I'm that kid. . .

Disclaimer: This is not a pity post.  I'm not asking for, nor looking for your pity.  In fact, I don't want it.  I don't need it.  Please take it elsewhere.  This is simply an observation, some thoughts, and acceptance on my part.

I started running for real on Thanksgiving Day, 2009.  I had done some running before that.  My father used to get me up at 5 in the morning when I was in Junior High to go jogging with him.  I did some running in medical school.  But then I sort of stopped.  Something changed that November morning and I went and ran about 5 miles, a new record distance for me.

Since that time I have continued to run, though with varying degrees of success at different times.  Last year was great up until the marathon in October.  Then I sort of slipped, was really tired (ya know, residency will do that to you) and didn't do great.  But we signed up for a half-marathon and I had some motivation again.  It was great to remember again just how good it feels to go out and move across the earth.

Our half-marathon was this past Saturday.  My wife and her friend did really great.  They were faster than me by far (no surprise), and even faster than they thought they would be.  I was super excited she did so well.  But I honestly had some difficulty with her congratulating me and being proud for me as well.  I mean, she ran it well and fast.  I just ran it.  Then the metaphor hit me.  I realized what kind of runner I am.

I'm sure we all know that one kid on the sports team.  Pick your sport, it doesn't really matter.  Let's go with basketball for sake of this blog, since I like basketball the most.  But there is always that one kid on the team.  He enjoys playing, but is just not good.  He scores occasionally, but will never make the winning basket.  He has a few assists, but more often than not either gets picked off or just throws it away when trying to pass.  And he dribbles off his own foot as often as he does the floor.

His mommy and daddy are proud of him because he is "there".  He's playing his hardest, despite the fact that, frankly, he sucks.  In fact, the team would be better off if he wasn't there, but no one has the heart to tell him that.  He just doesn't realize how bad he is, and that he is never going to be good at basketball.  Everyone just cheers because they are decent people and sort of feel sorry for him.  Fortunately for him, he just hears the cheers, and doesn't care.

I'm that kid. 

I'll go out and run.  I'll do okay, but I will never win a race, never win my age division, and will just constantly "finish" whatever race I enter.  And as I cross that finish line, there will be people cheering for me.  The only problem is, unlike that kid on the basketball court, blissfully ignorant, I know I'm that kid.  I know that, without mincing words, I kind of suck.

But I have accepted that.  So I will just continue to run, even though I kind of suck at it.

Losing myself

I managed 10.5 miles this morning.  Kept my pace about the same as it has been.  It was ridiculously cold (3 degrees F), but once I got going, it felt great.  I am beginning to think I just might be as crazy as people keep telling me I am.

Needless to say, over the course of the past few months I have been pretty regular with the exercise.  I have been doing some resistance training along with the running.  And I am finally starting to notice some results.  My pants are getting quite baggy.  Particularly through the legs.  This is unusual for me, as I have always had beefy legs.

So, I decided to break out the tape measure and see what was going on.  Here are some comparisons to this summer.

I have lost 20 lbs

I have lost 2.5 inches in my waist

I have lost 3 inches in my chest

I have lost 3 inches in my hips

I have lost 3 inches from EACH thigh

Slowly, but surely, I am losing myself.  I think I like this.

A moment of revelation

In an effort to improve my over all health, I decided to plunge back in to the world of regular exercise. It is amazing how poorly us doctors do at taking care of ourselves. The medical field has created this culture of self-neglect. In some aspects, I think the pendulum is swinging a bit. However, life as a resident is built on a firm dictatorial foundation. As in you dictate next to nothing about your life. However, as this year is my "research" year, I felt it was the best time to establish some healthier habits, ones that hopefully I can carry through the next two years after this until I am done and (hopefully) have a little more control over my schedule. As such, I have rediscovered that perhaps running isn't just as insane as I used to think it was. Here is a little secret: I used to hate running. In fact, hate may just not be sufficiently strong to convey my feelings about it. I loathed it. I thought it was evil, a beast that should be chained in the deepest pit of Tartarus. Yeah, not a fan. But biking just wasn't doing it for me. It didn't feel like enough of a workout unless I really went for a while. Still fun, but just not what I was looking for. So I decided I would try running again. I have flirted with running in the past. I have even reached a point where I didn't despise the very thought of it. But I never honestly could say I liked it. Until this morning. Getting back in the swing of things after some sickness and some stress at work, Thanksgiving morning I went for a 5.5 mile run. The most I have done in at least 4 years or so. It hurt. But mentally I was pleased I had done it, even if it was not fun. I have done pretty well since then, running regularly (a well as some cross training with weights, jump rope, etc.) with one other >5 mile run.

