Running Lies

It’s no secret to anyone that I’ve got a little crazy up in me.

I’m goofy. I have weird obsessions. I’m a product of my mother (just kidding mom, I love you).

Anyway, a lot of my friends find the whole obsession with running a weird one. Understandable. The enjoyment and feeling of accomplishment I get out of a solid 4 or 5-mile run comes from a strange place.

But some of my friends actually do get it. Some of them even like to run with me. Like Annie- who’s also joining in on the Run For the Zoo 10k with me this weekend. Or Mon- she won’t run with me, but she’s always excited to text me when momentous running occasions occur (she did 6 miles for the first time ever last night- woot woot).

So when a guy friend from college, who randomly works a few buildings down from me, asked if I want to start running a little during lunch a few times a week, I was totally down.

I’ve always wanted to do lunch hour workouts. There’s a nice park by our buildings. But there are a million trails that shoot off in a million directions (exaggerate much?). And I, being poor with the whole “sense of direction” thing, have been terrified of getting lost on them.

And even with crowds of people around, I’m never a fan of running across multiple vehicles with heavily tinted windows in the parking lot in the middle of the day. What ARE you doing in there?

I have my suspicions, but none of them are legal.

But anyway, our first run was last Friday. When I texted him to confirm this was indeed going down, he warned me of how hungover he was from the night before (happy hour strikes again!).

He also had knee surgery last year. And said he’s been slow getting back into running- something he really only did during team sports.

Oh great, I thought. He’s hungover and has barely ran at all. This is going to be interesting.

That little booger.

He totally understated his abilities. Granted that I’m still getting acclimated to outdoor running again, but damn he was speedy for recovering from knee surgery.

I feel fooled by his trickery.

But we’ll never let him know that. And shall continue to pace alongside of him. As best as we can.

Seriously… what a butthead.

That’s what I get for being a running snob.

Yesterday, even though it was warmer, went much better than last Friday. My tolerance of the great outdoors is much better. As was my night of sleep the night before.

I’m yet to recalibrate my Nike+ (seriously, I suck), but we estimate it to be a little over 2.5 miles after everything is said and done. Not bad because it still gives me plenty of time to “fix” myself and eat a quick bite before retreating back to my prison cell desk.

Combine this with my 25 minutes on the elliptical and 12 on the stairmill from an early morning wakeup call, and it’s a pretty solid and random workout of sorts.

The only thing I need to work on now?

The random burst of exercise suddenly thrown into the middle of my day has me gnawing my arm off by 3 pm.

The pizza getting delivered for late afternoon meetings in the office was a godsend.

Bacon is a seriously underrated pizza topping, by the way.

We started with the plan to run 2 or 3 days a week. So far only once a week has been managed.

But that’s better than nothin’. 

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