Never Give Up

Put this one in the column of "never give up".  Even on your worst days, you can still salvage something with a little creativity and a stubborn attitude.

My planned run today was 4 x 1 mile repeats.  This means I was planning to run fast (goal < 7:15 mile) four times with a quarter mile recovery in between each mile.  Would've been nice... but, I don't know, call it a weird diet this week- as I've been at a conference/study where they have been feeding us every day and while the food is good, it's not my usual, meticulously planned for carb/fat/protein that I usually eat.  Maybe it's that I have been sitting throughout the day- I am normally walking around a classroom all day so that my legs are regularly moving.  In any case, it was not a good day for 4 x 1 mile repeats.

I attempted the first one, but had to stop after 1m 30s, so I jogged back to my starting point and tried again.  I made it to 1m 45s before imploding.  Should I quit?  I decided that I needed to do this, so I changed my plans and decided that I would do 2 x 10, which meant that I would run hard 2 minutes, then jog slow 2 minutes- this sequence would be repeated until I had run hard 10 times.  I made it through 3, but imploded on my 4th attempt only making it to 1m 30s.  Should I quit?  I decided I would do something like "Fartleks" (ridiculous name from Swedish words meaning speed play)- but funny as heck in English, so laugh it up!

At this point I had run essentially 6 hard sprints at different levels.  So I reset my watch one last time to create a 30-60-90-120-150 interval run.  Run hard 30 seconds, recover 30 seconds, hard 60, recover 60 and so on.  When I finished the 150 interval (which I barely made it through), I stopped and called it a day.  Ultimately 11 sprints and recoveries.  I've had a lot of great successes in my runs, but this week hasn't been the best.

Sometimes you have great weeks, where everything works out exactly as you planned- your eating is spot on, your workouts are phenomenal, and you feel great; other weeks you stumble, implode and feel like a disaster.  The important part is this:  never give up.  Life happens and things aren't always perfect, but if you can plow through the tough times and make appropriate adaptations to suit your needs for the moment, and just keep your eyes on the road and your head up- the good times will return.  Without the tough times, we can't fully appreciate the good times.

What I did today was not what I had planned, and it didn't feel good; but I adapted to the situation and made something happen, and I can feel good about that.

Blessings all!