My road to 21k
Influenced by my father, I started running in 2014. I remember in my early days being able to run only 2k and be exhausted from it. Well, I’ve improved a lot throughout the years, and I feel like writing a bit about my experience and joy with running. I hope I don’t make this post look like a book, as Murakami did, but who knows in the future!?
So, I mentioned it about my beginning in 2014. I don’t recall much of my training and milestones from that year (if I ever had any) till 2017, but in 2018 I moved to Florianópolis due to college, and my father gave me his Garmin watch, and since then I began tracking my runs for real. I was able to run 10k at a comfortable pace (less than 6 min/km is what I consider satisfying, or good for me), but I was running only once a week, on Sundays, and never really had an interest in surpassing those 10k for some reason, and on my weekdays I practiced Muay Thai.
Not much difference occurred in 2019, pretty much just running 10k each Sunday, although I did run 11 and 12k a few times during summer vacation. Then in 2020 the pandemic hit, schools got closed, you all know the rest. At the same time, something interesting happened: I started running more, more kilometers, more times per week, and had greater enjoyment than ever! I decided I would break my distance records on Sundays, and little by little, was adding up those kilometers, 13, 14, 15, 16 so on and in 8 months I did a half-marathon!
Now let's talk about my methods, routines, and insights taken from this experience. I usually wake up at 7:30 and am on the street at somewhat 8:30. For most days, I eat a bowl of banana, papaya, granola, and honey for breakfast, and carry a squeeze of cold water (particularly, I consider you MUST carry water if you intend to run more than 10K). Just because I’m now a little bit comfortable running long distances, it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s always easy to run whenever I set myself to. Of course I face resistance of my own, but the funny thing is: to a certain degree, I run even if it’s raining, freezing, or hot. As a matter of fact, I encourage you to run during adverse weather, as it might happen during an official race!
My resistances are mental and physical, the last time I ran 21k, I caught myself asking why to run this much, “Why just not run 10 or 12k? Why do you want to make yourself suffer?” or “aaargh, it’s so hot!”, and even “Come on you legs! You can do it!”. I replaced these thoughts with some much better ones, such as: “Thank you (insert your god here) for my legs! For being able to run, for such a beautiful day!”
I must say these new thoughts make a hell of a difference, it makes the process much more endurable. You can also hit your face with some water that you are carrying to alleviate the hotness, which works too.
Unlike the vast majority of people, I don’t run listening to music nor listening to a podcast. I have tried, but at a certain point I can’t stand anymore the buzz in my ears and all I wanna do is to throw the headphones away. It may sound cheesy, but I rather listen to the sound of the world, nature and be aware of my surroundings.
I guess to wrap things up, when back home I eat a chocolate-banana-strawberry pancake that my mom makes. Fortunately, my parents also run during the weekends so we always have this moment post-workout. I recover using those myofascial guns on my muscles and taking a good hot shower.
It might be it, really wasn’t that long right? Are you still here? If so, I appreciate your time in reading my FIRST BLOG POST, heheheheh. I may have forgotten some details of my running experience, but perhaps will continue with these types of posts. Who knows, maybe you’ll see here my road to 42k?
