I'm not going to sugar coat anything here. 2014 was by far my worst year all around in 7 years. The running got off to a solid start and I managed to get into some of the best shape I had been in in 10 yrs or so by April-May. Well, all of that went to hell for pretty much the rest of the season after getting pneumonia just before what was supposed to be my peak spring race in Riga in May. After that, I was pretty much done. I was forced to sit out more key summer races than I can count some of which had damn nice prize purses. I missed Zelenograd for the first time in 9 years and sat out the North Face 30 just to name a few. Forget the New Balance run where I'd also regularly podiumed as well. I had no strength most of the summer and motivation was completely in the toilet because being sick for 3 weeks in May followed by 3 weeks of pleurisy in June had just totally effed up the rest of my season. No, I'm also not of the age to just up and chuck an whole season either. As it is now, I run each season like it's my last. I did not finally feel like I was beginning to get any kind of strength back until well into the fall season, and by then, well, the year was up.
I turned 40 in December- another sucktastic event. As I mentioned in my previous post, I want to reiterate that I have no plans to focus solely on masters running. It's just another category I've been relegated to for now. I will only continue to race and compete as long as I can still put down solid podium type performances and be competitive in the open division. Once things begin to go south performance wise because of age, I'm retiring not from running but from racing. Masters would be a good thing for me had I started later and were still progressing at all distances. When it gets to a point where the goal would be not to run this year worse than the previous one, well, no, that's the kind of mentality I don't need and psychological demoralization to which my response is just "no thanks". I don't know how much time is left on my biological running clock, maybe a year, maybe 5, 10, I don't know. I am just running each season as if it were my last. I do very much understand what Irina Privalova said about masters running being great for those who didn't achieve much when they were younger (or started late). She retired at 40 and declined to go after masters records in the 100 and 200.
I'm just hoping that 2015 will be better than 2014 which was just a sucktastic year all around. The visa mess in March was a huge financial strain. Ending my season in May before I barely got started was a nightmare.It's been extremely hard to get motivated again after losing a season.It's now led me to the deeper questioning of whether I want to bust my ass on a long training cycle prepping for a peak race again this year only to have some kind of shit hit the fan at the last minute thus making everything I did a complete waste of time and hard work. I am supposed to be focusing on 100k Worlds and Euros in September this year, but now that spectre looms over me as to what it the same damn thing happens again? I run a 4-5 month hard training cycle preparing only to watch it go to hell days before the race.
I've also been struggling with some pretty serious depression since August. It runs in the family and I have had to slay this dragon more than once over the years. I can't remember it being this bad since a bad patch in my mid 20s. It started mildly in the summer after the illness but the final straw had to be the Anchorage debacle. I finally had the opportunity to go back to the school system. I have been trying to go back since 2009.It was only going to be a .6FTE the first year, and the salary not great, but being high enough up on the salary schedule, I was ready to suck it up for a year knowing the position would likely grow. Wellll, had I known that as of September, anyone under .75 was not getting health insurance , I never would have applied. After researching the possibility of going Obamacare for a year, I quickly understood that was not the answer. Coverage sucked and the out of pocket annual premium was insane. I otherwise would have moved on a few days' notice for this job. I had planned to just take gear I needed til winter break and come back for more. I would have just paid the rent in advance like I do now and kept my flat since I'd probably have done as I did before and live here May-September + winter break and write it off as professional development since I'd be teaching Russian again in the US. Well that all fell through and I truly just stopped giving a damn about much else after that. Numbness and indifference really set in. I am truly tired of trying to better myself and my life to absolutely no avail over the past few years. The final blow came in December when the ruble just went literally deeper than the 9th circle of hell. Translation- I like many, ended up effectively with a 50%paycut. I was already underemployed when I got back from the US in November, but under the old exchange rates, I would have been ok because the days I was working were busy and full with clients. I've tried to no avail to fill openings I've had on two days since then. Usually, I fill any openings during busy season inside a week or two as I have lots of requests for lessons. So, I've started sending my CV out to possibilities in the Baltics and I'm working on researching Stockholm and putting out feelers at a few international schools there.Nothing is moving now though. I am not motivated at all to bust my ass for half my usual salary and it sure as hell won't pay the bills. Going back to somewhere outside Alaska in the USA is not an option. I'm not going to scrub toilets with a toothbrush or take other demeaning work just for the sake of living in the USA. The market there is a joke and I'd likely be like some of those PhD's working at the coffee shop. Forget it.
