I'm a Runner - Chapter Five

Woohoo! My first race!

A friend asked me two days ago how come I am running. She said she wants to run. She does aerobics, but when she trys to run it just feels awful. Now thinking about that, I'd have to say that running just isn't for everyone. But certainly regular exercise is!

But that question made me think. Why am I doing this? Running, I mean. Keeping fit is certainly part of it. And then there is belonging to a strange group of people called runners. The ones I used to pity as I drove by and about whom I said, "I'm sure glad that's not me!" But then I went to my first mini-marathon to watch Laurie run. For me, definitely the race event was what triggered running and is what gives me inspiration to stretch for something more today. Faster, longer, stronger.

So, back to my first 5K race ever as a runner. My heart rate was 118 at the starting line. What an adrenaline rush! Off we went. Past the cheering crowds, over the bridge, past the Zoo, there's the one mile marker! Isn't it funny to run a 5K and count the miles? Past the first bands and the guy preaching salvation. Hang a right at one mile and note that people are passing me at a more steady rate now. Up the first hill. OK, it's not really a hill, but it is SLIGHTLY uphill, and that counts. Then a truly humbling moment.

At about 1.5 miles you turn right and onto a bridge where the half-marathon and 5K runners run along the same course separated by a ribbon line. This is when the front of the pack of half-marathoners are hitting the last 3/4 mile stretch. And suddenly I am running alongside top athletes. Well, that's technically true, although duration of our side by side running is about .634 seconds. I am amazed at their speed and admire them from a rapidly increasing distance. With that dose of reality I turn my attention to the second half of my race and the fact that my legs are starting to tell my brain that they aren't sure they want to go any further.

This is when the five year olds start passing me. And I haven't figured this one out yet, because I crossed the start line about a minute after the gun sounded, but this is also the point that I pass the guy on crutches. Seriously. I pray that he jumped into the race partway, because if it took me a mile and a half to catch a guy on crutches with a one minute lead...

Are you getting a picture here? After two miles a PR is out the window in my thinking, even though if it is your first race, you have a fairly good chance of making that goal. No, I'm thinking finish, finish, finish. I've never had my legs just lock up and quit before, but the possibility occurs to me. Truly I was nuts to try this! I grab a water cup and almost choke to death as I breathe instead of swallow. My first water station!

But the the guys and gals standing along the route start shouting encouragement. And I begin to think I'm gonna make it. And then it's the final quarter mile of the 5K race (again, the miles/kilometers thing) and I actually pick up the pace. The final 100 yards is the same finish as the half-marathon course and the crowd is cheering us on. Now despair turns to euphoria! I am out of breath, but that doesn't matter at all. I give up the timing chip, collect my medal, and chug down a water bottle. I collect the chips, cookies, banana, gatorade, apple, etc and join the other finishers exiting the course.

Laurie was still running the half-marathon, so I hurried to the finish line to cheer her on. Here's where something funny happened. I'm standing at the 1/4 mile to go mark and cheering. Suddenly in my periferal vision I notice a TV camera. Then I'm tapped on the shoulder and the reporter starts asking me questions. That evening on the news I'm in the report! The introduction to my interview is. "Tim Rickel had finished the race and was cheering runners on while waiting for his wife to finish." I found that a hilarious introduction in light of the fact that after running 10 miles my wife ran her final 5K of the race eight minutes faster than I ran my 5K! But the TV said I was waiting for her to finish too. I played that line over and over. :)

When I downloaded the results from the race I noticed that another runner had my exact finish time. It was a lady.

35093 Tim Rickel 35:27 11:26

16644 Laura Mowery 35:27 11:26


So I looked up her information. She was 99 years old! Now I had a goal. Train and train so that next year I could leave her in the dust! My time was better than hers the next year. But somehow, when you beat a 100 year old by a couple of minutes in a 5K, it seems like bragging rights go to the 100 year young person. Way to go Laura!

