Sometimes being a runner means there's something really wrong with you.

At least, that's what I decided on New Year's Day as my brothers and I were "warming up" for our race. The term warming up implies that it is actually possible to get warm. Let's just say I found that difficult.

Now, I've been gone from Chicago for a good long while. I miss the snow sometimes, but I never ever miss the biting wind. I know, intellectually, that 29 degrees and sunny is very nice weather for a race on January 1 in Chicago. I know this. Heck, I run in 29 degree weather here in North Carolina from time to time. What I don't do is run into the teeth of what Wunderground says were gusts between 9 and 25 m.p.h.

Clearly, something is wrong with me.

In spite of my joking attempts to get my older brother to drink more at his New Year's party, the truth is that even on his worst day I can't keep up with his pace. Nor, for that matter, can I give my younger brother a run for his money. In the spirit of family togetherness, we all decided to run at my pace. I guess I would have liked to decide to run at their pace, but if I had that kind of power I think I would decide to win a million dollars in the lottery, first.

The mistake I made was to tell my I-keep-pace-like-a-metronome brother the pace at which I wanted to run this race. So he "helpfully" ran the race at pretty much exactly that pace. This meant that I spent the entire race about two feet behind my brothers, trying to catch up. I feel like I know what greyhounds feel like on the track, trying to catch that damn rabbit. Maybe those PETA people are right. That is cruel.

All of this wouldn't have been so bad if I had only applied earlier lessons to this race. I've got a Garmin Forerunner, and this device has an evil little stick figure.  You can set this stick figure to run at any pace you like. Then when you start running, you can glance down at your Garmin and see whether you're being humiliated by a little stick figure or not.

I actually figured this out.  What you do is you tell the little stick figure to run slower than you.  Then you get the sense of accomplishment when you beat him.  This is a much better strategy than telling the stick figure your overoptimistic expected pace.  
 
Clearly, I should have used this strategy on Brother Metronome.  Then I would have looked like I was tough, running faster than expected in the face of the cold and windy weather.  

I did have a really nice time, and I was glad my brothers decided to run with me. One of the best parts is that I got to run my first race of the year in my new x-mas present!  My sister-in-law, JoyMama, not only got me a great new running hat.  She also embroidered it with RatM, which is the nickname I've got over there because Running at the Mouth is just too darn long.  I made it my profile pic, too.  Isn't it awesome? :)