So I got an e-mail on Monday morning...Alan Webb was going to be in town and wanted to go for a run with me. Okay, that's not entirely how it went down, but he was going to be here and we was going running, and folks from the local running community were invited to join him and keep up for as long as they could.
The run was set to begin at 11:45, so my friend and I arrived at about 11:35. At that point, there were only a handful of people milling around, none of whom appeared to be a world-class runner. Unless I was the basis for comparison. In that case, everyone looked like a world-class runner. After standing around for a few minutes making small talk with the other runners and secretly feeling inadequate, we spied a couple chugging up the sidewalk. The broad, boyish grin identified one of them immediately as the reason we were all here. The other turned out to be his wife, Julia. They were just returning from a quick 5-mile run; a warm-up for the pending group run. The poor man is obviously malnourished; despite digging into a paper bag immediately upon his return and consuming a banana, half a Gatorade, then another half banana, he appeared desperately hungry. Additionally, he looked to have some weird subcutaneous parasite working on his calves. Then someone gently pointed out to me that these were most likely veins. Wow.
Someone asked him about his current training schedule. He reported that he was up to about 70 miles. Sweet! Here was my chance to really connect with him. The following conversation ensued:
"That's cool. I'm up to about 60-70 miles myself"
"Really? You're running 60 miles a week?"
"Oh. A week? Oh. Um...you win"
He then went on to describe a typical tempo run as being 8-9 miles at around a 5:00 mile pace. Jesus. That's not normal. And be able to mention that in such an off-handed manner is a sensation I'm reasonably sure I'll never experience.
Thus chastened, I prepared for the run. Just prior to departure, someone asked whether we would be maintaining a 9-minute mile pace. His wife answered, with a slightly bewildered look on her face, "I don't think he has ever run a 9-minute mile in his life." So we set off at a brisk 6:45 pace. I ran up front for the first mile-plus, listening to the banter while attempting to ensure that I would survive the run. Somewhere during the second mile, I backed off a bit to let some other people have their turn at the front. No sense in hogging the spotlight. As time was running short, and we did have jobs to which we needed to return, my co-worker and I decided to cut short our run at 5K and head back. I did stick around for the Q&A with Alan for a little while. He posed for a lot of pictures, shook a lot of hands, talked about tattoos, and basically acted like a decent bloke, which he truly seems to be. Even if he is maddeningly fit and blessed with an extraordinary amount of natural ability. That bastard.
If you're interested in seeing him run, Alan Webb will be back in Des Moines for the Grand Blue Mile on April 26th, along with 2010 champion Boaz Lalang and a host of other elite runners. The race is open to anyone, so if you want to run with them, you can. Well...probably not with them, per se, but in the same race, anyway. Or, you can come watch them run at a ridiculous rate of speed down Grand Ave. For more information, go to www.grandbluemile.com. I understand he may also be at the Drake Relays.
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