The huge devaluation here is due largely to low oil prices,but also to the US sanctions. The problem is that when politicians have their pissing matches and start throwing sanctions at each other they don't screw the higher ups they intend to screw,they screw the ordinary people that have nothing to do with politics. I hate politics, hate discussing it, and always have, but I have to question the logic in throwing economic sanctions at Russia. Trying to create political, social, and economic unrest in Russia is just ignorant and not good for global security. However, no one ever said the Republicans in the House and Senate that just gave Obama a green light for more sanctions had any kind of head on their shoulders much less brains! I never voted Republican in my life and never supported their right wing rhetoric. Screwing ordinary people living and working in Russia for political gains is not going to accomplish anything but anger and resentment already being seen in the mass media aimed at the US over the sanctions. Do we really need another generation to grow up knowing nothing but Cold War? Whatever happened to learning not to repeat the mistakes of the past?! It's just a really shitty situation.
So as for 2015- running wise. I will focus on100k Worlds and Euros in September. I had considered trying another go at Riga in May, but thanks to the shitty sanctions and skyrocketing prices, I can't even afford the plane ticket now despite having a place to stay once I get there. So, that's backburnered until further notice unless some kind of miracle with a contract as a governess or smthg comes through in hard currency much like I had until 2008. I would also like to do our North Face 60k, but the date has not been announced. Daugavpils is in late June too, but again, the cost of getting there is no longer inexpensive. I also really wanted to do Cesis Eco Trail 80 (near Valmiera), but it may be too close to the 100k for one this yr and, yes, there is the issue of no travel funds to get anywhere now. So, I will strategically race locally for now. I will not reveal my plans until I show up on a start list last minute. Sure, I will know them myself in advance, but I will be sly as a fox until the end.This is all about strategy and not letting my competition know my intentions. For now, I'm doing some indoor races here and there to try and get my speed back up while keeping a decent mileage base. Running seems to be the only thing that helps stave off the worst of the depression. It also gets me out of the house for something other than work.
Here are the few decent moments in 2014:
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And when things get really dismal, at least I have these cute sweethearts to cheer me up. Scrapper and his cute little brother Spikey-
I turned 40 in December- another sucktastic event. As I mentioned in my previous post, I want to reiterate that I have no plans to focus solely on masters running. It's just another category I've been relegated to for now. I will only continue to race and compete as long as I can still put down solid podium type performances and be competitive in the open division. Once things begin to go south performance wise because of age, I'm retiring not from running but from racing. Masters would be a good thing for me had I started later and were still progressing at all distances. When it gets to a point where the goal would be not to run this year worse than the previous one, well, no, that's the kind of mentality I don't need and psychological demoralization to which my response is just "no thanks". I don't know how much time is left on my biological running clock, maybe a year, maybe 5, 10, I don't know. I am just running each season as if it were my last. I do very much understand what Irina Privalova said about masters running being great for those who didn't achieve much when they were younger (or started late). She retired at 40 and declined to go after masters records in the 100 and 200.
I'm just hoping that 2015 will be better than 2014 which was just a sucktastic year all around. The visa mess in March was a huge financial strain. Ending my season in May before I barely got started was a nightmare.It's been extremely hard to get motivated again after losing a season.It's now led me to the deeper questioning of whether I want to bust my ass on a long training cycle prepping for a peak race again this year only to have some kind of shit hit the fan at the last minute thus making everything I did a complete waste of time and hard work. I am supposed to be focusing on 100k Worlds and Euros in September this year, but now that spectre looms over me as to what it the same damn thing happens again? I run a 4-5 month hard training cycle preparing only to watch it go to hell days before the race.