I planned to do a 10k this morning.

10k isn't a lot for people who actually run. You know, people who are healthy and in shape. Those sorts of people. But for those like me, you know, us fatties, 10k is a long freaking distance. I mean seriously, moving my meaty frame at a constant jog for 6.2 miles is a pretty big deal. So it took some mental preparation. I knew how far to go, where to turn around and had a sound plan.

0630 this morning I set out. A tad later than I was initially planning, but still early enough. As usual, it felt a little rough for the first kilometer or so. But I kept going and eventually it stopped hurting, and if it didn't feel good, it wasn't at least feeling awful.

Then "it" happened. For the past week the Nike+ sensor in my shoe had been telling me the battery was low. But it had still been working, recording my mileage and telling me when to turn around. Alas, at 3.92k my iPod told me it had stopped recording activity. Yep, my sensor was dead.

I won't lie. There was a part of me that just about turned around then. It would have been 8k, not bad and still a good run.

But I still could listen to music, and I knew when to turn around to make it the full 10k. So I decided to press on. I hit the half-way point and a funny thing happened. I decided to go a little farther. I knew how far to go to add another half mile out, adding a full additional mile to the run. 7.2 miles was sounding pretty good. Still, sitting in the back of my mind was the fact that however far I went away from home, I had that far to go on the return trip.

But I made it. Then another funny thing happened. I decided to go a bit farther. Up, over the pasarela (overpass, but for some reason they will always be pasarelas to me) and up to the High School. There I decided to turn around. I was actually feeling pretty good. Granted, I wasn't setting any speed records, but I was still running my pace and in a groove.

Five miles into the run, with a way to go still the weirdest thing happened. Something I have never felt before. I felt great. Not just good, but great. I'm talking grinning from ear to ear, breathlessly singing along with my iPod, giving high-fives to the low hanging tree branches great. I felt giddy.

I have heard about a "runner's high". Lis talks about them and my dad has even made mention of it. I thought it was fiction. You know, something that runners talk about to fool us regular folk in to running, telling us eventually we will feel it just to keep us going. In short, I thought it was a lie.

Not any more.

I felt higher than a kite this morning. I don't regularly use mind or mood altering substances. I have, on very few occasions, used narcotics while in the throws of passing kidney stones. I hated those. No idea why people would pay good money to feel that way.

But this was different. If I could have bottled this feeling to sell, I would be a millionaire. I felt invincible. I loved it. I crave feeling it again.

Oh dear. Looks like I got my first hit today, and now I am hooked. I just may become something of a junkie. 7.8 miles done, and I was already planning next week's runs. And, yes, I bought a new sensor today.

iPod and Nike+: A Match Made in Heaven

A while ago I wrote an article I titled: iPod and Nike, a match made in marketing. It isn't a long article, but in short, I slammed the idea as nothing more than a lame gimmick to get people to buy more stuff. I even went so far as to say "I wouldn't be interested at all."

Two years later I have to say the following: Not only is it a gimmick, it is the coolest freaking gimmick in the world.

I said I didn't see new runners being motivated by this scheme. WRONG. I also said I didn't see current runners getting into it either. Again, WRONG. A friend of mine mentioned that he had picked this up and was really enjoying his first foray into the world of running. The more we talked, the more intrigued I was by the idea. There was, however, one problem: I only have a 30 gig hard drive based iPod. The system only works with the Nano (they don't want to encourage people to jostle their hard drive around and then call them when it stops working).

Wait, what I meant to say was I only had a 30 gig iPod. Being the sucker I am, I now also have a 3G black 8 gig Nano. I now also have the Nike+ sport pack. This morning I plugged it in, put on my new Nike+ shocks shoes and fired up some good tunes (a little Testament at 5 am). I told the iPod I wanted to run for 30 minutes, then hit start. Then I started running. Well, okay, jogging. Calling it running is a bit unfair to, well, running.

After five minutes a voice calmly let me know I had been going for five minutes. I pushed the select button and that same voice told me how long I had been running, how far I had gone, what my current pace was. Once it was all over it told me how far I had gone, how many calories I had burned (calculated pretty well based on your weight which you enter), and what my average pace was.

I then plugged my iPod into my computer and all that information was uploaded to my Nikeplus.com page. On my Nike+ page I now have goals. I also joined a competition for beginning runners: the first to run 50 miles. I might not win, but heck, I might. And if I don't, I have something to work towards.

Overall, I love it. Sure, I can see that it is a gimmick. But I actually see it as a very motivating gimmick.