Are you getting the picture that you too could do this?

I think the great lie that the enemy of our souls has sold us is that somehow it is only special people who can accomplish great missional things for God are missionaries. It gives us a nice out. We "drive" by them and think, "I could never do that." When the truth is God has given us all unique abilities that He wants to see us use for him. We who have put our faith in Jesus are all to be missionaries in life. Ever see someone come back from a short-term mission trip? They love to talk about all that they did and saw and how the people responded. I'm convinced that is the type of enthusiasm God had in mind for his church most of the time. But somehow we seem to miss it more than enjoy it.

I'd love to hear your thinking on that in a comment...

We Interrupt This Blog Series...

OK, Old people, listen up.

That was the theme of the conference I was just in. Not the official theme. But definitely the theme that came through to me. I found it amazingly ironic to be in a room of mission executives where I felt like a new kid on the block and listen to 20 something leaders tell the oldsters that they’ve missed it. In fact, they expressed that missions is like an impenetrable wall. They’d love to learn from our experience, but we don’t seem to care. Our message? “Fill out this form and we’ll get back to you in a few weeks. Oh, and by the way, NO, we aren’t interested in a creative approach.”

It was also interesting to hear the response from the leadership in the room. My favorite question had to be one posed to a church leader of an emerging church that has started 14 churches in a closed country in three years by itself because the agency it has a relationship with told it that was impossible and to forget it. The question posed was, “SO, what if all churches did what you have done? Wouldn’t there be incredible duplication of efforts?” The implied answer was that God created agencies to avoid that problem. :) On Yahoo there is an emoticon for LOL that would work better here.

Actually, I found myself crying as I watched a video clip of young people at Urbana telling the camera what they would tell agency executives if they had the chance. The theme was, “We’re out here. We have passion. We want to change the world!”

What made me cry was the thought that I started into missions with a passion to reach lost people with the message of Christ. I specialized in bridging cultural gaps as a missionary to connect with people and be able to share what I know with them. Now, as an agency leader, I hear voices telling us we have missed connecting with a whole generation right here at home. In their voices I heard a longing for a connection.

At the Mission Exchange annual business meeting the chairman of the board did a skit with people from the audience. Of course there were no young leaders present. This was a business meeting for members. He asked for anyone under 35 to represent Paul and Barnabas and Titus. Then anyone under 40. Then anyone under 45. Finally he took people under 50 to speak for those young leaders. He got three older men to be Apostles and elders. He read the story of Paul coming to Jerusalem to answer questions about his work and then with no preparation asked these mission leaders to act out these parts and interviewed them about the upcoming meeting. I was sitting there trying to figure out the point of this when it dawned on me. OH, this is to show that what we have heard here is nothing new. New leaders have been stretching old leaders from the beginning of the church, so we really shouldn’t get too worried about what we have heard. We were young once too. They’ll come around and it’ll be OK.

Maybe they’re right...

Now back to our regularly scheduled blogging.

Oh, and BRAVO to the leadership of The Mission Exchange for bringing young and old together for that dialog. That deserves a link. http://www.efmamissions.org

I'm a Runner - Chapter Four

If at First You Don't Succeed

Fast forward one year and we are back from our second mini-marathon with fresh aspirations of becoming a runner. It happened again. The crowd of 30,000 plus runners, the excitement, seeing people running and thinking, "Man, if he can do it..."

This time I knew enough to know that I would need some help and inspiration. So I took out a subscription to "Runner's World" and began to read about running. Their suggestion for people like me was to start by running for a minute and walking for a minute. Or two. Or three. You know, whatever you can handle. And maybe start with city block and work your way towards a half a mile goal. We live in the country and one constant is telephone poles. So I decided to run past one pole and walk past two and work my way up. Now, the photo above is not me. Maybe when I drop 30 pounds. It is a screen saver that I used to inspire myself as I started running. Note the long empty road ahead...

