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Today I bailed on a half marathon I was supposed to run tomorrow. It pains me to leave money on the table. It frustrates me to not finish what I started. I feel shame for not following through on a commitment I made to my training partner and to myself. But today, I choose to be prudent.
The last race I fully trained for was the 2017 Eugene Marathon. In spite of a fast finish time, that race destroyed me physically and mentally. I recovered physically enough to race two relays a few months later, but by the fall of 2017 my body told me in no uncertain terms that it needed a break.
Painful tendonitis in my knee plagued me for the next nine months. My run streak stayed in tact, but my weekly mileage went from 40+ fast miles to 20 slow, painful ones. My run streak hit 1,000 days on April 4, 2018. I contemplated breaking my streak the next day, but I couldn't do it. I'm too invested in my streak to not run if I'm capable. God knew I would need it.
Five weeks later, one of our closest friends passed away unexpectedly and in the week that followed, suffering upon suffering besieged three more families we are close to. The grief was suffocating. Eight long months have passed, and there are moments of grief that still take my breath away.
In those eight months I have run four races, none of which I was properly prepared for. Predictably they were slower finish times, but faster than I should have been able to run given my lack of training. My streak is intact and just passed 1,300 days. It has been a vehicle God has consistently used in my life to grieve, process, brainstorm, find encouragement and build friendship. I AM SO GRATEFUL!
But I can't seem to find my running mojo. I have gained some weight. Lost a ton of speed. Put races tentatively on my calendar then scratched them when I didn't have the energy or time to start hard workouts again. It's not my favorite place to be.
Dawn, my training partner and one of my best friends, felt the same way. In early December 2018, we picked the Roaring Run half marathon and registered so we wouldn't back out. Our hope was that a few weeks of training would put us back in the groove and our finish time would give us a gauge for our current fitness level. This was Phase One of our Get Back in Shape plan. Phase Two is a late spring half marathon, one we can be fully trained to actually race.
I did get back to the track a few times, banged out some tempo runs, and eked out some double digit long runs. It felt good to conquer hard workouts again and I was really looking forward to the race tomorrow.
But then I got The Newberg Plague of 2019. It was the first time in years that I have been legitimately sick with fever and body aches and All The Things. "One continuous mile" on sick days feels just as difficult as 20 miles on a healthy day. I'm so happy my streak is still alive! Dawn got her own version of The Plague a few days after I did. Neither of us are close to full energy again.
Could we run tomorrow? Yes. But it would be slow, not fun, and the following exhaustion would wipe us out for a couple of days. Our Phase One goal was to break out of our funk and start doing some hard workouts again. We did that. We won't have a race time tomorrow, but that's okay. It's just not worth it.
The book of Proverbs in the Bible talks a lot about wisdom, understanding and prudence, likening them to rare treasures to be sought after. In this scenario, it seems the PRUDENT thing is to fix our eyes on the future (Phase 2) and take this weekend to keep resting and recovering. So that's what we're going to do.
I changed my Facebook profile photo to a race picture when I felt strong, fast and confident. I'm hoping it will be the reminder I need to combine newfound prudence with ambition.
What about you? What areas of your life would benefit from some prudence? What areas of your life need some ambition? Let's get after it together.
Running through life together...
Jodi
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