April 9, 1998

A Good Running Day

To you, this is nothing; to me, it is a cause for celebration.

For the first several years that I did any regular aerobic activity, I did the treadmill at the Apple Fitness Center. Every day I went in, I set the pace to 6.0 (which means 6 miles per hour, or 10 minutes a mile) and jogged for 30 minutes. Sometimes I got crazy and went for 40 minutes.

Then I moved in with Darin and decided to run down the train tracks near our house, which neatly measured 1.5 miles each way. And I discovered a truism that anyone who's done both the treadmill and dirt knows: running on dirt is way harder than running on a treadmill. (Thank you, Holmes.) I couldn't do my 3 mile run in anything under 35 minutes, no matter how hard I tried.

Well, one day, I decided to flat-out run as hard as I could, breathing be damned. I ran and ran and ran and when I finished my run I had done the entire thing in 30 minutes. So at the hardest pace I could imagine I just about equaled my treadmill speed.

(I have since found out that to approximate the more difficult terrain of running on ground, you should put the treadmill at an incline of 0.1 or so, which I never did.)

When I took up running again last year, I kept going at a 12 minute (or worse) pace. Losing 30 pounds has helped a lot, as I mentioned a few days ago: I found I was doing roughly 10 or 10.5 minutes a mile, which is not bad considering the last 1.1 or 1.6 miles (depending on my route) of my run is basically uphill--sometimes more strenuously uphill than other parts, but always noticeably uphill.

Which brings me to today and why I'm feeling giddy right now.

3.5 miles in 33 minutes.

I have never done this before. I am on top of the world. I feel happy about this.

What's especially thrilling is that I feel different. I feel as though I'm going faster. I feel as though my legs could just keep going and going; they're enjoying the ride as much as I am. I'm enjoying putting my body through its paces, saying, Let's see what we can do today! I feel as though I've become a runner.

I happen to like running because it's easy (wear small clothes, run in neighborhood) and I get to see my surroundings. I meet people: Hey, how you doing. I see people walking their babies or their dogs (or dogs and babies) and I see other people out running or walking or bicycling. It makes me feel like I'm in a neighborhood to see all of this in the open air, instead of from inside my car, the way I see most things.

And now I feel as though I'm getting something from the activity itself, instead of forcing myself to go through it as a means to an end.

Whee ha! I can't wait to go out there tomorrow!

Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics

3.5 miles.