Mile Three

So I'm trying to work my way back to running four miles, my pre-surgery run. Last week I managed to hit just over 2 miles. My goal this week was to do three. I mapped it out ahead of time, knew exactly what roads I was running on, and it would add up to exactly 3 miles.

So today I headed out. Mile one....not so bad. Heading into mile two, I thought oh, my goodness, this is still rough. At the end of mile two, I'm thinking I don't know if I can do this. My leg muscles started tightening up and felt like lead weights. I started struggling with the breathing a little, cramping a little on my side and started to doubt myself. Why am I doing this? Maybe it's too soon after surgery. I am really this out of shape? Maybe I should just give up and walk it and try again tomorrow.

So what did I do? I talked to myself, you can do this, relax, slow down a little, catch your breath, enjoy the music a little, this is not a race, one step at a time. Well, I did not give up. I just kept moving forward. The cramp in my side went away and the breathing got a little easier. Step by step, I was getting through the last mile, until finally, I MADE IT!!!!!!! Yeah!

I feel good about that. I should be back to 4 miles before I know and then I'll go from there. My goal for the end of the summer is to be able to run 10K, not necessarily an official 10K face but for me to be able to run the distance. Or maybe I'll enter the same 5K as last year, but I'll run it twice! Some other man did that last year. I thought that was the coolest!