I’m Still Here….Sort Of a Race Recap

I literally feel like I am crawling back up the mountain that was my attained fitness and weight loss.  I am so wanting to get back to where I was, and so discouraged by how far I have slipped off the cliff.

I used to run right onto my blog and post race recaps after running my races.  I have actually done four races so far this year, and I haven’t posted about a single one yet.  Why?  I’m embarassed and horrified as to how far I have let everything slide.

Plus I hate reading those blogs, you know?  The ones where the person writing makes the same mistakes over and over and over, disappears for a while, and then magically thinks they have it figured out This. Time.  You just kind of want to smack them and tell them, duh, stop eating so much crap and maybe move around a little more.

Yeah.  Except I keep telling that shit to myself these days and somehow, some way, I’ve managed to gain 5 MORE pounds since Christmas, to bring my tally up to about 17 pounds gained in the last year.  On my five foot tall frame, that’s a boat load of weight (or a wide load, as the case may be…).  It’s two clothing sizes.  It’s certainly some bra sizes but I haven’t honestly checked (I had some old “fat” bras I never got rid of in the bottom of the drawer).

I am so far gone I don’t even really care that much any more about the whole thing.  Sure, I know I’m fat.  Sure, I hate how I look in the mirror.  I really hate that even my underwear doesn’t fit these days.  But I honestly don’t seem to hate it enough to really do what it takes.

Except.

The running thing.  The running thing, which I honestly really do love, is really pissing me off these days.

I have always been a slow runner.  Even when I was at my fittest I never cracked a sub 35 minute 5K.  I never dipped below a 11:00 min/mile for more than a minute or two, tops.

But these days?  Those 36 minute 5Ks that used to frustrate me so much seem like the holy grail.  Kind of like when you were a teenager and you thought you were fat, but you really weren’t, and then you look back and you’re like….damn…..I had no idea how awesome I was back then?  Yeah, kind of like that.

I ran my first 5K of the year on March 13.  It took me over 41 minutes to complete.  Granted,  it was a hilly, not fun course, but still.  41 minutes.

I ran my second 5K six days later.  That one I did with a friend, and we agreed to go together.  We walked a lot.  It was a time of 43 and change (on a flat course!).  Ugh.

The third one I ran on April 2.  It was a big race, and the start was slow.  It was also cold and rainy.  I had hoped for below 40 minutes, but that shit doesn’t happen by magic.  I hadn’t been running and it showed.  I clocked in again over 41 minutes.

That day I set up my RunKeeper Beginning 5K program, ready to start all over again.  I know that when I have a plan running, it kind of pushes me to get those runs in.  So I am on week three of that now, obviously not done with the plan by any stretch.

Today’s 5K was a bit better.  I don’t have an official time, and my app didn’t start right at the gun, but I am reasonably sure I ran somewhere around 39 and changed based on the timing clock as I crossed.  Definitely an improvement, and a lesson too:  you have to do the training if you want to run the race.

So here I am, trying to claw my way back.  I don’t have any races coming up as of yet, although I would like to get back to my “one race a month” during running season.  My girlfriend is trying to get me to commit to another triathlon this summer, and I would love to do it.  I just don’t know if I can get from here to there by then.  I think I can. Maybe I can.

For now, I’m literally putting one foot in front of the other, and hoping to turn this big assed ship around.