Running is stupid, part 1

So why do I keep doing it? Also, trigger warning - bumsweat

We just booked in to do another marathon.

If you’d listened to me whinge about training for the last one you would have bet I’d never run another one again, and you’d feel confident about winning that bet.

I bitched and moaned before nearly every run. I complained about the weather (Putrajaya is so sticky!) the terrain (Athens is so hilly!) the pain (my calves always hurt!) and the boredom (not another lap around KL Botanic Gardens!)

I’m not sure how the husband didn’t push me in front of a bus just to escape my bitching. Either he’s a saint, or the hearing loss from his tradie days is worse than I think.

But really, running isn’t all bad. Not like you’d think from listening to me.

And one thing that keeps me coming back is the places we go and the stuff we see and the totally random events that always seem to happen while we’re out running stupid distances multiple times a week for months and months, so we can manage one single race that’s over in a few hours.

(^^^that was a common and ongoing complaint during training. Sorry husband).

Like this evening last February. This photo makes me smile every time I see it.

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20km into a 25km run in Kuala Lumpur I needed the loo. And we were right in the middle of the city, so we went to the Suria mall, at the base of the Petronas Towers.

(Look at me, location-dropping like the insufferably smug traveller I am! You’re going to have to learn to deal with it, because it’s one of my favourite things to do).

Suria is very fancy. It’s full of designer shops, and everyone gets dressed up to go there. Everyone wears immaculate outfits to match their immaculate hair and immaculate makeup. They’re probably stylish too, but I’m mostly oblivious to fashion so I wouldn’t know.

It’s the sort of grooming level that this scruffy Australian didn’t even achieve at my own wedding, where I paired my strapless dress with a singlet tan.

So when we staggered into the glorious airconditioning of Suria we, um, stood out. Our ratty running clothes don’t fit in with people that don’t really do activewear, even when they’re being active.

But the REAL problem was the physical state of us after 20-odd kilometres. Kuala Lumpur is equatorial wet tropical. And I don’t know if you’ve ever been for a long run in 30+ degree heat and 70% humidity, but it’s fairly brutal.

There is NO deodorant that can withstand that sort of sweating. There’s no point in wearing any, because it gets washed away in the first ten minutes.

The only reason my top is a uniform colour in the photo is because it’s uniformly soaked in sweat. I could wring it out and probably get a cup full of awfulness.

And that’s just my top - let’s not talk about my undies. The husband and I have had long running discussions about whether bum sweat differs from, say, arm sweat in any meaningful way. We can’t think of a humane way to test it, so the jury’s out.

You should be grateful that photos don’t have smell, because I have a miasma around myself during a run like that. I get used to it, but sometimes I get a whiff of myself and nearly make myself sick.

And if my dripping arm brushes against the husband’s while we’re running he’ll scream at me to get my grossness off him, even though he’s just as bad.

Maybe slightly less bad. I’m really bad. But he’s still pretty bad.

Anyway, back again to Suria and the needs of my bladder after skolling litres of water while running to prevent myself shrivelling into a dried-up husk.

I found the closest toilets and they were the Premier toilets. They’re so posh I had to pay 2RM (0.66 AUD) to use them. I made sure I dropped my sweat-slicked coins directly into the box so that the attendant didn’t need to handle them. They probably don’t get paid biohazard allowance.

When I walked into the bathroom I realised it was stocked like a fancy hotel. Actually, I’ve never been to a fancy hotel, but I hear they have posh bath products. It was definitely stocked better than our standard caravan park cabins, anyway.

The makeup related stuff was irrelevant, as were the hair products (I suppose I could have washed my hair in the sink, but even I know that’s taking it too far).

But the deodorant? That was VERY relevant. I used a LOT of deodorant. I don’t think it helped much, but maybe rancid sweat with floral overtones is better than plain rancid sweat?

And the whole time my sweaty thighs were sliding around on the immaculate electronic toilet with in-built bidet with heated air-drying function (that I was too scared to use in case I randomly pressed some high-pressure water blast button, so toilet paper is just fine, thanks) in the marble cubicle, I was laughing.

The sheer incongruousness of being in one of the fanciest bathrooms I’ve ever seen while I was in such a disgusting state was absolutely hilarious. I was still laughing when I found the husband standing in all his wet and smelly glory in front of the Christian Dior window display.

And then we headed back out into the heat and humidity and did the last 5km, and it felt like nothing because we were having so much fun.

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So yes, we’ve booked in to do another marathon. It’s in Thessaloniki, in Greece, which is where the husband’s grandparents emigrated from.

We’ll get to train by doing parkruns and events across Europe. So far it looks like we’ll be stopping in lots of places between Rome and Lisbon, and I’m trying to fit in a (30km) trail race at a UTMB qualifier, because I want to be a starstruck ogler of the superhumans doing the 180km distance.

I’m convinced there’s no better way to sightsee than by getting out and running regularly.

We end up in all sorts of places that we’d never go to otherwise, and they’re often the most memorable parts for a range of reasons.

We see the touristy stuff at all hours of the day and night, and often have it to ourselves.

We see the residential areas, and the small stores and workshops, and the schools and building sites, and people going about their everyday lives.

We see festivals and markets and parties and live music and celebrations that aren’t listed anywhere and that we’d never know about otherwise.

We see the rats and the rubbish and the grime, and carry pocketfuls of change for the unhoused and refugees, because we see them too.

We could run just because. But when I know that I’m going to have to go out in public, and run a stupidly long distance, and want to save myself the embarrassment of vomiting or collapsing or DNFing or timing out, I will get out there and train.

Even if it’s hot, or raining, or I’m tired, or I have any one of dozens of excuses that could be considered legitimate.

I might bitch, but I get out and do it anyway.*

And that might be one of the most useful things I’ve ever learned.

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xxKelly

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P.S. Another perk to that night (as if I needed another one after nearly sliding off the loo due to my own bumsweat) - we walked out smack-bang into the middle of the nightly KLCC light show, which shows levels of unselfconscious patriotism that us very self-conscious Australians with our sordid history will never have.

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And then we got to sing ‘Ma-LAZIER’ for the next few weeks until we left. Yes, we’re very easily entertained.

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*As long as the view is worth it. To people who run the same routes around the same place looking at the same sights month after month, I admire your tenacity - my novelty-seeking brain goes haywire with boredom and sabotages me with rebellion and refusal. Luckily we’re never in one place long enough for me to get really unfit.