So I took the advice that I read, along with coaching from Laurie, and increased the running to walk ratio until I ran my first half-mile, my first mile and finally my first 5K distance. For me that took several months. But what a tremendous sense of accomplishment each time I ran a little bit further! I didn't worry about speed so much. OK, honestly when December hit I decided that while running was fine and dandy, the wind in the country wasn't. So I took a hiatus until the end of January and began working to be ready for the May 4 race. I was up to the 5K distance by mid April, so I felt pretty sure I could at least finish without walking! This would be my first organized sporting event ever with real live spectators who weren't all directly related to the participants.

We got a hotel in Indy the evening before the race, picked up our packets and tried to get to sleep that night. Early the next morning in the hotel lobby, where I had gone for my free breakfast, I met another runner. He asked me which corral I was in and I said I was running the 5K. "Oh," he snorted, "That's not even running!"

Well, now, I hadn't put in all those miles to let that get me down. And really, that's how it goes, whether it is running or any other worthy thing, somebody is likely to say something, well, insensitive.

Funny things that happened. We got down to the staging area early and were standing in line for the Porto-potty when the PA announcer said, "Runners, remember to attach your timing chip to your shoe with the plastic tie that was in your packet." I looked down and NO TIMING CHIP! I had left it in the hotel. Since the 5K start followed the half-marathon start, I had just enough time to run back to the car, drive to the hotel, pick up the chip, drive back to a much farther away spot, and run back to the start line. I figure all that running was about 5K!

I'll share how I did in my next post. But here are a few lessons learned in the year prior to my first 5K.

• It really helps to have a coach when you are trying something new and challenging. Somebody who has done it before to provide knowledge and inspiration. For me that was the magazine and my wife, not in that order!
  
  
• There's just a lot of slogging involved in any worthwhile goal, but it is worth it.



• Don't listen to the naysayers.



• Start with what you can do and move on from there.

Whether it is running or becoming more active in missions, those things hold true. (I told you I was going to relate this to my passion for missions) I think in the church we sometimes set the goal so high that people just don't try. They see the missionary as someone they could never be. But I believe God calls every believer to be a "missionary." That is, one who is on a mission. I think we have a hard time finding coaches to show us how to do that, and I think we are not short on naysayers. But if we start simple and work our way up, the slogging that is involved at times is worth it, especially when we see the results!

I'm a Runner - Chapter Three

Reality Check

Well, my conviction lasted a full week. That was how much time Laurie took off from running following the race. After her recovery time following the half-marathon had passed we went for a run together.

Now, when you listen to the stories of marathon runners you might hear them talking about hitting the wall. I'm not sure what that's all about, but around the one tenth mile mark I started panting. By one and a half tenths of a mile (hey, it's the truth!) I said, "I gotta stop." Suddenly all the reasons why I had sworn I would never run again in my life came rushing back to me in a moment of clarity. It was one of those "what was I thinking?" moments.

Now, I've never been immediately identified as a runner by people in the street. If you look at the photo of me at my daughter's cross-country meet, you'll figure out why. So all I had to do after my stab at running was look in the mirror and the truth was evident. I didn't look like that guy on the cover of the running magazine. So what was I thinking?

This is where it gets interesting. I've wanted to write about my running experience before this, but never found the appropriate forum. I've wanted to write about it because my move from non-runner to runner was a major shift in my life for the good. I find tremendous satisfaction doing something that isn't easy, but that brings great fulfillment on a number of levels. At the same time, all my adult life I've been involved in missions, first as a missionary in Honduras and now working out of Indiana. Missions is also something that is not easy but that brings great satisfaction on multiple levels and has real significance on a grand scale.

I'm going to give away my central reason for starting this "I'm a Runner" series of posts. Here it is. I've begun to see some real parallels between how I became a runner and how I might convince others to share in this passion of mine for missions. I hope to stimulate some dialog while sharing my story, so don't be shy about posting a comment or two.

