March 12th 2010 Running Blog

"Good things come slow - especially in distance running."- Bill Dellinger, Oregon coach

Today was a good day, sorta silly but good. On my third mile I thought I saw a snake- no, it was a fat frog but I tried not to run over it and in doing so tripped all over the place. I scurried around trying to look normal and see if anyone saw that. There was an elderly gentleman and that was all but I was so embarrassed I was trying to explain how that happened, in the midst of how goofy that even was I just started running again.

One thing that was neat too was seeing these groups of older men. I see them all the time but they are always bundled up and today they looked like normal people not eskimo's :-) They look like cute little Grandpa's. If ever you get to run at Boling early in the morning these cute little Grandpa's are great cheerleaders!! Very sweet, kind and encouraging. There are often a couple of them that say as I pass, "So! Are you going to do 20 miles today?" I laugh and say, "Yep!" There is this one man who is always like, be careful you don't want to hurt yourself. When I pass them, most of the time they smile and say, "good job, don't quit." There are times when its conversational and they mention the weather etc. I wonder if they know how much that helps when you're out there trying to do one more mile. Just a smile and a thumbs up gives you more energy.

So, today was good but mentally I was forming a plan. My plan - when I get to five miles I'm just gonna stay there awhile that will be a huge victory! I'll probably stay there for months to work on speed. Right now its all about distance, Distance, Distance, Distance...I was really hoping by now that I'd be running four miles a day. It is hard to run four miles right now. Its like occasionally I can do it but most other times I can barely lift my legs after the third mile. Today I ran three miles, stopped briefly to catch my breath and ran another mile. Maybe thats how I need to approach this. Stop for a minute, breathe, run!

Oh! And one more thing! Running is not meant to be miserable...I dressed totally wrong today and that won't happen again. I was sweating so bad it was gross! Part of the problem was being over dressed. I typically unlayer anyways but didn't have that option today. So now I do not care how cold it is when I get out of bed and into the car ~ short sleeves for me buddy! Maybe I wouldn't have stopped to catch my breath if I was dressed accordingly??

Boling Park
4 miles Ran