Our incredible Jemal ran his first half-marathon without really expecting to. Here is his story, enjoy!
– Laurent
Leaving my house around 7h30pm for a night run, I didn’t really set a goal for how long to run. Caught up with a running buddy in Chinatown, we headed to Parc Jean Drapeau over the amazing Jacques Cartier!
At 7k, my buddy decided to take the metro back to the island and I (BLUFFED) to run a 20k (my alter ego plans to take the metro maybe after 12kish). I kept running along the basin, in the dark. I encountered what looked like a coyote on my way… awkwardly starred at each other until it disappeared into the bushes. That experience later caused me some jitters as every tree branch sticking out to the road seemed like another coyote.
Lost in the depth of my thoughts, I wasn’t giving match attention to how long or how fast I was running. I had just hit the 15k mark. It is very dark now, way past 9pm. Nothing to see except some flickering biker’s lights from distance, and fireflies, mosquitoes and my footsteps! shook shook shook! Let’s skip how many times Google maps sent me astray, most routes ending up being closed or inaccessible.
Anyway, I Got LOST!!! I had kept my phone flash to use it as a signal, and YES to fend off possible coyote attack! My phone battery is about to DIE! HORROR!!! I can’t be lost here!!! I put my phone on battery save mode…found my way and then suddenly, I felt an incredible, sudden loss of energy! I wasn’t in any pain; I just couldn’t squeeze an ounce of energy to keep moving anymore! Wow! I thought that’s it! I am going to crash!
I looked at my Strava, boom!! 20k! I was like “woohoo!! this happened only once for me, I’m gonna do my 2nd ever 1/2marathon”!!! Excitement kicked in. I started thinking about my #NPMTL mates…. and recalled how much I love running despite my now-subsiding fear of running distances longer than 10k….lots of reflections and emotions followed!!! I’m now on the main island heading home as I kept running to crack the 25k barrier! And somehow, I coincidentally ended up right in front of #yamajo HQ 🤩, always good to be there!
I finally got home safe and happy and not too proud but very very grateful and appreciative of what I have got going. I am deeply thankful for my dear half-awake, under-caffeinated friends I see every Wednesday at 6h29 and every wonderful human at #Yamajo. I am learning a bunch every day from everyone and literally going longer distances👌, eh!
Not hiding my embarrassment at bragging about a 25k in front of friends who run the damn TSP and countless ultras and marshal the stairs of Percival Molson every week, I have to say this is a big deal for me from a more personal angle. It’s proof of me doing something that I thought would never be able to do! Well, so what? He who is an East African should even run more, right? Kidding!!!!
My point here has to do with the confidence to say YES I CAN DO IT and believing it. It doesn’t come easy for some of us, but I am happily growing into that now, with ever new PB and every extra KM. Laurent, thank you for your casual yet inspiringly illuminating “I know you can do it” comments🙏🏼
So, I can now say ‘Call me when you run a half, eh! 😍Love you all. Thank you.
– Jemal
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