There are thousands of runner blogs out
there, why would you want to read mine? Well, because I'm just like you. I'm a
mother and a wife. I work full-time outside the house and I am also a piano
teacher.
When I run, I run for fun.
When I run, I run for fun.
I'm not looking for anything called an
FKT. Just trying to avoid a DNF. (But I should add that I never want to see a DNS.)
For the most part I'm in middle of the
packer (can I stretch it to say I’m a front of the middle of the pack?). But
when it comes to ultra running I'm at the back of the pack. Waaaay back. Pretty safe to say that I'll probably never have a sponsorship. On
second thought, it might not be a bad idea. Considering the glacial pace at
which I run, it'll give spectators and other runners plenty of time to read any
kind of marketing pitch that a big sponsor would like to write on my shirt on
wear on my feet. (Hey Hoka One One, if you're reading this I take a size 7.)
I’m definitely not new to running as I've
been pounding the pavement and dirt since I was junior in HS....so that would make….
gulp 24 years. With my head down and knuckles dragging, I did
what any self-respecting varsity soccer -reject would do: I joined my HS cross country team. In retrospect, that probably wasn't the worst
thing that ever happened to me. If you look at Athlinks (which becomes “ass
links” if you are using a dictation app) it'll show 60 of my races. I thought
that was a lot until I did the math. Totally need to up my game!
But how did I get in to ultra running? I
blame my tribe of running friends (and their friends). It totally sucks to be
part of such a supportive, motivational yet co-dependent group of athletes.
Having people around to constantly remind you that you can achieve anything you
put your mind to is such a drag. That’s what happened the day I decided to
train for my first 50K.
I was sitting zombie-like on the train on a Friday afternoon scrolling through Facebook. A fellow running tribe member had just finished another full Ironman and I stared longingly at her finisher pictures. “What the hell is wrong with me?" I thought. “I need to get out there and do something I haven’t done yet.” I messaged a friend and asked if he thought I could train and complete at 50K one month from now. “Sure you can! Why not?” he said. Why not? Having bonked HARD at my last marathon 2 years prior and swearing that distance off forever (for the 3rd time) I was pretty sure he was just telling me what I wanted to hear – that’s why not! But, I figured I had nothing to lose. I’d start training and see how it went. If I was doing ok then I would actually register for the race. Registering is the hardest part. That’s definite, actual, ironclad, tangible, hard proof that you mean to do it. Don’t even get me started about putting it on Facebook! Gah!!!!
I was sitting zombie-like on the train on a Friday afternoon scrolling through Facebook. A fellow running tribe member had just finished another full Ironman and I stared longingly at her finisher pictures. “What the hell is wrong with me?" I thought. “I need to get out there and do something I haven’t done yet.” I messaged a friend and asked if he thought I could train and complete at 50K one month from now. “Sure you can! Why not?” he said. Why not? Having bonked HARD at my last marathon 2 years prior and swearing that distance off forever (for the 3rd time) I was pretty sure he was just telling me what I wanted to hear – that’s why not! But, I figured I had nothing to lose. I’d start training and see how it went. If I was doing ok then I would actually register for the race. Registering is the hardest part. That’s definite, actual, ironclad, tangible, hard proof that you mean to do it. Don’t even get me started about putting it on Facebook! Gah!!!!
I trained, I ran, I finished AND IT WAS
AWESOME!!! And now I want more!!
I’m still a newbie to all this and I’ve
got a lot to learn. So stick around, you (and I) might learn something.
