tending towards a finish line
I was asked to write a piece for the Camino Ultra, after I ran their 50km Epping Forest race on October 4th in their non-binary category. Thought I would share here too x
I’ll start at the end: with David’s face coming towards me as I sat crumpled but joyous on the other side of a finish line, in a muddy field, with Storm Amy amping up her thoughts. “I want to give you this”, he crouched, handing me a trophy. A standing green placard with a circle and within it the words “Epping Forest CAMINO ULTRA 50km”. Below them: “1stNon-Binary 2025”. I am in disbelief, grinning, moved.
I should clarify that running has never been about placing. I run because distance running has long felt like an essential. A practice I have dedicated myself to for over a decade, showing up 2, 6, 1, 4, sometimes 0, times a week. A practice of showing up for myself, my mental health, the act of putting one foot in front of the other very simply an act of becoming, of being. A decade is a long time, a period of shifts, increasingly creaking knees, choices, mistakes, new beginnings, loss, love in many forms, lines digging a little deeper around the eyes. One of my biggest shifts has been to lean further into my queer identity, and a few years ago coming out as genderqueer: feeling neither male nor female, but somewhere in the expansive possibility of in-between.
Almost six months ago, on the other side of a PhD which had left me burnt out and very much in my head, I was mindlessly scrolling when a post popped up. Camino Ultra were looking to include new members of the running community as part of their upcoming Epping Forest 25 km and 50 km. Tentatively, I messaged explaining how much I appreciated the post and that I would like to put myself forward to participate in their non-binary category. It was, on both sides, a resounding yes and what followed was a phone call with David where I immediately found a kindred spirit and swiftly into a four month training block with him and Paula. Each week I would report back, with questions, explaining the niggles, the joys, photos of a grinning face after many, many 2 hour runs with my dog. It has to date been one of the most joyful training blocks of my life. They were accommodating when I explained that I didn’t train with a watch or an app. Without producing data I lent in to how it all felt. It doesn’t mean I ran fast, but it did mean I ran with more grace for myself, finding that I showed up for the training runs with more ease, tending towards the moments of joy.
As days moved into weeks moved into months, the ultra arrived and with it a readiness. Running, for me, is about self-actualisation. I have often leant on the experiences of running long distance to remind myself that I can show up formyself with consistency and do hard things. I also really believe in the importance and value of this for queer and trans people. In the early kilometres of the race, I was reflecting on this and I kept thinking about the liberatory politics of running. Running is political, gendered, racialised and can be hostile for trans people. It is no small thing that Camino had the category of non-binary, because there often isn’t. What it means is that as a trans person I got to run as my whole being. Taking up space by moving in the world, embodied, to the depth of my lungs and into the core of who I am. Running as an act of becoming: four months and then the start of 50 km; an inflatable pink start line; three check points; hands full of candy; more electrolyte gels than I am willing to admit; highland cows; three almost falls and then one definitely fall; bloodied, grazed knees and hands; conversations with others as we ran around each other; the question, what made you want to do this?; legs burning; the last 10 km a mental game; talking to my dad; the finish line in sight; David and Paula’s arms around me; relief and tears; a medal around the neck; grateful, for this one precious, little life and these big, little moments
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