running scared.

I was never a runner.

I was awful at soccer as a kid because I didn't run like the girls who were actually good (I stopped playing because one girl made fun of me). I started swimming on a team when I was 10 and never looked back. When we ran during the first week of high school team practice when I was a freshman, I was slow and couldn't keep up. One coach told me once that swimmers don't need to be runners, so I listened and never focused on running. (Now I know that's not really true but my 15-year-old brain found it to be a great excuse.)

Now I want to be a runner. Some might say I am a runner because I have done a few 5ks and a 10k. And I'm starting to focus on that half marathon in December. But I still have a long way to go. And I'm scared.

I'm not scared of the distance.
I'm not scared to be slower than my friends.
I'm not scared to do the training.

I'm scared of getting hurt.

I had shin splints. With some help from ART and a shift in my form (from heavy heel-striking to mid-foot-striking), shin splints are gone.

I felt something "snap" back in July on a run. I stopped running for a while.

I had such a tight posterior tibialis muscle - a pain I had never felt before, not even with shin splints - that I was concerned that I had a stress fracture. I stopped running for a while. Thankfully, it was just a muscle, but still.

Lately, my ankles have been so stiff that it's hard to walk up and down stairs after I run, even after icing and stretching.

I want to run. I want to be faster than I am now. But I am scared of being hurt.

I'm used to being sore. Swimming a lot makes you sore, especially when you're putting in yards you haven't in a while. But being sore from swimming and being sore from running are different things. In swimming, I can tell the difference between being sore and being injured. In running, for me at least, it's a little harder.

You probably don't care. Running might be easier for you, or you don't do it at all. Maybe you think running is stupid. But I am still trying to figure out how to tell if I am just feeling dead or if my legs really need a break.

Tomorrow I am taking a break from swimming, just to sleep. I need to get rid of this blah feeling and twitchy eye that I have been dealing with today. Then, I'm going to try to convince myself that I am OK, and running is OK, and I can do this. I think I question myself on sore vs. injury because I am scared of pushing myself.

But why?

I know how to push myself. I just need to get my shit together and actually prove it.

master swimmer.

Fall always makes me think of swimming, for some reason. It's probably different from most people, who associate swimming with summer, but for me, fall brings back memories of competing on my swim team in high school. 

I didn't swim in college. I went to a smallish Division I school that didn't have a swim team, so I joined a sorority instead. By then I was ready for a break from swimming anyway. But now when I look back on it, being on the swim team in high school was one of the best times I can remember.

We were a genuine team. A family, almost. We were quirky but we had fun, and not to brag, but we were good. We always seemed at the top of the pack, including my freshman and senior years when we won our conference meets.

Parts of my life were shaped in large part to my time spent at a pool. There's no crying in swimming (seriously - we maybe made fun of swimmers who cried when they lost). There's no quitting or skipping sets. You've got to have pride in what you've accomplished, even when it feels crummy to lose a meet by two points against one of your biggest rivals. We had a long list of goals, that I still have somewhere. They all still ring true.

To this day, a handful of the people I keep in touch with from high school were teammates.I don't think I'll ever be able to replicate the camaraderie that I found as a member of the swim team. No one will ever call me Swim Bible in my everyday life (but yes, that was my nickname on the team). But recently, in my attempts to increase my fitness as part of my half marathon training, I decided I was going to try to go to the local masters swim workouts. And I have to say, I was surprised.

I wasn't surprised at how hard it was to do any workout that contained butterfly. I wasn't surprised at how many 500s we would swim on a distance workout day. I wasn't even surprised at how much yardage I could cram into 80 minutes of swimming. But I was (pleasantly) surprised at how nice people were.

I'm not sure why. Somewhere along the way I have learned that swimmers (and triathletes for that matter) are friendly folks who are sometimes a bit odd. If you know any swimmers or triathletes (and probably runners), you know that they are a little bit more eccentric than other active people. They wake up at 4 or 5 to train. They train sometimes multiple times in a day. Almost every day of the week. For fun. But still, to have strangers tell me hello and good morning, and wish me a good day as I leave the locker room... it's not the type of greeting you would usually receive many other places.

For me, swimming fills a void. Yes, swimming two miles is hard. But it sure feels great to be back in the water.

Look at that form...

I still miss those days back in high school sometimes. I miss being part of a team that had cheers and bright green sweatpants and singalongs on the bus (with songs that aren't exactly PC or appropriate, as if it mattered). I miss being part of a team that was working toward a common goal (like conference or state meets) and that could relate to exactly what was going on in my life (like school plus morning and afternoon practice plus Monday night band rehearsals) because they were doing the exact same thing. Now people have families and jobs and that sort of thing, but in my mind, it's totally different.

If you want to make a love connection with the pool, consider joining a masters team in your area. Being part of a masters team will give you a workout, and someone to push you out of your comfort zone. You might not go to meets together and have t-shirts with slogans about winning (like one of my favorites from my freshman year: We are one*. [*One that will beat you.]), but you will at least find others who are doing something they enjoy and want to work hard at.

Were you on a team of some sort in high school or college? Do you ever miss it? What sort of activities have you found in your adult life that keep you connected to something you enjoyed from your past?

12 weeks to go.

Last week I started my half marathon training. Yikes. If you remember, back in May I signed up for the Rock n Roll Half in Las Vegas, which is the first weekend of December. I have had some setbacks since I signed up but last week on Monday I started my training plan. And for the most part, I've stuck to it.

With just 12 weeks (or maybe 11 and 6 days) to go until my half (my very first half, since I ended up being unable to run the one I signed up for in July), there are a few things I need to remember. If you have advice for me that I might not have thought of, leave me a note - I am a bit nervous and would appreciate hearing your experiences.

Remember:

• Sleeping is just as important as training. When you can't get enough sleep (especially on a regular basis), you aren't going to do yourself any good on the treadmill, on a trail, in your job or just in a normal day. Don't feel bad about sleeping when you need to.
• Your training plan will work if you follow a particular schedule. I actually coach on a youth swim team, and am at the pool every Tuesday and Thursday night after I leave my day job. This means I either run in the morning, or I run at 8:30 at night. Which do you think I prefer? (This is a trick question: the answer is really neither. But running the morning is easier than at night in this case!)
• Not to eat everything in sight. This is particularly important on swim days. How can swimming possibly make anyone so hungry?!
• Running fast is not always the most important thing. If I wanted to run fast, I would stick to 5ks. I have never run a half before, like I said, and right now I need to remember that I am running for endurance, not for speed. It is OK to run "slow" - really it just means you're slower than other people.
• The altitude around my neighborhood is 6,500 feet. The altitude in Las Vegas is 2,000 feet. That's a noticeable difference. It's gonna be fine. 
• No matter what happens, it's gonna be fine. Have fun!

Remember that one time I ran a 10k?

I was reading the notes on Hal Higdon's half marathon training plan (which is what mine is based off of, although not exactly) and I like that he says you don't have to run exactly the distance on the plan. Even though most of my running is done on a treadmill right now - hey, it's real dark and scary at 5 a.m. - it's nice to know if I can't do the last .1 mile or want to run .5 more, I could. I know, I don't have to run exactly 3.5 miles just because my training plan says, but I'm still kind of trying to figure this out.

I'm still a work in progress with this running thing, but that's OK. Maybe someday I'll progress to a marathon, since it's something I still would really like to do. Maybe someday I'll bust out my bike and do a triathlon. Maybe someday I'll stop worrying about what other people think when they see me running, and just run because I like it.

And for once in my life, I can actually do it.