting line looked like, Saturday at 5:59 a.m.

This is how it looked 90 seconds later:

One hundred miles. 160 kilometers. Half a million strides. Starting NOW.

We were about to burn 10,000 calories. Sweat 20 litres of water. Our hearts would beat 1.2 million times.

If you were to add up all the calories that runners have burned in this race over the last twenty years, it would be equivalent to a tower of butter that stretches all the way from here to, oh I don’t know, the moon.

The weather held, despite the dire forecasts. A few brief showers fell throughout the day, but the raindrops stayed mostly in the canopy of trees, and the trails remained firm. Don did a brilliant job (as usual) of marking the route, and the aid stations were exploding with outrageously cheerful volunteers. You know, the kind of people who think nothing of baking a hundred dozen almond-rice bars, draining your blisters, and not even twitching at your repulsive Heed-breath.

Can we talk about me for a second? Awesome. See, I couldn’t find my groove for the first thirty miles or so. The first fifty miles always get me down in this race. They strike me as a prelude; something you have to get out of the way before you can get on with the Real Race, which is miles 51-100. But something else felt off too. I was lonely. I barely saw anyone out there. Later, I’d learn this was because I was farther ahead of the pack than I thought. But at the time I thought it was just low enrollment.

Wrong, wrong, totally wrong. Enrollment was UP. This race keeps getting more and more popular.

Anyway, back to me and my crappy mood. Every part of my body took its turn complaining, as usual. But then, at mile 46, something wonderful happened. A volunteer at aid station 3 greeted me with a huge hug. “Oh my God!” she shouted. “You wrote a novel! And it’s about this race. When can I read it?”

This perked me up considerably. I stood there chatting awhile, basking in the adulation, until I suddenly remembered that I was running a race. I grabbed a couple of potatoes, and got on my way, promising to return with a copy of the book on my second lap. This little exchange turned my race around. Suddenly my legs were spinning like pinwheels. The knee pain I’d been feeling was GONE!

I finished the first 50 miles in nine and a half hours, and met my family at the turnaround, which boosted my spirits even more. I sent a copy of my book out to the volunteer at the third aid station, and by the time I ran back there, she’d already read the first two chapters. Crazy! At aid station 2, I met a young kid who had his nose in the book as well. Double crazy! I wanted to sign his copy, but nobody had a pen.

Oh well, just keep the legs moving! Down Poachers Trail and then on to The Pass. Everywhere I looked, I saw little details that I’d stolen and woven into the book. The Nanaimo bars at aid station 4. The disco ball at aid station 7. The hilarious goings-on at Margaritaville. Even Troutspawn Lane, a gravel road near the entrance to Normac Trail, became the name of my protagonist’s favourite band. It was a surreal experience – like I was running through the pages of my novel. Mind you, I didn’t have any hallucinations, of which there are A LOT in the book.

Of course I suffered the usual pain, and gobbled my fair share of Advil. And I sank into the inevitable fits of depression whenever I foolishly contemplated the insane number of miles I had left to run. But I tried something new in this race. Excuse me if this sounds flaky. But whenever I felt that familiar depression coming on, I would say to myself, yes that’s true, you have a long way left to run, but how do you feel IN THIS EXACT MOMENT, RIGHT NOW? Every time I asked myself that question, I had to admit that I didn’t feel so bad. Once I stripped away my anxiety about the miles that remained, I was left with only the sensations in my body AT THAT MOMENT. My body hurt, of course. How could it not? But it never hurt enough to stop me from running. So I kept the legs moving. And the number on the odometer kept rising.

I crossed the finish line just before 3 a.m. The clouds blew away and the stars came out, and, later, the morning broke cold and clear.

As usual, my favourite part of the race was hanging out at the finishing line campfire, eating Helen’s fried chicken and trading stories with the other runners. Stories about bear sightings and injuries and personal revelations on the trail.

A few people congratulated me on my run. I was thrilled with my time, but I felt awkward about claiming third place. I only got it because some better runners had bad days on the trail. But I guess that’s how it goes sometimes. And I must admit, it was a lark to squeeze onto the podium for once!

