OK, so I’ll admit the quality of the bling on offer plays a part in helping me decide what running/adventure race events I’ll enter these days. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t do an event I’m completely uninterested in just because it has good bling. But, ah, actually, scratch that, maybe I might. You know, if it was really good bling. 😉

Let’s be honest, there are so many events to choose from out there, that we all have to apply some sort of criteria to decide which ones we’ll do and which ones we’ll pass on. And for me, bling is definitely on my consideration set.

I had a mate who shall remain nameless, but let’s for the sake of this story let’s call him Graham, (because that’s his name), who ran an event overseas only to be given a drink bottle at the end. And no bling. A cheap plastic drink bottle. No shit. Now, because ‘Graham’ is a good mate, and being the kind and caring person I am, naturally my friends and I, (yes, contrary to popular belief, I still have a few), torment him relentlessly. There’s not an event that goes by where one of us won’t ask if there was a drink bottle at the finish line. It’s actually pretty hilarious. Unless you’re ‘Graham’.

So I of all people understand that crossing the line and collecting your bling is all part of the ritual and theatre of running events. Not that it’s always been that way. And it’s worth remembering that. I’ve got a bunch of shit ones from a few years back when bling, if you were lucky to get anything at all, consisted of pretty much the kind of medal I received at the 1978 Christian Brothers College Sports Day. (Under 9 Champion by the way, so suck on that!) That is, the generic crap you get from a trophy shop with some lame stick on panel on it. Now days, if an event dared to serve that sort of thing up, there’d be hell to pay from the expectant hordes. Or worse still, if there’s supposed to be bling and for some reason or other, there isn’t any, whoa, batten down the hatches, there’s a storm a coming.

And that’s really what I want to talk about today. See? I always get to my point. Eventually.

In pre-bling days, running was, go figure, just about running. Then running became about running plus an event t-shirt with the obligatory silhouette of another runner. Or if the event was really politically correct, male and female silhouette runners. Although I’ve never really understood why we had to be so literal about showing both. We get it. Men and women run. But that’s an article for another day. So for a while it was about running and Tshirts. And now it’s about the bling. And for some people it seems as if it’s all about the bling.

I don’t like to single out individuals because I tend to get in a bit of strife when I do that, but I know after the Tarawera Ultra a year or two back there was a woman who contacted the medal maker direct and asked if they could make her a 50km finisher’s medal, because she didn’t make it to the 60km finish line and still wanted some bling. That, by the way, is a true story. And while it’s almost as hilarious as Graham only getting a water bottle, it’s also actually pretty sad that someone felt like they needed some sort of validation for running 50kms. (Just to be clear, there is no 50k distance in that race, 60km is the shortest distance on offer. So basically this person wanted a finisher’s medal for her DNF.)

The race formerly known as The North Face 100 also copped it’s fair share of flack over the years for its bling policy. Finish under 20 hours, get some belt buckle bling. Finish over 24 hours and you’re a DNF. But finish in between 20 and 24 hours and you get sweet FA. Slightly unusual, but them’s the rules, and as it happens, rules that weren’t all that popular with those people finishing in between 20 and 24 hours. Rules that changed when the event shifted to Ultra Trail Australia, by the way, where it’s back to every player wins a prize. Yay! Bling for everyone!

And then, as a variation on the theme there was the opposite issue at Two Bays, where someone who finished after the cut off time was still given some bling, (and come on, Two Bays was one of the first Aussie races to set the standard with epic bottle opener bling), but didn’t get recorded as an official finisher because, well, ah, they weren’t an official finisher. That whole ‘cut off’ time thing should have been a clue, but apparently this particular runner had a fair old dummy spit about being listed as a DNF.

Which brings me back to running. You know, that thing some people do just so they can get some bling at the end of it? Bling is nice. Being on the finisher’s list is nice. Pushing yourself to do better is nice. Standing on the podium is nice. As is, I’m sure, winning the fucking lottery – not that I’ll ever get to do either of those things. But running was, is and always will be about… running. Well, at least it should be. Some days it goes your way and you finish. Some days you get served up a shit sandwich and don’t finish. Or you finish after the cut off time. Or just do a shit time. Or don’t get a medal because the event stuffed up and ran out. And none of those things have absolutely anything at all to do with the training you did, the effort you put into it, or the war stories you can tell as a result.

Ms 50kms DNF’er? More power to you, you just ran 50kms. Go you. You don’t need a damn medal to be able to tell that story. It’s about what you did. And Ms Bling But No Official Time? Who cares. Well, you obviously, but you kept going when you could have stopped, even after the cut off, and finished that damn course. You ran the distance you set out to do. Massive congrats to you. You’re not on the list, but that doesn’t mean you didn’t do it. You did!

My collection of bling is hanging on the back of my office door because I think bling hangers are a bit lame and bling isn’t really good for anything else really, are they? (Bling hanger people please send your hate mail to someone who cares. i.e. Not me.) Maybe when I’m old(er) and senile(er) I’ll look at those medals and it will remind me that I used to be slightly less old and crusty. But bling or not, I did all those things. I have the memories. I have the sense of achievement. And like most runners, I’ve been known to tell a story or two about my grand achievements as well. I don’t need bling to know and feel and remember or prove any of that. And neither do you.

Come on people, it’s not about the bling. Or the water bottle.

 

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