Wannabe Runner

When I woke up this morning, I laid in bed trying to decide wether to close my eyes and go back to sleep, or get up and go for a run. I've been out of the habit of running for a while, since I rolled my ankle hiking Mt. Bierstadt. It's hard to get back to the point where it's easy to get up and go. Or well, to the point that it's easier to get out of bed to go running. I had to give myself a pep talk, or rather debate with myself. It went something like this...

You know you want to run a 5K before the end of the year...

But I was sleeping so well, I could get at least another half hour...

You'll sleep better tonight if you run this morning.

Maybe.

You know you'll feel great the rest of the day if you go. 

The bedroom is cold, it'll be colder outside.

Perfect temperature for running!

Hmph.

You can wear your Slacker long sleeve shirt!

Great, I probably won't be able to fall back asleep now.

Your Nike+ mini (screen saver) will stop whining.

Who cares, I'm deleting the stupid Nike+ mini

It will be awesomeness, the weather is perfect.

You won't meet your goals if you stay here.

Ugh. OK. 

So, I did the hardest part and got up and got dressed. I ran. I didn't get a runner's high like I did last time, but it was a good run. It was the longest I've run in over a year - 25 minutes of running (or jogging depending on how you define it) straight. I feel good about it :). I'm so glad I got my butt in gear this morning and just DID IT.

When I went to sync up my iPhone with Nike+ afterwards, I saw this video posted on my friend's wall on facebook. I'm still thinking about it hours later, so I thought I'd share it here.

Talk about inspiring! The body is such an amazing thing. I love watching people learn this for themselves. Learn that they can do ANYTHING with determination. You can also check out his blog, Ben Does Life.

I'm a wannabe runner.

I couldn't run a mile until I was 29 years old. I never had the desire to.... and when I was younger I'd laugh at the idea of people running to run, and not because they were being chased. I have friends that are runners, and I'm not sure how it happened but they must have rubbed off on me. Or maybe I just wanted to defy turning 30, but I got the bug. I completed the Couch to 5K (C25K) training program, and then I ran my first 5K in January of 2008.

I'd like to say that I've been an avid runner ever since, but unfortunately, no. Though I had fallen in love with running, which for me become a therapy of sorts... I had some issues with my right knee after starting the One Hour Runner program, which I started because I wanted to run a faster 5K, and eventually a 10K. However, every time I hit about 4 miles, something funky happened to my knee and it made me back off... Then summer came with temperatures in the 90s/100s, I found some more excuses, and I pretty much stopped running altogether except for the occasional short run. I missed it. Really missed it. Then we moved to Colorado, and being so close to trails, I was excited to get back into running again. I wanted to try to strengthen up my knee, and go to a doctor if necessary to figure it out.

I thought I was gonna die on my first run. My heart was going to burst out of my chest. Darn altitude. Eventually I decided I should just re-do the C25K program and gradually work back up to running. It was all going great, and I was scoping out my next 5K when I rolled my ankle about a month ago. That was a huge bummer. I have a weak right ankle (which is most likely related to the knee issue I have), but it had been doing so well for a long time.

Earlier this week I returned to the program since I felt more confident about my ankle. I started where I left off, by repeating week 6 day 2 and was shocked by how awesome I felt. First of all I ran further (which means faster) than I had the last time, and I didn't feel like I was dying, in fact, I felt great! This was shocking to me since a) I hadn't ran in almost a month, and b) I had been expecting to struggle since I'd heard (from multiple sources) that stopping for more than a week and starting again, at altitude, you have to adjust again. All I can think of is that my hiking has kept me in better shape than I had thought. I have been hiking at around 8-10,000 ft so I'm guessing it helped keep me in some sort of condition, making running at ~5,500 ft not as difficult as it would have been... had I done nothing. Seriously, the body is amazing in how it is constantly adapting, and able to change. All we have to do is push ourselves.

Wow, this got long! Sorry for the rambling if you made it this far :). I guess that's what an inspiring video that makes me cry does to me!