It finally hit home that we're all freaks

Rogue has this elite group of runners now. They are all very fast, and the types that will compete for a spot in the Olympics of 2012, if all goes as planned for them. I was talking to one of them this morning after my run, and that conversation sparked this whole thought process in my head where i kind of got a taste of reality and it freaked me out. (quick rewind: The day prior, I also saw him and answered the question of how far we ran and said my normal: "Oh, just 10." because it's exactly that... our normal easy 10 miler. But after my answer, even this elite runner ( I think he runs the 1500meters) smirked and replied: "just" 10?)

He's new to town and was asking what Team Rogue does in terms of mileage, training etc. I told him I usually try and run 10 miles as a minimum, then no less than 20miles on Saturday; but as I'm training for an Ultra...

-AND BAM! this is where it hit me. I'm actually training for and Ultra Marathon. (I've never really felt like a 50km is an Ultra. I mean, what so ultra about 8kms more than a regular marathon?) To be honest, it(62miles) feels kind of whimpy, considering two training buddies of which one is a close friend, just finished a 100mile race. I mean, not too long ago, I had no idea how the heck i was going to accomplish 100km, but now, these 62 miles just fall flat on their face in the fear category. I don't at all feel competitive, like I have to "one up" my buddies, but somehow, now when someone asks about the 100km, I tend to say it as. "Yeah, I'm training for 100km", which in my mind feels like, "yeah, whatever, it's just 12 hours of running". BUT to them, it's probably ridiculous sounding.
So anyway, this is hard to explain, and feeling impatient about editing this to make it sound good and flow well, i'm leaving it as is. But that's the general jist of the mental freakout I had-

I continued my answer to him.. "...it's a 100km in January, so most of my weekends are a minimum of 3-4 hours, with several 6_ hours or 30+ miles runs." I mean, it came out so normal. There was nothing crazy about what i had just said in my mind, but now, i spent the entire drive home thinking about how many people I have said this to, or even just said "i run 10 miles and then 20+ on weekends", and they look at me like I'm some freak. It never used to concern me, but today, it really did.

It also didn't help that I then talked to Cindy, yet another 100mile finisher, and she had heard I was doing Bandera100. But she caught the "belittled" tone in my voice and laughed with me and repeated my: "Yeah, JUST 100km." It was a great moment! But you see, she got it. She got that this whole high mileage thing is nutty but we just kind of take it in stride and laugh at it!
I mean, at what point in time, did I go from 20miles on a Saturday, to just half ass prepping for a 6 hour/30+ mile trail run in the middle of the night? How does this happen?!?!

I don't know what I'm saying here.... i guess I'm just babbling.... I'm not freaked out about the whole idea, but this morning something inside me made me realize that other than my friends I run with, Team Rogue that runs high road mileage, and the small endurance-athlete community in Austin, everyone else must think we're absolute freaks, and NOW, I'm totally reliving all these visions of people's reactions to what I've told them i do. ( I mean, even an ELITE runner looked at me like I was a nutjob!) But what does it say about you, when even other distance runners think you're nuts?

So I think next time I meet someone, I will do everything I can to not mention that I'm a runner, which will be hard since I either meet new people through runner friends, OR, my non-running friends tend to say: "This is Mike, he's a marathon runner. He runs crazy miles." Guess i'll have to educate them to just shut up about it! I'll report back on this.

Not sure where this post went, it was kind of a brain drain, but hey, it was fun to type away.

The thing is, I kind of think that my friends that don't run that read this, have now gotten a little de-sensitized about all this nonsense, since they know me as Mike, and not "Mike, the freak"!

Maybe they do think I'm Mike the Freak and just don't tell me?
Maybe I/we runners should require new people we meet to read our training blogs for a few months before they talk to us?
Maybe I should just quit it all and return to the general population?

I dunno. Maybe tomorrow when I wake up, i won't think about it anymore.

The thing is, I'm not a freak. It's easy to get to this point. You just have to want to. But you do have to have a little bit of freak in you. There's no doubt about that. I mean, it's not like everyone just gets up and goes for a 20+ mile run without any concern in the world.