I had a dilemma. See if you would do the same thing in my
situation. Let say you had signed up to do the P.F. Chang Half Marathon
in January. And lets say you had been training for it and were looking
forward to it. Now say that you got sick with a cold and shortly after
got sick again and you thought to yourself, this must be the flu. In
reality, when you went to urgent care you discovered you had pneumonia.
Add this up with not being able to workout at all for a month and a half
due to holidays, my son and sickness. Would you still do the race?
Well
that was me right there. Far from the shape I should have been in to do
the race. I figured since the doctor gave me antibiotics for 5 days I
would be good after that and still be able to do the race. Well it was
not as simple as that. On the Friday before the race,which was a week
after getting pneumonia, my follow up appointment pointed out I still
had it and would need to go on antibiotic for ten days. All signs I
should stay home and rest.
Unfortunately I had one
thing going against me. I have done various races and challenges inmy
life. This would be the first one I signed up for I did not complete.
That did not sit well with me being such a competitive individual. Not a
nice way to start the New Year. I figured even if I went and walked it I
would have my slowest time EVER but I would have completed it and that
meant more to me than the time. So guess what.... I went.
Walking...
I think not. I heard the gun go off and I had to run with everyone
else. It was tough I have to tell you that. I ran a pretty good 5K. And I
made it to the 10K mark and it was not to shabby a time. For the next 4
miles I did a combination of running and walking. Surprisingly not that
my lungs and breathing was the issue. It was my knees. I was not ready
for this distance.
The last 3 miles were brutal. When I
started to notice the people passing me at a pace that would not have
been able to catch me I am like, "That sucks". Then when I started
getting passed by kids I am like, "Nice, rub it in". It was not until an
old gentleman in white with long hair and a beard passed me with a
shirt that said still running at 83 did I want to throw my hat on the
ground and kick it saying. "Oh come on....!!!!!!". I had to let all of
them go. My legs were not going to do any more than they had been doing.
The
hardest thing for me was not to finish in the slow time I did. Although
2 hours and 20 minutes is not a shabby time for my condition I have to
say. It was 40 minutes slower than I should have been able to run it.
No, the hardest thing was not to be able to sprint to the finish. The
thing I do every time I race. Finish hard is what I say. I was only able
to muster up enough juice to do a little bit of a jog the few feet
before. I was done. Done in so many ways. At least I completed the race.
I can be proud of that.
I guarantee you I will be back to run this thing next year and I will be kicking ass and taking names.
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