Speed is Relative

This is not about speed, by the way. I don't care about speed. Speed is for suckers. I'm going for distance, and endurance, and time measured in hours, and possibly days. A half marathon in half a day sounds good to me. As I used to tell my fire crew-mates who were amazed that I passed the "pack test" (the fitness test where you carry a 40 lb pack for 4 miles in under 45 minutes), I'm more of a mule than a racehorse. But not in that drug smuggling way.

Ever since I started running again last October, I told myself that I would be relaxed, and non-crazy, and listen to my body. And by gods, that's what I've been doing. If the body needs sleep, I sleep in instead of run. If the body needs yoga, I do yoga. If the body needs to walk instead of run for a while... you got it. Those are the same principles that Chi Running applies, in a more formal and well-thought-out way, and which I am practicing right now. Miss Nancy turned me on to the Chi Running last year, and I have to say it's done wonders for my lack of injuries, and relative endurance, so far. More on that later.

We have a training schedule for Team Challenge, but I haven't been keeping to it religiously. (just a little joke there, Coach Carrie and Coach Tim! ha ha! Seriously!) I've been listening more to my body than a piece of paper is what I'm saying. This morning, I ran about 3 miles in 35 minutes. Not bad, I guess, especially because by the mid-point my shoes were utterly soaked, and every step was marked by a distinct squishing sound. Also, I wasn't dressed warmly enough for the chilly morning, and the combo kinda killed my mojo. No excuses. I AM SLOW. AND PROUD.

Since I prefer to run on soft surfaces like grass, and am fortunate enough to live near a long greenway where I can do this, the grass is often still wet from the sprinklers first thing in the morning - and thus gooshy. A few months ago I came home from a run with those little tiny slugs all over my shoes. Ick! I pointed them out to my husband, who dryly remarked, "you musta been going really slow."

So much for his idea of using sex as a "recovery day" activity.

The Non-Half-Assed, Fully Rock n'Roll Marathon Training Blog

There's no turning back now, it's a BLOG! I am officially in training for the Crohn's and Colitis Foundation's Team Challenge Half Marathon, to be held December 5th in sunny Las Vegas, Nevada. For you avid runners, yes that's part of the Rock n' Roll Marathon series, and yes the Vegas version is supposed to be a mixture of Bolder Boulder craziness and well, Vegas. Meaning, there are running Elvi by the hundreds, people getting married while running the course, live bands, juggling, and probably lots of sex and drugs. No, I will not be dressed as Elvis, getting married, playing music, or doing any of those other shenanigans while running. I will, hopefully, be running.
I'm doing this for a few reasons, some of them selfish, and some altruistic. Firstly, my friend Miss Nancy Freimuth was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis/Crohns over 10 years ago, and she ran the Team Challenge half marathon in Napa a couple years ago. You may know of her excellent blog account of the experience, "The Run to Erase the Runs." http://nancyruns.tumblr.com/
She raised over $5,000 for that effort, and was so impressive in general that CCFA immediately set about hiring her to be part of their fund-raising staff! Smart folks, those CCFA'ers.
Which brings me to the other reason I'm doing this particular half marathon- I am pretty darn impressed with CCFA in general. Those of you that know me know that I'm an insufferable pompous ass, who is, not coincidentally, usually NOT too damn impressed with humanity in general and their/our feeble efforts to survive. In other words, I'm an anthropologist. But all kidding aside, I'm very pragmatic (some would say "cold and clinical") when it comes to diseases of the human. There are many I don't think we have a chance in hell of curing, and I don't waste my time or money on them. These days, it seems a new disease or disaster pops up every ten minutes, and we are all suffering from bad-news exhaustion, coupled with the crippling paralysis of believing we can do nothing about it. Donating money to these causes feels like you're just throwing it into a huge black hole, at times.
The Crohns' and Colitis Foundation is not one of those black holes.
In fact, it is the polar opposite of a depressing black hole. Picture that hole covered with a huge, yellow smiley face of hope- and you get the idea. These digestive diseases are something I believe we can cure in our lifetimes. That is, completely eradicate. Kaput. Kerfllooeeey. GONE. Is what they will be.
My anthropologist spidey-sense tells me that digestive diseases are the result of an industrialized diet (which humans were really never meant to eat), over-prescribed anti-biotics, background pollution, water pollution, and basically STRESS with a capital T that's flipped all our genetic switches to "CODE PURPLE" for - well I really shouldn't curse here. The folks at CCFA are cognizant of this as well, and for agreeing with me, I commend them. :) Their approach is very open-minded and supportive of whatever treatment you seek, rather than pushing certain drug protocols because they are essentially sponsored and funded by certain drug companies- like some "disease-based" foundations I could name. Nope. The latest research, in fact, includes very promising results from poop transplants, and re-introducing worms to the gut. You read that right. Poop, and worms. Not too many people in America are going to open-arm those things, but CCFA does because it's actually helping their constituents. Take that, Foundations Who Will Not Be Named!
The selfish reasons I could list include the Phorty Phreakout that a woman of my age inevitably goes through- wanting to get back in shape lest I continue the slide into a big pile of goo; and introducing a type of discipline into my life that feeds and enriches me. Namely, I'm doing this training in conjunction with trying to get my writing muscles back in shape too, and I think the discipline/mind clearing of running will help me get there.
However, most of these blog posts will probably be whining about how difficult it is to train when you have a recalcitrant 4 year old daughter who won't stay in her own bed, but keeps me up all night pulling my hair and kicking me because it soothes her. And most of the pictures will be of me lying down, on the grass, "recuperating" after a run. Or, they will be self-portraits of my feet.

I'll end with this quote from one of Naropa's founders, Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, because my husband put it up on the wall today and it made me laugh:
"In the Garden of Gentle Sanity
May you be bombarded by the Coconuts of Wakefulness."

run hard,
Suzy