Clark Kerr Track
Somewhere along your Ancenstry.com results is a giant omission. That’s where the hamster side of your family comes in. Running the track makes you feel closer to your predecessors. If you squint your eyes enough, it resembles a hamster wheel.
Euclid St. to Rose Garden
You take care of yourself. You always wake up on time, you constantly have two kinds of alternative milk in stock, and you follow your daily planner to the minute. You’re wearing a matching pair of shorts and tank top set (a muted color of course) from a sustainable clothing brand that’s been sufficiently vetted. You drink water out of mason jars with a slice of lemon that you grew from your compost-powered micro garden.
Sproul Plaza
Exhibitionism speaks to you. Though you’ll never admit it, you enjoy the fanfare of zipping through the throes of Teva-clad, sleep-deprived students. As club recruiters attempt to force their fists full of flyers onto you, you dodge them with ease akin to Neo from “The Matrix.”
Fire Trails/Berkeley Hills Neighborhood
As your calves burn on what seems to be an endless uphill, you grit your teeth and blast Screamo. Though the way up is nearly unbearable, you know the panoramic view at the top is worth it, so you harness a degree of self-discipline that not even the Rose Garden runner possesses. You don’t bother to drink out of a Hydro Flask anymore. No, you pour your water into your protein powder bottle and down in it faster than your mile time (at 5.38E-6, you’re faster than the speed of light).
The Glade
Even with Berkeley Time, you’re still running late. Though you do not exercise (like, ever!), you can be seen sprinting down the bike path to Dwinelle every Monday and Wednesday morning at precisely 8:07 a.m. As your leg cramps up and your stomach growls at the lack of breakfast, you resolve to buy that electric scooter you found off Reddit.
RSF
Yellow fluorescent lighting mixes with the smell of too many unwashed bodies packed into the depressing concrete box that is the Recreational Sports Facility Gym (not that I’m biased or anything). Whether you are unhinged, are a masochist, or merely have yet to be shown the beauty that is outdoor running has yet to be decided.