Morning Runs...?

Full disclosure: Since my last post I have gone on (again!) only two walk/runs.

Better news: one walk/run was in the morning!

School is now back in full swing so instead of getting home around 4:30pm I get home around 5:30 or 6:00pm. Japan doesn't do the whole daylight savings shenanigan so these days it gets dark around 6:45pm. I have found that by the time I run errands after school and finally get into my running clothes...well, I've got about a 15 minute window of daylight left.

Which wouldn't be so bad.

Full disclosure 2: I am actually a little afraid of the dark. Plus I have no established routes; I just run down streets until I have to find my way back again. Doing that in the dark would probably be much less exciting and much more terrifying.

So on my last after school run I came upon an interesting thought. I was trying to decide if I should push myself a bit more than I am. I sprained my ankle in March which is making me additionally cautious. But I then thought about my life as an athlete and all I used to do so maybe I'm just being lazy...?

Then it came to me: I was an athlete up until my junior year of high school. I was probably strongest my freshmen year. That was almost ten years ago.

I think our bodies keep much better track of the passage of time than our minds do.

Nothing to be discouraged about. I used to be 14 years old and incredibly fit. Now I'm 23 years old, mildly unfit and a bit over-weight. That's reality. I still feel like a running god for not giving up on this whole thing. But keeping reality in mind instead of some self-concept almost a decade old will certainly help keep me from injury and definitely from making unrealistic goals/expectations.

I love mornings but find getting up early to be next to impossible. I knew I had to switch my walk/runs to mornings, however, because it's only going to get darker the closer we get to winter.

I got up in time for only a 15 minute walk/run so I decided to give myself a minute walk before and after but then run the rest of the time. I'm usually making it about a mile but this morning I didn't even make it a half mile. Right now in my training it's just about time spent running and not mileage but I like to keep these things in mind for when miles begin to matter this spring when we start our hardcore marathon training.

It was raining. But I wore a hat. Almost refreshing except for the squish in my shoes.

Best things about running in mornings: after school I don't have to do anything!

Keep on keeping on,
Claire