Running for your life

3.3K followers

Updated 7 years ago

I never thought that I would write a post like this...

But the truth is, although, I have hated running my whole life it has given me a new lease on life. Who would've thought?

So as you may or may not know I have just returned from the good ole U.S. of A.

Now I have every excuse under the sun for not getting things done and the worst one is not going running.

I returned over a week ago and the thought of running has filled me with dread. Every morning this week I have lain in bed and steadfastly hung onto my bed sheets denying my body the pleasure of a run. (Don't laugh, as if my body thought of running as pleasure - those two words should never be said in the same breath).

For those of you who don't know, Australia is heading into winter - in fact today is our official first day of winter. And yes it's seriously cold here in the mornings! (3 degrees Celsius or 37.4 Fahrenheit)

So as each day has passed I have been blissfully slumbering in my warm (electric blanket) bed and letting the world slip by but it wasn't as blissful as I would have liked...no, there was this nagging thought in the back of my head - damn it!

Finally this morning (Thursday morning) I had to stop fooling myself into believing that health happens without any effort. So tentatively I peeled back the covers to let that cold morning air hit my body. I was tempted to pull the blankets back over my body and call it a day.

Something stopped me...it's called a conscience and a commitment or idiocy - you can take your pick.

You will not believe it but while I was in America I put on weight - a full 3 kilos! (6.6 pounds!) My good work prior had gone out the window. But that's not the worst of it, I am back at 90 kilos (198.4 pounds) and if you have followed my story you will know I was stuck on this weight for a full 3 months - geez!

I had a compelling reason to get up this morning - I had entered myself into a 14 kilometre race (8.6 miles) for charity (If you want to send a couple of dollars to my cause PM me and I will send you a link - it's for a research institute who are working on cures for cancer. To sweeten the pot I am also going to make a Steampunk artefact for the one who donates the most, $53 AUD is the highest so far. The Steampunk artefact will be up to the value of $1,000 AUD).

They call it a fun run (how can they put those two words together?) for charity. You can Google it - City2Surf.

City2Surf has competitions that link to your watch tracker. Yep, just sync your tracker to their app and you are automatically entered into some competitions before the 'real' event in August.

Unfortunately the Pebble watch I bought does not link to their app - so I had to go out and buy another tracker. I bought a Fitbit which is on their app list. Like I needed another tracker!

So, I rummage around for my running gear and manage to pull out track suit pants and a T shirt. I am going to freeze my a** off. I find a polo neck sweater, put that on and head out out into the blistery cold.

The cold wind hits me like a knife. In fact by the time I have walked the 1 kilometre to the Bay I think my nose has fallen off my face and my hands are blocks of ice.

While I am walking to the Bay I turn on the Fitbit tracker (it's GPS) so I can record my heart rate, distance run, calories burned and other bits and pieces. After I hit the tracker button I have to wait a couple of minutes for it to link to some nearby satellite, which it does.

So now I have arrived at the Bay and I hit the start button on my watch. NADA - NOTHING, the battery has died between me turning it on and the 1 kilometre walk - GREAT!!!

So I can't prove that I ran this morning. (It's never worried me any other morning-but this morning was going to be different-this watch has all the bells and whistles and it enters me into competitions to earn some prizes).

Not now it's not because it's DEAD!

So feeling a bit blue (It's at times like this that I want to scream at someone!) I start my disillusioned run...