You guys, I am so tired of sweating. Maybe not sweating, but showering. And blow drying my hair. Yeah, that’s it. All the showers and blow drying.
Happy New Year, I know.
As a little New Year’s Resolution challenge to myself, I decided to take on the Winter Warrior Challenge from Marathon Sports, one of the major local running stores in the Boston area. For $7, I was set up with a RaceMenu account to track my Gold, Silver, or Bronze status for running 5, 3, or 1 mile(s) a day, outside, for the entire month of January. 31 days, in the elements, no excuses.
Originally I kind of thought I’d go with a mile a day. I can manage that, I (correctly) assumed. What’s 10 minutes, max, every single day? Then, the New Year started with my running club’s annual New Year’s brrrRUNch, a 5K jaunt through a neighboring town. On day two I figured, Hey, may as well stick to 3 miles for the weekend, which resonated again on day three.
Day four was tougher, I think, because it was too dark to run alone in the morning and I’m afraid of ice, so I took a really long walk on my lunch break (walking is allowed), step-by-step to get to three. I decided a 3:1 ratio was probably best – run three days, walk one. I have a totally tweaked knee right now, but for some reason walking and running is the best it feels, so I’ve tried to bury that excuse too. I ran three in a flurry, on a pretty warm morning with my running buddy before the sun, and in an absolute deluge on Sunday afternoon, squelching with each step.
Last night my sister was over to visit after her vacation, which meant I could get out for three guilt-free miles while she played with Henry (they’re best friends), but it was so much more tempting to pour a glass of red and catch up. Just go, she reminded me. At least try to do three a day til the halfway point. I had two glasses after instead. I didn’t go to bed until 4 AM this morning, up all night while H tossed and turned, wailing now and again, double-ear infected and feverish. I cancelled my buddy run for 5 AM as I finally drifted off for a fitful few hours; with Nik home for the sick day, I’ll sneak out for three more tonight.
It’s kind of wild what we’re capable of when we just do it, don’t you think? If I had decided on a mile a day, I’d be doing it, but facing the same exact wallowing, I have no doubt. Do I really have the time and I don’t feel like it would be replaced with Why bother? It’s only one mile, I’m absolutely sure. But something is better than nothing and coming up with 25 minutes to be active isn’t really that much time to find over the course of 24-hours.
It’s the sweating and the showering and the blow-drying that might just put me over the edge, though, not the miles. How weird is that? That the cleaning up from running becomes the actual work?
Are you challenging yourself this New Year? I’m working on some goals, but haven’t thought enough about it to spell them out just yet. 350-something days to go to figure that out; for now my countdown is at 19.