I seem to have a peculiar worldview. I feel like “I still have my whole life in front of me” even though I’m already 53 years old. I’m ready to try new things and keep moving forward even as those around me “settle into AARPness”, as a good friend stated recently. Maybe I’m nuts but I don’t see that I really have any limitations–which is exactly how I felt when I was a 37 year old college freshman aspiring to eventually go on to medical school (which I successfully completed)–despite the much-cliched “odds stacked against” me and to the possible chagrin of my local doomsayers.
My latest adventure involves nurturing my long-dormant inner athlete, just like I resurrected the “good student” that had been set aside for two decades back in 1993 when I started school. I privately call this latest phase of life “the era of the athlete” because I intend to spend the next decade or so pursuing goals that will cultivate myself physically as much as college and med school did for me mentally. Hopefully it will be much more fun and nowhere near as grueling!
So lately I’ve taken up running and I do enjoy it, even though I’m told I’m more of a jogger than a runner because it takes me greater than 10 minutes to run a mile. Yeah right, whatever, who cares? In the words of John “the Penguin” Bingham, “I’m slow. I know. Get over it.”
What inspired me to start this blog was a desire to chronicle my life and training as I attempt to move up from 5-K and 10-K races to a half-marathon. I registered for the Walt Disney World Half-Marathon in Orlando on January 10, 2010, which is roughly 22 weeks from now. I ran in the Cleveland Marathon’s 10-K back in May and liked it so much that I wanted to push myself a little farther by moving up to the next distance. Since we take an annual winter vacation in Florida anyway, the Disney half was a perfect fit.
Now it wouldn’t be very Lianne-like if there wasn’t some crazy obstacle to overcome, so I naturally managed to get injured, slack off, lose some stamina and gain some weight. So here I am.
I’m going to be following the FIRST regimen which I learned about in Runner’s World. It involves 3 running days and 2 cross-training days each week along with flexibility and strength sessions. I followed it loosely for the 10-K and liked it quite a bit. Given my unpredictable work schedule at the urgent care centers, I wanted something with variety as well as a bit of flexibility. The program is 18 weeks long and I will be officially starting in early September, but this is my “getting ready to get ready” phase.
I’ve been doing a bit of running, a bit of biking and not nearly enough strength and flexibility training over the summer, so I plan to ramp it up over the rest of this month in order to be able to follow the program as religiously as I ever follow anything.
More tomorrow….
Boldly running where I've never gone before 