On Thanksgiving day I woke up to loud pounding on the RV door. For crying out loud, it was 7am and I was on vacation like the rest of America. Hadji was screaming something about a 5km turkey trot at a local school. As much as I tried to reconcile both words, I couldn’t figure out why they would call it a trot, because the only one trotting would be me. Perhaps, this was a personalized race for moi!? Unlikely!

I scream back something about being tired, and my bastard of a training sergeant said something along the lines of “we have the rest of the day to be tired”. I’m like…it’s Thanksgiving, it’s the only day of the year when I drink coffee just to be sufficiently awake to keep on eating.  Being tired is not part of anybody’s Thanksgiving plan.

It was below freezing, so I put on every conceivable item of sports clothing I had and walked out the door: I looked like a poorly decorated Christmas tree. As soon as I got in the car, Hadji said…we’re only going to warm up for the race, so go get your dog.  I still puzzles me that Hadji thinks I need warming up. You don’t need warming up when all you’re going to do is start slow and then taper off.

My trusty partner Velo, came along, and I was forced to “warm-up” 3 miles up to 8000 feet. I tried as best I could to hide the fact that the “warm-up” had been a race in and of itself.  At this point we drove back to the house, shed some clothes, and drove to the race, where over a hundred people had decided to duke it out for a turkey or pie.

I ran positive splits, which is to say, the worst way of running a race– the first mile at 6:40, the second at 6:45, and the last one at 8 something– I progressively got slower and slower. Somehow I managed to get passed by cripples, little girls, and cardiac patients, all on my way to scoring a personal best of 22:00, at 7,500 feet, in freezing temperatures, long pants, and with nothing flat but the 5 meters under the finish line banner. Luckily, I have a lot to improve, and running’s not even my sport!

At the finish line we met some other pros. These were west Kenyan runners, and possible one of the few people who make me look fat. Since pros tend to congregate together, I introduced myself as a newly minted pro, and proceeded to trade training and diet tips.

Apparently, I’m fat…by a long ways. At 5 foot 3 inches, one of them weighed 102-104lbs, depending on the time of the year. So, all things being equal (which they’re clearly not), I would have to weigh 116 pounds to put out the kind of speed his lanky ass legs can put out.

When I was racing my bike, I managed to drop down to 138 lbs one year, and friends of my parents thought I had cancer. I can only imagine what they’d think of me at 116 lbs. Clearly, I’m going to have to either find another sport, or find other things on which to improve.

I thought perhaps I could lose a few pounds, so I grilled them on diet. Apparently, that’s a no go as well. Breakfast is tea and milk. Second breakfast is 3 slices of bread, fruit and orange juice. Lunch is rice, lean red meat, and fruit. The afternoon snacks consist of nuts. And dinner is enough to weather you through the night without waking up hungry. Apparently the trick is to always be semi-hungry, but not starving. Again, nothing I’m willing to improve upon. I’m going to have to concentrate on training.

Initially I thought training was very doable, until I realized their 18 miles a day weren’t on a bike. They were running. The easy weeks in the off-season include 80 mile weeks, whereas the regular weeks mid year consist of 140 mile weeks. Hmmm… I wonder if I’m currently even doing 80 mile weeks on the bike… probably not.

Ok, so I can’t get any skinnier for fear of affecting my social life. I can’t eat less, because…well, beer tastes so good, and I can’t train more unless the 80-140 miles are on the bike, so that pretty much leaves sleep. I’m sure I can sleep more– even on par with professional athletes. So there!

But then again, I’m not getting paid to win races, but to write, so back to eating the pie Hadji won at the turkey trot!