This blog post was delayed by several weeks.
Get over it; at least we’re all still here, right?

Trying to make sense of my emotions, running-wise. I didn’t train as hard as I felt like I should have after Mountains 2 Beach, but I trained. I didn’t do as much strength, flexibility and movement work as I definitely should have done, but I did some. The results? Two half marathons six weeks apart, both a tremendous improvement on my tentative performance at the Mountains 2 Beach half marathon, both ended up essentially the same.

SHORELINE HALF MARATHON, VENTURA. EARLY JULY:

Nervous about how well I was going to do on that cool, breezy morning at the start line overlooking the beach in Ventura. Fellow running friends are there. One of them, a fellow pacer, and another one a new runner who would run with him. Motivational music blares from the start line speakers. Excitement permeates the festival atmosphere, rare on an early Sunday morning but common for road races.

Crack! The starting gun goes off, and we race out of the starting gate, cross a grassy field and file onto the skinny bike path that leads north along the beach, meeting up with the Pacific Coast Highway where a row of skinny, orange pylons protect us all from automobile traffic speeding the opposite way. I lock into a slightly painful but comfortable 9:30/mile pace and with gritted teeth prepare myself for the journey ahead. A few hills, but nothing serious. Four miles in, it feels like we are running uphill. Our visual sense confirms this to us as several runners around me look forward to the turnaround and a nice long downhill run to the finish. We make the turn, but alas, we are denied! The anticipated downhill is just another flat surface that thanks to our depth perception feels like another uphill. Ha! I think out loud. A flat course!

My thoughts turn to my body: it has been about three months since the quadriceps injury. I think back to the strength training, and all the fear and anguish I felt as I realized how far I had fallen behind, and how much work I had done to get back to the point where I could even begin to train again. Look how far I’d come! My fellow LA Road Runners pacer runs past me near the ten mile mark, and tells me the woman he was pacing has decided to walk. He could easily have completed the race with a 1:45 or better time, but hey, it’s just a race, one of many, and it feels great to be out in the sun, running down the beach path on this glorious summer morning. He finishes just ahead of me, and I finish in 2:05 and change, a full ten minutes faster than poor ol’ Mountains 2 Beach a mere six weeks earlier.

I feel great! And with another six weeks to go before the Santa Rosa half marathon up in beautiful (you guessed it) Santa Rosa, California, there is nowhere to go but up!

SANTA ROSA HALF MARATHON, EARLY SEPTEMBER

Nervous about how well I was going to do on that even cooler, breezier morning at the start line in downtown Santa Rosa. Downright bone-chilling. A good omen, though. A few friends are there as well, some running the half, like me, and others running the full marathon. Rows of portable bathrooms, tables set up for post race food and beer in the beer garden. Motivational music blaring from the start line speakers, excitement permeating, yadda yadda yadda.

Crack! Dammit, I think to myself, I can’t get the Strava app on my phone to link up in order to enable family and friends to “follow” me. Fukkit; just use the timer. Off I go, meandering through downtown before hitting the long green tunnel route that follows a creek deep into redwood and wine country. This course is even flatter than Shoreline, and I settle into– hmm; let me check. Yep. 9:30 per mile pace.

I spent $400 including car rental and motel for a repeat of my previous race? Apparently so. But despite the pinched nerve in my left foot giving me a bit of trouble, I hang on, compliment and encourage other runners, cheer the fastest returning marathoners who had started an hour earlier and were now on their way back, and just enjoy the verdant, rolling scenery.

I finish in 2:04.

ANALYSIS

Am I proud of both accomplishments? Undoubtedly yes. Crawling back from a serious injury, essentially restarting my personal racing clock, is one of the most physically difficult things an athlete can do. Especially (and boy do I ever hate to say this, but to deny it would be so, so wrong) at this age. Nine times out of ten, runners in their late 40’s and beyond simply stop training and do something else when faced with the daunting task of getting behind that boulder, and like Sisyphus, grinding him or herself into the menial task of shoving that burden up the hill. Again.

Still, why did I dial the intensity back? Fear of re-injury? No doubt. I had also gained ten pounds. Not sure why about that, either. But it happened.

Between Mountains 2 Beach and Shoreline, I googled training exercises and programs, signed up for virtual training from a well known mountain and trail runner. Did the exercises. Had trouble with her app because of the age of my phone, but it was all right there. I simply– slacked.

CONCLUSION

And perhaps slacking was part of my recovery journey. I didn’t give up. I didn’t even sit down and “re-evaluate” my goals. I know what my goals are, and I know I can achieve them. But it’s like love. Can a broken-hearted person learn to love again? Many do. And acknowledging your broken heart, feeling it slowly and tentatively heal, taking the steps to test its strength, then easing back for a time to catch one’s breath before moving forward again is part of the healing and revitalizing process.

But it’s time to get back on that horse again, to move forward now. Nothing is permanent, and the clock is ticking. I want to see how far my running body can take me. So I need to continue to commit to making all those little tasks– strength training, flexibility and movement training, long runs and speed work, the bedrock of my life again. I need to look a year in advance, and register for tune up races and ultimately the marathon where I will PR and qualify for the Boston Marathon with as many minutes to spare as I possibly can. And along the way, enjoy the long green tunnels and the windy, ragged beaches.

Because we’re only here once, and sometimes, we have to cram two lifetimes’ worth of challenges into the only life we have.

Learn to love again.
Learn to love again.