Some of you may or may not recall a post I wrote a couple months ago, about ending up with a case of de Quervain’s Tenosynovitis. Since then, it’s been copay upon copay and visits to the ortho and physical therapy twice a week. Welp, I graduated from PT last week! I’m on the mend, but there are still a lot of weight-bearing exercises that I am not yet able to do.
Essentially banned from my 5x/week WOD habit, I floundered through the summer trying to find something else to keep me both occupied and somewhat in shape. However, it was much easier to let things slide without a goal to focus on. In CrossFit, you’ve got PRs to aim for. You want to lift more, you want to hit Fran faster, you want to qualify for regionals.
Without CrossFit, I needed to get a goal.
Casual working out wasn’t… working out. I like to have a purpose. In the past few months, I found myself increasingly making comments about running a half marathon. I can do a 5K in my sleep, and my usual run is about 4.5mi. Finding a 10K to run didn’t seem challenging enough. So, I began spouting off what my 2002 self would have deemed TOTAL NONSENSE… how about running a half marathon?
So, I scoped out training plans, to see if it was somewhat feasible. I’m not in half marathon shape (yet), but I’m certainly no couch potato. Training would be required. The plans I found all shared the common theme of shorter runs in the 3-5mi range during the week, and then an increasingly long haul on the weekends.
Holy crap. Maybe I can actually… DO THIS.
A very popular race around here is the Hartford Half Marathon, and it’s on October 10th. This past week, I realized that it was time to put up or shut up. If I hesitated any longer, then I was losing valuable training time. If I didn’t sign up, then I was just going to be a yammering bag of hot air who was all bark and no bite.
There shall be none of that.
So, I bit it. I ponied up the $80, and have committed myself to ring in my 30th year on this planet with a 13.1 mile run, just 5 days after my 30th birthday. The necessity of training runs will also keep me from trying to come back to CrossFit too quickly and reinjure myself. It’s been 4 months to progress back to this point, and I’m not going to f*ck it up now.
Ready or not… 10/10 is on its way, and it’s time for me to pound some pavement.
Today was Day 1 of half marathon ‘training’. With zero focus on pace, and all focus on simply NOT STOPPING, I went out for 7.16 miles. I did not stop. That is the longest I’ve ever run nonstop in my life, and it’s still 6 miles short of a half marathon. Oomph.
Have I bitten off more than I can chew? Meh. As I saw someone post on facebook earlier today… I’d rather choke on greatness than nibble on mediocrity.