The frustrating thing about knowing most of the people that read my blog is knowing that I can’t say “I BET NONE OF YOU RAN 10 MILES THIS WEEKEND”. In fact, I know that a lot of you probably did.
But, this isn’t about you. This is about me. And I RAN 10 MILES THIS WEEKEND!
That’s right, 10 statute miles. If you were searching for the closest me on a website, you’d have to select the second radio button, because I was more than 10 miles away. If you wanted to track my mileage, your odometer needs a 10’s digit, or the ability to remember a 10’s digit, or you need to be counting in base 12 or base 16, in which case you have a screwed up odomoter. Plus my blog is hard enough to read without saying things like “I ran #0A miles”.
It was glorious! It was amazing! It was life changing! It was at least 11.11% better than running 9 miles! This is so momentous, it needs some kind of marker, like a stone, that marks how far, how many miles, I’ve come.
BUT WHAT COULD WE CALL IT.
Actually, while there’s a little bit of mental celebration, 10 miles feels pretty much like 9 miles before it. My traditional warmup and cooldown were skipped, making this feel a little easier, and there was a little extra walking done while searching for water, crossing busy streets and otherwise navigating city running. On top of that, part of the purpose behind training so hard, so steady, and so sensibly, is so that my next steps feel like evolutions, rather than big breakthroughs.
The run itself was great; I ran with Swem (See Village of Trainers) through the streets of Chicago, through the Loop, past Lower Wacker (no car chases going on, sadly) and out along a beautiful running/biking path that the city has along Lakeshore drive. Being among so many people, seeing so many runners and cyclists was inspiring, compared to running in the suburbs, where I run past cars and children pretty much exclusively. I saw girls in the traditional serious runner outfit, guys bigger than me struggling along in gym shorts and t-shirts, obligatory-inline-skating-backwards guy and what looked like an out of place long distance cycle relay team (dressed to the 9’s in their serious business cyling gear.) We turned around out at the 2.5 mile mark along the lake shore, and took a different route back into the city, which let me see more of this amazing town, including running along crowded Michigan Ave beneath signs like “Tiffany” and “Giorgio Armani” and momentarily outpacing a Dodge Viper who was stuck in city traffic.
I ran 10 miles, something I can honestly say I didn’t think was possible last year at this time. This coming weekend I’ll do it again, and then it’s on to the next milestone.
32 days to the Pittsburgh Half-Marathon.
Wisely and Slow 