I've also been struggling with some pretty serious depression since August. It runs in the family and I have had to slay this dragon more than once over the years. I can't remember it being this bad since a bad patch in my mid 20s. It started mildly in the summer after the illness but the final straw had to be the Anchorage debacle. I finally had the opportunity to go back to the school system. I have been trying to go back since 2009.It was only going to be a .6FTE the first year, and the salary not great, but being high enough up on the salary schedule, I was ready to suck it up for a year knowing the position would likely grow. Wellll, had I known that as of September, anyone under .75 was not getting health insurance , I never would have applied. After researching the possibility of going Obamacare for a year, I quickly understood that was not the answer. Coverage sucked and the out of pocket annual premium was insane. I otherwise would have moved on a few days' notice for this job. I had planned to just take gear I needed til winter break and come back for more. I would have just paid the rent in advance like I do now and kept my flat since I'd probably have done as I did before and live here May-September + winter break and write it off as professional development since I'd be teaching Russian again in the US. Well that all fell through and I truly just stopped giving a damn about much else after that. Numbness and indifference really set in. I am truly tired of trying to better myself and my life to absolutely no avail over the past few years. The final blow came in December when the ruble just went literally deeper than the 9th circle of hell. Translation- I like many, ended up effectively with a 50%paycut. I was already underemployed when I got back from the US in November, but under the old exchange rates, I would have been ok because the days I was working were busy and full with clients. I've tried to no avail to fill openings I've had on two days since then. Usually, I fill any openings during busy season inside a week or two as I have lots of requests for lessons. So, I've started sending my CV out to possibilities in the Baltics and I'm working on researching Stockholm and putting out feelers at a few international schools there.Nothing is moving now though. I am not motivated at all to bust my ass for half my usual salary and it sure as hell won't pay the bills. Going back to somewhere outside Alaska in the USA is not an option. I'm not going to scrub toilets with a toothbrush or take other demeaning work just for the sake of living in the USA. The market there is a joke and I'd likely be like some of those PhD's working at the coffee shop. Forget it.
The huge devaluation here is due largely to low oil prices,but also to the US sanctions. The problem is that when politicians have their pissing matches and start throwing sanctions at each other they don't screw the higher ups they intend to screw,they screw the ordinary people that have nothing to do with politics. I hate politics, hate discussing it, and always have, but I have to question the logic in throwing economic sanctions at Russia. Trying to create political, social, and economic unrest in Russia is just ignorant and not good for global security. However, no one ever said the Republicans in the House and Senate that just gave Obama a green light for more sanctions had any kind of head on their shoulders much less brains! I never voted Republican in my life and never supported their right wing rhetoric. Screwing ordinary people living and working in Russia for political gains is not going to accomplish anything but anger and resentment already being seen in the mass media aimed at the US over the sanctions. Do we really need another generation to grow up knowing nothing but Cold War? Whatever happened to learning not to repeat the mistakes of the past?! It's just a really shitty situation.
So as for 2015- running wise. I will focus on100k Worlds and Euros in September. I had considered trying another go at Riga in May, but thanks to the shitty sanctions and skyrocketing prices, I can't even afford the plane ticket now despite having a place to stay once I get there. So, that's backburnered until further notice unless some kind of miracle with a contract as a governess or smthg comes through in hard currency much like I had until 2008. I would also like to do our North Face 60k, but the date has not been announced. Daugavpils is in late June too, but again, the cost of getting there is no longer inexpensive. I also really wanted to do Cesis Eco Trail 80 (near Valmiera), but it may be too close to the 100k for one this yr and, yes, there is the issue of no travel funds to get anywhere now. So, I will strategically race locally for now. I will not reveal my plans until I show up on a start list last minute. Sure, I will know them myself in advance, but I will be sly as a fox until the end.This is all about strategy and not letting my competition know my intentions. For now, I'm doing some indoor races here and there to try and get my speed back up while keeping a decent mileage base. Running seems to be the only thing that helps stave off the worst of the depression. It also gets me out of the house for something other than work.
Here are the few decent moments in 2014:
Scrapper preening Spikey
Scrapper in front Spikey behind
