2 weeks

Wow. Didn't realize it's been about 2 months since I've posted anything. Oops. Things have been busy. Things have also been sneaking up on me. Here we are 15 days from the 2015 BolderBoulder. The last month or so, while time has been flying by, I've been moving very slowly. I've been dealing with shin splints in my right leg. If I was smart, I would have stopped when the symptoms showed up, but I didn't. I finally went to the doctor this past week, and he confirmed it. It could be worse. I'm lucky it's not a stress fracture, which is what I had feared had happened. The pain is manageable, but the down side to that is I've really had to lay low with the running. With laying low, I've put on some extra weight, which I'm sure doesn't help.

I've been struggling, both with not being able to run enough, but with my weight. I had done so good, but once Thanksgiving hit, things just slid. I know I can bounce back, the problem is just getting myself to do it right now. I know what I need to do. I've been finding bits of motivation here and there, and it's helping. Like today, I didn't want to run, but I did. 3.12 miles in just over 26 minutes. If I can maintain the pace I ran today, but over 6 miles, I be sitting really good to reach my goal of 50 to 52 minutes in Boulder.

One of those bits of inspiration came today while running. Somewhere around the start of my second mile, a song came on. I haven't run with music in a while, but I really wanted to keep my head clear of distractions, and I figured it was time to start doing this again. It seemed to work, I only looked at my watch a couple of times, and it was mostly just checking distance, not time. But anyway, a song came on around mile 2 and it really brought a strong drive to finish hard. It's called "Rise" by Justin Roth. It was on the mix that the wonderful people at BolderBoulder and KBCO put out every year.


Just something about this song really made things click. It made any doubt that I would finish today's run go away. My struggle though pain or weakness is nothing compared to the struggle other's have to go through. Just as the people of Colorado have risen back from fire and flood, I too will rise and come back from what's going on with me. They've come back strong and resilient, I'm going to bounce back and run my best on May 25th. I can't wait.