Running a 20K in The Philippines

As many of you know, I like to run, at least when the weather is nice. Over the past few years I've run at least two half marathons a year, with a couple of 5Ks thrown in for good measure. While traveling though, I haven't really been running. Sure, we did some great hiking in New Zealand, and we walked a lot in Sydney, but that's not the same as running four to five miles a few days a week. So, why on earth did I get up at 3:00 am to run a 20K race in Santa Rosa, The Philippines? Well, the Logans had an extra registration, and I figured it might be cool to say I ran such a race in The Philippines. Here's a quick recap of the experience.

We were out the door at 3:30 am, because most of the races in The Philippines are run at night or in the early hours of the morning, because otherwise it's too hot. As we stood in the dark waiting for the 4:00 start, I kind of grinned as I looked around an realized I was, by far, the tallest person in the starting area.

I should say that I was running alongside our new friend Craig Logan and his son Justin. Craig and his wife Michelle have been missionaries in The Philippines for 26 years. Their son, Justin, has special needs and is unable to walk, so Craig pushes him in his racing stroller. They've run various distances, including a few marathons, and they are fairly well known in the running community in and around Manila. Throughout the race, we heard people greeting Craig and Justin and cheering them on. It was like running with celebrities.

As we took off into the night I was kind of wishing I had brought a headlamp, not so much to see, but to be seen, especially when we began coming up on runners who had already made one of the out and back turns on the course. As we ran, Craig and I chatted a bit about ministry and other churchy stuff, while also enjoying the sounds of the runners feet pounding the pavement around us.

Around the 8K mark, a young man named Ken ran up alongside us and greeted Craig and Justin by name, asking where his wife was today. He said he had seen them at another race and read about them online and was inspired by their story. Craig explained that I was Michelle for the day and that she would be at the end to greet us. We got to talking and he asked if he could pace with us.

At the 11K mark, the course took an unexpected turn up a pretty steep hill with a gravel road. Ken joined me and Craig in taking turns pushing Justin up the hill, and after a bit, we all decided it was a nice hill to walk up. As we climbed the hill, light began to creep into the sky as the sun awoke from its slumber. By the time we reached the top, a dark starry night had transitioned into a hazy morning, with the moon still keeping watch over our run. At the turn, we ate a couple of little bananas and decided the hill was steep enough to walk most of the way down as well. When we got to the bottom, we had 5K left to go, and I was beginning to feel the results of no training and an entire race run on concrete.

Craig and Justin blazed off while Ken and I took our time. As you might imagine, I'm chatty, even when I run, but Ken was equally glad to talk as we went. We made sure to high step and run by the photographers, and ran it in for the last K, but otherwise, we did plenty of walking. Ken hadn't trained either, which is apparently fairly common here. I'd say it was providential that we had each other to get through the race. God is good! All the time! Even when you don't train for a race and need some help to finish.