3rd most recent run (Lake Houston 10K on August 25): Yep, you read the date correctly…exactly 1 month ago. In July, a 14-year-old acquaintance invited me to sign up for the Lake Houston 10K/5K. I had not been running consistently, and figured the motivation of a race would help. Rather foolishly, I chose the 10K.
My 10K PR (that’s Personal Record for you non-running folks) is 57:58, acquired during my first-ever 10K, about a year after I started running. On August 25, I finished my 10K in 1:04:20 (a pace of about 10:22 minutes/mile). Far from being disappointed by my time, I was absolutely amazed by it.
After all, since my 2:17 half-marathon PR in March, I had been running only about once, maybe twice, a week. (I must correct my previous statement—my training had actually been extremely consistent…consistently infrequent.) Apparently the race-induced motivation never materialized. Or, if it did, it was quickly buried in data collection preparations. With as little as I’d been running, I was pleasantly surprised I could run 6 miles at all. I did take several walk breaks, starting at around 3.5 miles, but I still finished far quicker than I expected—on a hot muggy day too.
I can’t say I had fun during the whole race—the second half was actually rather unpleasant. But even while I was hot and tired and couldn’t wait for it to be over, I marveled at the remarkable capacity for physical accomplishment God designed into us humans. Three years ago, I couldn’t imagine ever running a 5K. Heck, I didn’t think I’d ever be able to run a single mile! Now, here I was running a 10K, even after having run only twice a week for the last 5 months. It’s not so surprising that a properly trained human could run 6 miles—what’s surprising is that I could do it, given my scant level of conditioning.
Lesson #1: Once you have gained a reasonable level of running fitness, you can maintain it surprisingly well, just by running once or twice a week.
2nd most recent run (two and a half weeks ago, on September 8): Five miles in the dark in a neighboring neighborhood (our neighborhood has lousy running sidewalks), with a silly grin plastered on my face the whole time. On most 5-mile runs, I enjoy the first 3 miles and survive the last 2, knowing I’ll be glad I did it. This time, every step was a pleasure. I haven’t had this much fun on a run since I ran down the New Orleans trolley tracks in the rain. Perhaps then I could credit the specialness of my run to the novelty of the venue, but not now. I don’t know if it was the cool weather, or the darkness, or the 10K’s training effect, or what, but I absolutely had a blast.
It was as if all the gunk that usually clogs my mind and deadens my senses disappeared, leaving me fully in tune with the world around me. Have you ever been very, very scared? The few times it’s happened to me, my senses went on high alert....as if the tiniest pinprick would instantly propel me ten feet off the ground. I felt a bit of this same heightened awareness during my nighttime run, except that Joy had replaced the fear.
Lesson #2: Running produces a unique sort of aliveness that I don’t get from anything else.
Most recent run (today): Another neighboring neighborhood with wonderful sidewalks. Ran 2 miles reasonably comfortably, even though I couldn’t listen to my crutch music. (A frantic search through my running bag turned up the IPod Shuffle, but no headphones—apparently my running hiatus had included a raid on the running bag.) During Mile 3, I took three or four 30-second walking breaks, and realized I had badly overestimated my current running capability. I had set off on a 4.25-mile loop, and there were no shortcuts back to the car—I had to finish it. At the 3-mile mark, I walked at least a quarter of a mile, and didn’t care—I just wanted to be done. I eventually started running again, as slow a jog as I could manage. After one more really long walk break, I was nearly there. I decided to “sprint” the last two-tenths of a mile back to my car, just to end on a positive note. I then plopped myself on a bench with my head between my knees (which I never do). Ugh.
Lesson #3: Running twice a month will NOT maintain running fitness, and is a recipe for misery.
1 comments:
Let's see, my third most recent run was a speed session at Agri Park. No profound insights from that one, but it was fun! My second most recent was Winslow last Saturday. I learned from that that training for distance has not increased my speed. My most recent run was a night run around Fayetteville Lake on the mountain bike trail. I learned that training for distance definitely has improved my recovery. I could hardly tell I ran a difficult half marathon the previous day! Sometimes the lessons I learn from long runs are completely unexpected. I while back I learned that if you tape the toe next to your big toe (index toe?) with micropore tape, you should also tape your big toe. It is not necessary to tape your middle toe. Perhaps the more precise lesson is that your big toe operates more independantly from your other toes than you think. Funny, the things you learn while running!
Nice post. Glad your finding time to run every now and then.
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