Must stay focused. Must keep running. Must stay on schedule. Keep the pace up. Not slack. Not … give … in … to … the … tempta …
Oh, the heck with it. I want a beer and some pretzels.
So goes my on-again, off-again training regimen for the upcoming 15K River Run in Jacksonville. Mostly it’s on-again. I’m on an overly ambitious quest to get back down to the times I was running in college. At 39, that’s no easy feat. Even more remarkably, I might just be on track. “Might” is the key word, and only if I STAY on track.
But it’s getting harder and harder the closer I get. Sleep in or go for a 9-mile run in the chilly morning air? Hmmm, which are you going to choose?
The race is next weekend, and I think I’m better off than I was last year thanks to some new techniques, a renewed focus and taking the beer and pretzels on runs with me. So I thought I would share all that I’ve learned in hopes that it might inspire you to go and burn out your knees just like me:
• The secret to running in the cold? This is a simple one to follow: Don’t do it. It’s a horrible, miserable experience. And we Floridians look especially ridiculous when the temperature drops because we don’t have proper cold weather running gear. We have to improvise. No running gloves? Wrap toilet paper around your hands. No running jacket? How about a plastic garbage bag? Bystanders see shivering, screaming people running by in what looks like trash and they think the door to the insane asylum has broken again.
• Don’t get run over by a newspaper delivery driver. That could adversely affect your time.
• Don’t discover a new kind of all-natural, organic chocolate cookie with real crème filling just two weeks into your training plan. You’d be better off adopting a drug habit or eating bricks.
• Don’t try a speed workout on a tall bridge during 30 m.p.h. gusts of wind on a day that your hair desperately needs a cut. The outcome is never good. Your hair will look like an azalea bush or a bowl of extra-fluffed popcorn. It will scare little children and make bystanders think the door to the insane asylum has broken again. I’m still trying to get it back under control with gels and hair sprays.
• Never forget your iPod before you run 9 miles on a treadmill. There are only so many times you can count the beads of sweat on the display before your mind turns to oatmeal.
• On particularly long runs when you’re tired and dreading the return home, click your heels together three times and say, “There’s no place like home. There’s no place like home.” Then remind yourself you’re not Dorothy and that you don’t even have money for a cab ride.
• Know that when you’re running speed workouts, long distance and tempo runs all week, you can eat just about whatever calorie-rich food you want. Eggs benedict. Pizza for breakfast. Peanut butter and bacon sandwiches. But, again from personal experience, never do it right before your run.
• If you’re on a run and someone yells from a car, “I’ve seen stirring sticks with more meat on ‘em than you!” just wave and take it as a compliment. Don’t engage in any back-and-forth banter. Don’t belt out the first thing that comes into your head, like: “Oh yeah, well I’ve seen meat with more brain cells than you!” Because they’re right. You do look like a stirring stick. And in a fight, you will snap in half just as easily. Runners run from danger. Never to it.
• If you’re running for time, make sure you hit “start” on your watch at the beginning of your run. It will give you a much more precise reading than if you hit “start” at the end.
• And right after your race — right after all that training scores you a personal best and you feel that great sense of accomplishment — swear off running. Swear it off! Go gain 15 pounds from chocolate crème cookies and wait for next year before you pledge to do it all again.