Yesterday was the 45th day of the year and my 45th blog entry. I lost count. I posted a duplicate no. 44 before correcting later in the day.
When I started blogging, recording, and taking better care of myself earlier this year, I thought, “What comes next after 100 days?”
Yesterday, I entered a ten mile race.
Disney’s inaugural Tower of Terror Ten Miler launches at the end of September. It sounds like a fun event. In a way, I’ve begun my training by participating in the regimen I’ve adopted.
Running has been a love/dislike thing with me. I’ve completed three marathons. I love the sense of accomplishment that comes with it. I don’t enjoy the seemingly mandatory upper respiratory infections that always happen when I run over 40 miles a week. Training for that kind of distance is overwhelmingly time consuming, too. It’s not just the running. It’s also the rest and recovery after a long training run that pretty much takes the whole weekend…at least for me.
Ten miles seems like a reasonable distance. During a marathon in November in 2008, I felt my left knee weaken and tighten up at mile 8. I had tons of energy, but I couldn’t run. It was frustrating. I was lucky to finish at all. Since then, I’ve retired from 26.2ers.
I like to leave my iPod at home for training runs (and for the real event too). There’s something almost meditative about being in the middle of the woods, running at a nice pace, and having time seem to stand still for a while.
I look forward to going back to Disney World. The interesting thing about this race is that it starts at 9 pm. I’ll have to be a night owl for a few weeks around then. That sounds kind of fun. We’ll also get to ride the Tower of Terror after the race.
Onward.
