Back to the Present

I'm back to present time. Almost. I started the blog in December, whining about my knee and initiating the prequels. The last post described my fall races, but stopped prior to the events that brought out my whining and 2010 indecision.

The fact is that, in December, I overcompensated for a lack of exercise during a rather delicious and enjoyable Thanksgiving period. I went to the gym three days in a row, cranking up the speed to 5.5 - 5.7 mph range (getting into the under 11 minutes per mile for a bit.) On the third day, I felt a "twinge" in my right hamstring. My knee started hurting, accentuated (in my mind) by all the car driving I was doing.

Bother. And I have a bit of hypochondria, as both of my daughters can verify.

What should I do? One answer was "write a blog" and the other was to lower treadmill levels and build up strength in leg muscles with other exercises. What winter events could I even consider? I obviously wouldn't be going as fast as in the fall and had never done winter walking. 

After I started this blog, I surfed the Sullivan and Orange County runners' club web sites for upcoming races. Maybe I should consider a 10K, where my training speed would more likely match my event speed?  I had noticed that once I got into a walking groove, I could keep going for a while at about the same pace.

A few events looked intriguing, but one stood out: a walker's start at 8:30 AM and a runner's start at 10 AM for a half marathon in March. The downside? A half marathon is 13.1 miles! Right. My previous high race was 4.3 miles and I had never even attempted a 10K (around 6.2 miles), I'm whining about a knee brace, and I'm going to leap into 13.1 miles in a winter race?

Not very logical. But then it wasn't too logical eleven months ago to enter my first ever 5K.

So the indecision is gone. My next event is on March 14 in Sullivan County: http://www.celebratelifehalfmarathon.com/  

As Carol likes to say, "Go Figure."

NEXT: The loneliness of the long distance walker