An Israeli in Houston Marathon Blog

גיא כהן מסכם את חצי המרתון הראשון בחייו

  •   Guy Cohen summarizes the Houston Aramco Half Marathon, the first half marathon in his life
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  • גיא כהן מסכם את חצי המרתון הראשון בחייו

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    תאריך: 21/01/15, מאת: גיא כהן

    7:00 בבוקר, 10 מעלות צלסיוס. זריחה. מרכז יוסטון. 37 אלף איש ואשה מתחילים לרוץ. חצי המרתון הראשון שלי. מתנה ממני אלי לגיל 40.

    הערה - אני לא אוהב לרוץ... תמיד היה לי קשה לרוץ, כבר מבית הספר היסודי ודרך התיכון ואחר כך בצבא - כוכבים בעיניים, קשיים בנשימה, שברי מאמץ (ובכלל הייתי ג'ובניק אז מה הקשר לשברי מאמץ?!) בקיצור - מי צריך את זה?!

    http://ow.ly/HJ3ub ​

  • Translation into English

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    ​Guy Cohen summarizes the Houston Aramco Half Marathon, the first half marathon in his life, "a gift from me to me for my 40th birthday", he writes.

    Date: 01/21/15, by: Guy Cohen

     

    It is 7 a.m., 50 degrees, sunrise in downtown Houston. More than 37,000 men and women are starting to run. For me, it is my first half marathon. A gift from me to me for my 40th birthday.

    Sidenote - I do not like to run... I’ve always had a hard time running, from elementary school through high school and then in the Israeli army. I used to see stars in my eyes, difficulty breathing, stress fractures.

    The problem is that, like many others, I also reached the age when I started to feel uncomfortable with the continued neglect of this thing called "body."  Something needed to be done. So, I decided to walk. It's a great sport, and indeed, I walked three times a week with a friend. We were talking while walking about this and that, arguing Israeli politics.

    One day, I came across an article "How to get from walking to running straight 3 miles." I never ran more than 1.5 miles without stopping, so the challenge was interesting. After six months of very short running combined with walking, I got to the point that I can run half an hour straight -- slowly, but continuously. Still running three miles seemed like an impossible task. I cannot explain how, but sometime during January 2014, I decided that I was ready and wanted to try to run 3 miles. I tried ... and succeeded. The satisfaction was immense.  I decided that the next stage is 4 miles, and if sometime in the future, I will be able to run 6.4 miles, then I did my duty in this life.

    The security officer at the Consulate General of Israel to the Southwest, where I work, recommended the participation in races regularly and that I go with him to cheer for the Houston Marathon runners. It seems so obvious and logical - the guy runs marathons, he is my source for every question/problem that I have, and of course, a role model.

    But what is there to me and to competitions?!? Oh well ... I went anyways. Much to my surprise, I saw runners that are not taken from sport and fashion magazines who didn’t look like male and female models. They were like me and like you. It was a serious disturbance in my perception - until now it was clear that runners are made with zero fat percentage, between the ages of 18-25 and have eternal smile on their face. When a man who was at least 70 years old ran in front of me, I realized that something was not quite accurate with my worldview. Moderate physical pressure from my running training partner, a dear friend who ran for years and appliances with the gears in a room with air-conditioning and decided to go and join me in open air runs, convinced me to sign up for my first race - 5 km (3.1 miles) race.

    When I completed 10 km for the first time, I decided it was time to move forward in life and I bought a water belt & a GPS watch with heart rate monitor. I found out that, according to online professionals, anyone who runs more than 1.5 miles regularly more than three times a week is a "long-distance runner." Nice to meet you - Guy.

    At this point, I was opened to the world of runners' gadgets like Alice in Wonderland, I followed the White Rabbit to a world full of wonders and surprises, from special socks that keep the calf muscles tight (cool !!!), through reflective glow and shimmer stripe for the night runs (my mother worries I run at night), running shirts, running shorts, running socks, running hat, running underwear (my wife calls it - "the stinking clothes" and I do not blame her ...), to water proof patches to protect places prone to rubbing... To quote one of my running friends - "The most important challenge before a long run is to choose the right underwear!”. There is no doubt - the woman knows what she's talking about. Indeed, a world of colors, scents and shapes and I didn’t even mentioned the running shoes ... Ohhhh .... shoes .... mmmmm .... it is hard to explain. I think there is no one single shoe in Houston (the fourth largest city in the United States) that I didn’t try on. Pure Pleasure.

    Three days ago, a year after I was able to run my first 5 km, I finished the Houston half marathon, 21 km of running. Charming atmosphere, thousands of cheerers around, young runners, young in-their-mind runners, my GPS watch, which I've learned to love so much, Hebrew song called "comes from love"  in my headphones immediately followed by Simon and Garfunkel with "Mrs. Robinson", legs muscles aching, formation of vesicles between the toes of the right foot, tendon pain in my left foot that I already carry with me for a week, I mutter to myself the phrase from “unbroken” I had seen the week before - "You take it, You make it! ", sucking the disgusting / tasty mixture of salts and sugars goo that I have already got used to and continue running while trying to suppress and dismiss the desire to stop, a desire that appeared with the first step I took – to stop. What will happen if I do?! ...

     Just at that moment, my father, who passed away in January thirty-one years ago when I was nine, came to my thoughts with the immortal phrase that ways seems so archaic to me - "There is no cannot, there is only will not…"

    "Well ... So, what do you say,” I replied to him in my mind, "Can you run a half marathon? ... "

    "Me?!" I imagined he would reply, "I prefer to sit here, way up, and smoke my cigarette ... you just keep on running, and do me a favor, stay down there a bit more than I did ..." he said, adding playful wink that was reserved only for me.

    So, I kept on running. Not too fast and not too slow, like in training, reading the signs held by the cheerers "Run Fast, the Nigerians are finishing your beer !!", and all sorts of phrases and jokes that help not to think about the pain. Read and continue to run.

    At the 16th km, I saw them. In their small coats, their eyes looking for me among the runners, and the smile on their face when they saw me - my two children and my wife, with signs mixed Hebrew and English - "Go Daddy Go!!" And at that moment, I realized that a great deal of time, (far too much) and certainly since they were born, I was not proud of something I did as I was proud of myself at that moment.

    Two hours, eight minutes and twenty-three seconds after my first step, I have completed my first half marathon. Sore, tired, panting, sweating and ... proud. Very proud.

    So, it turns out that really, there is no cannot. There is only will not.