Track was the only time in my life I have worn gold polyester shorts.

I loved every part of sprinting but the gunshot – crouching on the track in pre-launch, waiting for someone to tell us to begin running. The moment before a race begins is an intense silence, hovering over the absolute stillness of six people who are capable of moving very fast and wafting amongst an array of dormant leg muscles.

"Potential energy," my science teacher would call it, back when I was young enough to have a science teacher.

I remember crouching in those ridiculous shorts next to any number of girls from other schools, wearing equally ridiculous shorts in a variety of ridiculous colors. If you could harness the energy released at the start of the race, it could easily power a small town for several days, as long as no one left lights on in rooms when they weren't home or played Nintendo at all hours of the night or owned more than one refrigerator.

And if I could go back to my high school track team and change one thing – ok, if I could change one thing I would have made myself realize earlier on that I would never be any good at the hurdles, thus saving me the cost of several pairs of new glasses. And if I could change two things I would never have taken the insoles out of my New Balance sneakers (what was I thinking?), leading to an avulsion fracture at Rockland Community College, four weeks on crutches and permanent knee damage... but if I could change THREE things, I would get rid of the starting gun, and begin each race to the sound of a voice going, "Oh my god the train's here – get it! Hold the door! The train! Get the train!!"

The G train is half the length of regular New York City subways, meaning that if it is pulling into the station as you are walking down the stairs, you have about 100 meters to run before you can wedge your hand into the last door of the final car. The G train is driven (I believe) by retired SS guards who often take great pleasure in closing the door in your face and making you wait for the next train, which will usually arrive in the following eight or nine months.

I have lived off the G train line for three years and for the first two I defeatedly jogged toward the conductor, weakly signaling with my hand for him to hold the door.

"Stop!" I would say, shuffling along in my ballet flats, toting a gym bag full of magazines and Trident. "Hold the train." Often I would go on the assumption that I would miss the train and wouldn't bother running at all. I would walk dejectedly along the platform, streams of people passing me in the opposite direction as I watched the doors close and the train putter off into the tunnel. And it was not until late last year that I walked down the stairs, already 20 minutes behind schedule and saw the train stopping at the far end of the station.

"That train has come to a full stop and you have just stepped onto the platform," said the part of my brain that deals in common sense. "There is no way you will make that train."

"You can make that train," said another, normally dormant part of my brain. "Run!"

And without more than a split second to consider whether one argument had more of a basis in reality, or that my being late was nearly inevitable, or how ridiculous I would look sprinting through a subway station in my Issac Mizrahi for Target shoes, I ran.

I have always loved to run. But not just to run – to run really fast. The sort of running that never comes into play in everyday life unless you live in the sort of place where you are regularly chased by lions. As I ran for the train I could feel my arms pumping and my legs burning through the soggy, packaged croissant I had eaten for breakfast. I passed a woman dragging a child and a man jogging. I passed a second woman and two kids in school uniforms. I felt their eyes on me but kept my eyes on the train. I was running faster than I had ever seen anyone run inside a train station.

"I am coming, goddamnit!" I wanted to say, but I had no energy left to speak. My heart was racing. Having used all my inherent energy I began the interior monologue that marked the end of all my races. "Brain to legs: keep moving the legs! Brain to legs: do not stop running! Increase speed. Divert all excess energy to the GODDAMN LEGS! THE LEGS, GODDAMNIT!" I bounded the last few paces to the train door and the driver leaned his head out the window.

"Good running," he said. And wide-eyed, I panted at him, which I assume he knows meant "thank you," before walking into the last car of his train.

I sat down among a plethora of children and business people and families, sweating, my heart running fast enough to power the train. Other people stared at me with an emotion I was unable to discern. I wiped my sweaty forehead with my sleeve. I felt wonderful.

If I were to go back and re-choreograph my entire high-school track team, I would do away with the gun.

They would begin running after descending a set of stairs leading to the track. They would take two or three seconds to realize it was a race, before their bodies kicked in and began sprinting toward a set of taillights that were placed one to two hundred meters away. The school uniforms would be discarded and replaced with individual costumes. The boys would be wearing suits or collared shirts with ties. Many would run with messenger bags strung across their backs or Metrocards in their hands. The girls would wear skirts or pants suits – quick drying business casual, with their dress scarves flying up around their faces. They clutch laptops under the arms of their silk blouses. Some run while eating Luna bars. Times are decided accordingly.

The other day I stepped out of the stairwell alongside another woman, both of us registering that the train had just pulled into the station.

We began to run. And it was the first time, since I have started running, that I was running alongside someone, and that the objective was not only to make the train, but to win. To arrive there before this other unnamed office worker, in her maroon sweater vest and pearl earrings and tan skirt. Not having pegged her as a sprinter, it made the run all that more exhilarating, she in her school uniform-type ensemble (thought she was clearly in her mid-twenties or early thirties) running side-by-side with me in my khakis and floral shirt from Ann Taylor Loft. It was the sort of running that would look ridiculous on a treadmill, if it is even possible, but would look perfectly acceptable in a Gatorade commercial. Both wearing flats, sprinting on our toes, we arrived at the train simultaneously.

"Good game," I wanted to say to her, slapping her a high five, but instead I sat down in one of the few available seats to rest. I was thankful for my khakis, as sitting on a train in scant gold track shorts would have made me A. a target for either ridicule or violent crime, or B. the recipient of at least 30 diseases. And I was thankful for my run since, on a train full of heavy-lidded administrators and comatose office mates, it had rendered me, for a brief invigorating moment, awake.