Run.
I don’t know what I’m doing, because I’m not on the trail.
People seem surprised that someone could run as much as I do. “Wow, that’s really awesome,” they’ll say, seemingly through an awkward smile.
I get it. Kind of.
A little over two years ago, the mere idea of a 35-mile week being “light” wouldn’t make any sense to me. I was burnt out on running. The 2019 Chicago Marathon, and the training1 for it, broke me. At Thanksgiving that year, I vowed to never run a marathon again. “I’ll run in a half marathon again. But never a full.”
A little over three months later, I signed up for the Twin Cities Marathon.
I often think about running. Before I go to bed, when I wake up. Before work, when I get home. Scrolling through my Strava for 15 minutes at a time, remembering my best runs. “My best runs” — a phrase I didn’t have in my vocabulary even two years ago.
What’s happened to me?
I have fallen in love with running.
Since high school, I have been able to get into (and out of) running, seemingly whenever it suits me.
Need to lose a few pounds? I’ll run every day for a week. Need to get do something active, because, oops, it’s been a couple weeks? I’ll run three miles. Once I got a few years past high school, that’s essentially how I exercised. Whenever it suited me, I’d run.
It often didn’t suit me.
I ran a half marathon in 2013, but it didn’t stick much beyond that. I signed up for half marathons and full marathons, but oddly ended up injured (in different ways!) every time I was finally going to run a full.
My dad would talk me into half marathons here or there. But it was just a race. Something I did. I’d train, often well, throughout those 12 weeks or so. But then I’d get past race day, and one week off would turn into a month. Any gains I’d made as a runner wouldn’t take. Every time I started training, I was back at square one.
And then I went through a divorce.
I couldn’t sit and focus, so I went to the gym. I didn’t want to go home after work, so I went to the gym. I woke up and… I don’t know, need to do something? So I went to the gym.
I didn’t even train that well. Sure, I “followed” a plan. Really, I would just run fast, hoping it would help me feel less.
In April of 2018, I ran my best ever half marathon. Suddenly I liked running more than I ever had, so I signed up for a marathon — my third attempt — hoping I could actually follow through and finish 26.2.
I did.
I will never forget how hard the race was. The emotions I felt when I saw my dad after the race. It was more than just finishing a marathon. It was the culmination of the previous year. I did it.
And then my running fell off again. I’d run, mainly because it had been a few days since I’d last done so. I dreaded working out, instead of looking forward to it.
Still, I signed up for the 2019 Chicago Marathon. I didn’t take my training seriously. The combination of injuries, coming up with excuses to avoid training, and a general lack of miles ran, I went to Chicago just hoping to finish. I did. And it sucked. And I told anyone that would listen, “never again!”
Eleven months later, I ran 26.2, mostly by myself, on a trail that was a mile and a half from my apartment.
At the start of 2020, I decided to do what a lot of people do at the start of a year — lose weight. And, knowing I could run a few miles at a time, I decided to start running. Adding to that, I started eating better than I ever had before. I cut out booze. And the pounds started falling off. Instead of just going out for a run, I focused on my heart rate. Wait, running slow is good? I was actually enjoying my runs, not just the results.
On March 8th, 2020 I signed up for the Twin Cities Marathon. On March 11th, 2020, everything changed.
Immediately I realized the race would probably be canceled. I remember thinking I had an out. I never told anyone, but I didn’t think I would follow through with it. “What am I going to do, train for a ‘race’ that I would run alone?”
In fact, that’s exactly what I did.
I don’t know what this newsletter is. I think I need a place to talk about running. The feeling I get seven days a week. Why I do it. A place to put together some thoughts after an 18-mile run on a warm July morning.
I love running.
So that’s what I’ll write about. Once a week? Once a month? I don’t know. But I’ll talk about my time on the trail.
Run.
Calling it “training” is being kind — Not counting the Chicago Marathon, I ran more than 13.1 miles only twice during those 18 weeks.
Nice. Looking forward to more!
Glad you shared this on twitter!