Tech can also disconnect us from something else that makes a fun run “fun”: other people and the carnival atmosphere.
Two years ago, as he was running past the starting line at the City2Surf, Todd Liubinskas’ training partner and co-founder of the 440 Run club, Trent Knox, told him to hand over his watch.
Todd Liubinskas (left), and Trent Knox.Credit:edwina pickles
“I had my Garmin on, and he goes ‘give it to me’ and he said ‘just focus on your breathing’,” recalls Liubinskas, who did his first City2Surf as a seven-year-old.
Knox says he could see that his friend, who shot out too fast, was already anxious about achieving his splits.
“I wanted him to get out of his head,” says Knox, who, along with Liubinskas, is leading the Under Armor run team at the race. Without the distraction of his watch from him and chronically checking his pace from him, he relaxed: “You can run a race a hundred different ways and get the same time.”
Liubinskas, whose goal was to run the 14 kilometers in under 70 minutes, did it in 64 minutes and managed to enjoy himself, too.
“There will be people who will keep looking at their watch the whole time, ‘Oh I’ve got to get this, and I’ve got to get that,’ and you miss everything,” says Liubinskas, who hasn’t worn a watch to track his runs since.
With numbers for this year’s City2Surf lower than in previous years, Knox has been asking people why they’re not signing up. They have told him, he says, they would prefer not to run because life, and COVID, have got in the way of training, and they won’t get a PB.
It’s a shame, says Knox. “It doesn’t matter if you’re not at your best; it’s about being together.”
Being together and, after COVID’s many variations as well as a nasty flu season, a celebration of being well.
A colleague of mine had been hoping to train for the event, but illness made a mockery of her plans. She has decided to run – or walk – anyway, and reset her expectations of her.
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“I used to feel frustrated if I wasn’t able to jog up heartbreak hill – if I had to resort to walking,” she says. “But now I’m just so grateful to be well enough to participate at all (as a result of having had COVID) that I’m just happy to jog some and walk however much.”
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