Many thanks to Helen, Don and Gary, and all the other volunteers, far too numerous to mention, who gave me and so many other runners such a precious gift. It’s a life-changing experience to run through a forest all night long, and it wouldn’t be possible without caring souls who are willing to watch out for us and cheer us on and put up with our B.O. and queasy stomachs and pain-induced crankiness. You all deserve a finisher’s medal!

Finally, a shout-out to my amazing parents, who gave me the genetic material that allows me to run these crazy races in the first place. Let’s face it, it’s a privilege to have a body that can run for 100 miles straight. Yes, we train hard, and yes, we watch what we eat, and yes, we focus obsessively on our goals. But we couldn’t do any of it if not for that duo who gave us the greatest gift of all.

This one’s for you, Mom and Dad!

Photo hat tip: my brilliant brother, at http://www.flickr.com/photos/andys_camera/

Eve of Self-Destruction

Extra shoes and socks…check.

Electrolytes…check.

Salted yams…double check.

Drop bags all packed

Weather report?

90% chance of rain.

So that’s how it’s gonna be.

Ok, whatever. Bring it on.

3 More Sleeps

Pray for good weather. Three days out from a 100-mile race, that’s all you can do. At this stage, there’s no point doing any more training. Your body isn’t going to get any fitter over the next 72 hours. You might as well relax, eat well, sleep as much as you can, run to stay loose, but not so hard you deplete yourself. And above all, pray for clear skies.

100 mile races are challenging enough when the sun is shining. Wet, muddy trails can make things hellish. Under those conditions, your goals have to change. You’re not just trying to cross the finish line in one piece anymore. You’re trying to keep your feet dry for as long as possible. Wet feet are susceptible to blisters, and blisters can end your race fast. Which is why runners usually bring 2 or three pair of runners and a half dozen pair of socks to each race. We store them in “drop bags” along the course.

The worst possible scenario? Cold, pounding rain. Last year I ran a 100-mile race in something close to a hurricane. All 50 runners were soaking wet from the very first mile. Blisters were the least of our problems. There was chafing and hypothermia to deal with too. Late at night, when the temperature dropped, I couldn’t stay warm enough. Shivering uncontrollably, I dropped out at 3 am, after having run 92 miles.

There’s my list. You’ll notice Advil at the top. A couple of years ago, after some exceedingly painful ultra marathons, I discovered the joy of ibuprufen.

I don’t take many. I’ll gobble a couple of those sweet little pills at mile 75, and another couple four hours later.

It’s not recommended, of course. Too much Ibuprufen could potentially damage your kidneys, which are already under serious strain, trying to keep your urine flowing despite a lack of available body fluids.

Still, they do such a good job of dulling the pain, especially when running downhill late in a race. You’d think that running uphill would be the hardest thing, but it’s not. Running downhill feels like your legs are being pressed through a cheese grater.

So hello Advil, old friend! I don’t care if you’re not recommended. Running 100 miles through a forest isn’t generally recommended either.

This is What a Dream Comes True Looks Like:

Yesssss!

My first novel. In my hands. For realsies.

It was the hardest thing I ever did. Writing the thing was only half the battle. Getting it published was even harder.

But this feeling, this moment, makes it all worthwhile.

To those of you who are struggling to get your writing into print, please, don’t give up! It can be done. Hard work pays off.

And I must give a huge shout-out to my nieces and nephews – who inspired this story, lent their names to some of the characters, helped me with the jokes and dialogue, and even shared early versions of the book with their classmates. You all deserve a finisher’s medal:

Aaron, Alex, Ali, Ben, Benjamin, Brody, Caelan, Caitlin, Caleb, Christopher, Daniel, Darcie, Grace S., Grace W., Jackson, Julia, Julian, Kara, Kelsey, Kiernan, Leonardo, Lucy-Claire, Luke, Monty, Madelaine, Maggie, Mateos, Nate, Oliver, Olivia, Parisinia, Quinn, Ray, Riley, River, Rowan, Rylee, Sacha, Skyler, Sofia, Sydney, Tahnee, Tobias, Zoe.