was a skinny, seventeen-year-old kid in June 1984 when I ran my first 10K race on the grounds of Chanute Air Force Base near Rantoul, Illinois. My Lieutenant Colonel uncle and nineteen-year-old cousin, an endurance race junkie, were my running companions, so to speak. The three of us lined up on the starting line together and at the gun, ran as one for about a half mile. At the half-mile point, or maybe a bit before then, my partners left me, a sprinter with no business running more than a mile, to fend for myself on the leftover fitness from my senior year track season. As a just-out-of-high-school sprinter, I felt miserable throughout the 6.2-mile race, but finished it without stopping to walk in just over fifty-four minutes. I stumbled off the course after crossing the line with no desire whatsoever to run another race over 400 meters ever again.
I wonder sometimes what kind of runner I would be by now if instead of loathing the pain of that first event, I had embraced it. When I allow myself to dream a bit, I imagine enduring 26.2 miles at a sub-six minute pace. As the seasoned veteran I see in my mind’s eye, I picture a wall full of first in age group medals hung on the wall beside the treadmill in my basement.
I am nothing like the runner I conjure up. I am a prematurely gray 44-year-old distance running newbie.
In July 2010, I bought my first new pair of running shoes in 26 years. Shortly after I made that purchase, I pulled my gray and red Nikes on and started training for my second 10K race. I was miserable at first. I couldn’t run for more than ten minutes without stopping to walk. During my first run, a three and a half mile walk/run trek around town, I felt nauseous over and over. I didn’t puke, but I thought more than once that I’d surely feel better if I did. My pace at the end was nearly twelve minutes per mile. If I hadn’t already committed money to the shoes and my word to participate in the Run for Missions 10K in October, I might have hung up my shoes then and there.
I’m not sure why, but I believed running would be easier than it was. I’d been cycling seriously for seven years, racking up enough miles to get me around the globe once. I was healthy and strong. How hard could it be to transfer fitness on two wheels to fitness on two feet? I thought. Maybe every newbie thinks the same way. Maybe it’s just me. I don’t know. All I know is this: starting to run is hard. It takes time for the lungs and heart and legs to adjust to the demands placed upon them. The fitness will come, but it won’t come without pain and persistence.
I’m kind of competitive, so when I started running with others I often pushed myself a bit too hard. I would try to keep up with a faster runner or the speedy group rather than hang back with the more sensible runners. This mistake led to many painful finishes as my energy was spent in the first mile and I had to drag myself through the rest of the run. If I’d run my speed instead of fighting to keep up with those who were clearly out of my league, I’d might have finished with a improved overall pace and felt a lot better. As it was, I ended more than my fair share of collective workouts feeling miserable. I’m more careful now about who I run with and how much beyond my regular comfort zone I allow myself to be pushed before I tell my friend to go ahead without me. Taking this tack has reduced my puke quotient and made me a ton happier. Following this plan and ignoring the urge to keep up with the speedy folks passing me at a 5K race on Thanksgiving Day gave me a new personal record at that distance.
I mentioned I’m a bit competitive, right? I laugh now, but I decided early in my running career to check my standing on the leader board on my favorite social network, DailyMile. I kept clicking on the ‘Show More’ link at the bottom of the page. I clicked so many times my pointer finger developed calluses. I’m exaggerating a little, but it was pretty ridiculous. I found myself somewhere around 847th place among my running friends. It was worse when I compared myself to ‘everyone’ on the site. I don’t look at my running leader board very often any more. I’m currently in 102ndamong my friends this week. I’m right behind my friend Patrick G from Wichita. (I peeked.) What good does this information do me? It does me no good, so I just stick with my plan and get in as many miles as I can now. No more comparison. I’m a newbie. I’m not going to be on the top of distance chart for a good long time. What I can do is more than enough for me to worry myself over.
I think you can see that I’m not the perfect runner. I’m not even sure I’m a good newbie. I’m just a guy that’s figuring stuff out. I still find some runs almost unbearably difficult. I occasionally forget and push too hard when I’m running with friends. Every once in awhile I look at the top ten runners on DailyMile and sigh wistfully. Then I turn my back on those experienced runners and do my own thing. I run my own pace which has gotten better. The nearly 12-minute per mile newbie has become a fairly consistent sub-8 newbie.
Now, don’t compare yourself to me. Get out there and run your pace! (originally posted on the DailyMile Community Blog)
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