Nothing New

The last koan is the running adage: nothing new on race day. Not shoes. Not food. You have arrived at this point ready. Your training has worked. You have seen this course. You have felt the weather. It is nothing new. You are good to go. Believe this.

And if we are doing nothing new this week, then I, too, am going to go back to the work that I wrote this season. This is nothing new:

Lay your running clothes out the night before the run.

Run your own pace, not your neighbors’ nor Joan Benoit’s.

Cheer everyone you see on the course even if it is with just a nod. It is their day, too.

Remember your legends - the Susan Butcher's, the Lance Armstrong's, the Pheidippides', the Charles Lindberg's of the world - the ones who reached for the horizon. They, too, were nervous, as is anyone who pushes their limits. But the world is a better place for their courage. The world is a better place for yours.

Wear sunscreen but not above your eyes.

Remember your friends both present and past. They are the mile markers of your life. With luck place a few of them on the course. Tell the ones who want to take photographs that you will look the best around mile six. Save the better conversationalists for Lake Merced and Ocean Beach. Offer the ones who cheer you on race day pizza. Write the others about your gratitude. After all this done, perhaps convince one of them to go for a run.

Hydrate.

Appreciate beauty. Seek it out everywhere from museums to concerts. From great poets to silly musicians. From views of the Bridge to the cute runner just up ahead. Never underestimate the power of a muse. It is what gives civilization purpose.

Remember your honorees.

Enjoy the race t-shirt. Wear it to the next family dinner. Be nonchalant about it.

This season began with the word "Go", and it ends at the same place. There is one last "Go" this season, one last early morning run through the city on the familiar routes we call home. You are ready.

Go team. Go.