Broad Street One - Shamus Keough

Broad Street One

It was the morning of May 3rd, 2015 I had just woken up around 4 am. I was waking up a lot earlier than I normally would, and was feeling very tired because of it. The morning was cold, so I decided to dress in an undershirt, and then my blue Students Run Philly Style shirt on top because I had to represent my running team. Besides that, my outfit consisted of running shorts, a normal pair of socks, and my running shoes, all of which had become normal wear for me when ever I had a run. After getting dressed, I proceed to go to the kitchen, where I tried to eat breakfast, but I was feeling so worried and anxious, that I couldn’t eat anything. Anything that I did eat, I vomited. You may ask, why were you so worried that morning. I was feeling worried because that day happened to be the first time I was going to run the Broad Street 10 Miler
Let's back this up a little bit though to the night before, where the story starts. It was my eighth grade year, and my first year trying students run. I had figured, "It's my last year here, why not try a sport?” I decided to join Students Run Philly Style, an organization that helped kids participate in distance running for free. I was enjoying the season all the way up to the Broad Street run. Although I was one of the slowest runners on our team, I really enjoyed being on the team.

Our season leading up to Broad Street was comprised of running distances that were getting longer and longer until we could run ten miles. Everyone on my team and me had been putting in so much effort, training 3 or 4 days a week, and always trying our hardests at those practices. By the time we were getting close to Broad Street, we had already gotten to ten miles, and I felt okay with running distances that long. I was still feeling worried though, and I wasn't sure why. All these feelings had followed me to the night before the run, when our team was having a celebration dinner. All the coaches, parents, and kids were bringing food to eat, and celebrating what we had accomplished. We had been eating and talking, and it was all really fun, but through the whole thing I was still feeling worried about the run the next day in the back of my head. People were talking about the race tomorrow and lots of the things they were talking about made me excited or happy, like when my coaches were talking about what it felt like when you crossed the finish line. At the same time, I kept thinking about things that worried me when they brought up certain situations that could happen. Like when they brought up finishing the race, my mind started thinking about having to do the whole race, and the physical struggle of doing it. I was also thinking about doing the race and how hard it would be all night as I tried to fall asleep, and all the way till I woke up. At the same time, I couldn’t stop thinking of how much time and effort I had put into this, and how I had to finish the race.

The morning of the race, I was extremely worried, so worried to the point that my arms and legs were shaking, and couldn’t stop until we started running in the race. I had been getting myself so worried about the race from all the things I had been hearing from people. I had been getting myself so worried about how all these new experiences would go, and what would happen. While I was getting ready and everything, I just kept trying to calm myself down, and think of good things that would happen. I kept trying to think to myself, “You’re going to do great. You can do this,” or anything to keep positive thoughts in my head. When we got to the starting line, and I was waiting with all of my team, I was still just as, if not even more worried. Eventually, the time had come to get into the crowd of people all waiting at the starting line, which took about an hour

It felt like it would never come, but we finally started the race, and I began to feel significantly better once we began the race. Around the start of the race, I was having a bit of a hard time, but still trying to focus on keeping myself running. I was running with one of my friends and coaches, and it was really helping to talk with them while running, and trying to keep my mind off of all the things I was getting myself worried about. My stomach had been feeling extremely nauseous before the start of the race, but after we began and I started trying to focus on running and forget what I was thinking about, it started to go away. The more I tried to think about the happy thoughts like finishing the race, the less I started to think about the bad thoughts like if I didn’t finish the race, or if something else bad happened. I started feeling a lot better, and I was getting less worried as we got farther through the race.

As we were getting farther into the race, I was having a hard time running.  I was to distracted from being tired, but I was feeling happy about how I was doing so far, and that I was still going. It also really helped me feel better when at different points I saw friends and family on the sidelines cheering me on. It made me feel confident in myself, and I thought to myself that I should try my hardest to make them proud. At the beginning of the race, I was worrying if I would finish or not, but at the point I was at, I was starting to feel confident in myself that I would be able to finish. Me my friend and my coach kept going, and it was feeling like it was taking forever. Eventually though, I finished the race, and was feeling a lot happier. I was really tired and exhausted, but very proud of what I had accomplished. I sprinted across the finish line like my life depended on it, and was overjoyed once I crossed the line. I slowed down to a walk, and continued to go at that pace, smiling, and heading towards the tent where I got my medal. I walked through the crowds, got my medal, got the free water and snacks they were giving out, and then met up with the rest of my team. We all were congratulating each other on finishing, and how great we did. Later on my mom also found where me and my team were, and was telling me how proud of me she was, and it all made me feel happy with what I had accomplished.

After finishing, I thought back about how worried I had been at the beginning, and how unnecessary all of it was. When I was younger, I got worried before lots of big events that I participated in, and this was one of the biggest events I had participated in ever . There were so many events that I had tried in the race that was brand new to me. Like the fact that it was the first race longer than 9 miles that I had ever tried, or that it was only less than a year since I had started trying running and I was already trying the Broad Street Run. After seeing how I had reacted the morning of the race to all the worries I had, I felt pretty safe saying that I wasn’t the best person when dealing with change, especially large events like trying Broad Street the first time. I still felt pretty happy to say that I was able to finish the race, and all of my friends and family were all very proud of me. I was feeling very happy that I had made the decision to join Students Run at the beginning of the year, and even though it was very hard and I had a very difficult time dealing with my emotions, I wouldn’t want to experience it any other way.