OK, back to our story. It only took one week to see my running ambitions shattered. So how did I come to write this story about being a runner? Well, it has a lot to do with the fact that when I stopped, my wife kept running. More on that next time.

I'm a Runner - Chapter Two

A Moment of Glory

So how did I go from a childhood of negative running experiences to a guy who ran 3.3 miles last evening after a busy day at work just for the fun of it? I mean, if you think about it, they use running for punishment in school. "OK, everybody, just for that, take a lap!"

It happened in a moment of glory. Well, that's maybe a bit of an exaggeration, but my entry into the ranks of "runner" does point back to a singular event that took place in May of 2003.

It was 6:30 a.m. and Laurie and I and our daughter were driving through downtown Indianapolis looking for a parking spot somewhat close to the starting line of the 500 Festival Mini-marathon. This was to be Laurie's first race in twenty years, almost to the day,when she ran a full marathon in Cleveland, Ohio.



We drove through the downtown area, filled with runners dressed in T-shirts of every imagineable color and design, running shorts and shoes, and of course, a race bib with their number on it. It was a crisp morning and there was electricity in the air. There was a sense of something about to happen. Anticipation. Streets were blocked off. Someone was on a PA welcoming runners to the 28th running of the Indianapolis 500 Festival Mini-Marathon. There were news helicopters hovering overhead, for crying out loud. Our daughter leaned over the seat and said, "You know mom, I'm kinda proud of you!"


This was a new world to me. I've never been mistaken for an athlete. But there was such energy in the air as 30,000 plus runners came together for a half-marathon and a 5K race that by the end of the day both our daughter and I had determined that we were going to run next year in the 5K race. We had a whole new take on running. It wasn't just something hard that Laurie did all the time any more. As I looked around I saw every age and body type pounding out the miles in a display of athletic exuberance. I wanted to be part of that! This was something that I could do too!

So this then was the beginning of something new for me. Besides being fun to write about, and hopefully to read about as well, the story of my becoming a runner also has a direct connection to my passion for missions. Missions is viewed by many as that odd thing that some Christians do that has little to do with their life. But just like me and running, I think that everyone can find excitement and fulfillment in getting active in missions. But just like discovering running was for me, what I have to say about missions is probably way different than what you might expect, or at least what you've heard in the past.

I'm Tim Rickel and I'm a Runner

That's how I introduced myself in chapel at WGM last Tuesday. I took that phrase from a feature in each "Runner's World" issue that comes to our house which features different celebrities or corporate personalities and their story about running.

I've been thinking about my running and how it applies to what we are doing at WGM. So, I am going to dedicate several posts to talking about this facet of my life. In case you don't believe I'm a runner, I present the following picture as evidence. It is my bib number from this year's 500 Festival 5K run in Indianapolis. And a copy of "Runner's World" which I will refer to in my story of how I became a runner.

Chapter One - My running history

Running didn't come naturally to me. My earliest memory of running comes from age five when I ran into my neighbor's barn and my head connected with a piece of farm equipment that was right at eye level. After I came to I realized you can get hurt running.

Then in third grade we had a race in the gym at recess. I beat everyone sprinting, even the fastest girl. It was a short-lived moment of glory. When we picked teams for kickball I was still one of the last ones chosen! Athletics were never my strong point. Especially after I got glasses in fifth grade!

In high school my good friend, Terry, convinced me to run with him at 7 a.m. in order to get in better shape. We both lived within a few blocks of the high school track. Well, that lasted about a week. As we pounded around the track; me trying to keep stride with his longer legs, I decided I could be still sleeping rather than feeling out of breath this early in the morning.

My next run in with running, (pardon the pun), was in college gym class when we had to run an 11 minute mile to get a passing grade. As I ran the final two tenths of a mile, feeling completely like I was going to die, I decided I would never again voluntarily run unless it involved lots of money or really good food. And I held to that until 2003. But that's for the next post.

My sisters Beth and Becky and me in college