back at it

Now that it's warm out, I've taken up running again. And as always, it's so hard. No matter what I seem to do at the gym during the winter, it seems I'm never in good enough shape to just ease into it out there. It's always an uphill climb at first. Lots of huffing and puffing and sidewalk pedestrians moving out of the way when they hear me coming up behind them (they can hear me about half a block away.) I know it will get better in about a month. Maybe less.

I don't run long distances. I rarely if ever go farther (or is it further?) than 3 miles. This is good for me. It's the range that seems to be the best fit.

Several years ago, when we lived in the city, I got into this kick about pushing myself to run longer and longer distances. I think I just wanted to see if I could do it . Also, I was inspired by the joggers I saw every morning down by the lake. I figured, if they can do it, why not me? I started keeping a daily log of my runs on the Hal Higdon website. It was kind of exciting to see my progress over the months, to see that what I thought was impossible was actually - possible! I'd go out in the morning for a run by the lake, then come into work and log my miles on the computer. I saw my distance building like a graph chart. 3 miles, 3.5 miles, 3.7 miles, 4.1 miles, 4.6 miles...and so on. I peaked around 7.5 miles. That was plenty, I didn't have to prove anything to myself after that point. Plus, I got pregnant. My interests changed.

Today I don't think about pushing the distance, I think about pushing myself out the door. But hopefully not for too long. When summer really gets going, I'll be just fine.