First night of Half-marathon training.
I think I have to set the scene here. My CANTOO half-marathon training takes place every Wednesday evening at Chatswood Athletic Field and every Saturday morning, starting from Kirribilli (straight across the harbour from the Opera House).
Our very first training session was Wednesday February 9th at 6:30pm. On the Tuesday night, I asked Dave - who had also signed up - if he thought I’d have to run more than 500m on my first night (given I was a complete beginner). He looked bemused. Not more than 1km though? Now he looked amused. They might...
But I convinced myself otherwise. Why would I have to jump into the deep end. Wasn’t it all about building the strength up slowly?
I had also roped my Drogheda cronie, Sarah, into signing up. She put forward the same reasonable question. As a seasoned Cantooer, I convincingly replied with “Nah they’ll probably have to talk about the program, go through admin stuff and we’ll have to introduce ourselves”. That was probably more self-assurance than anything else.
Yes, the Team Captain, Mentors and Coaches did introduce themselves, but that only took 10 minutes. There was a brief overview of CANTOO and its goals, and that might have taken another 10 mins. And the next thing I heard was “OK, onto the track for a 2km warm up”. You what? I looked at Dave and then at Sarah. Dave’s eyebrow raised and Sarah laughed. The tears had started to well up already. I was still waiting to hear the addendum “and the true beginners, stay behind for some molly-coddling”. But of course that wasn’t said, so I had to follow all the other pro-like half-marathoners with my legs shaking and a sick stomach feeling. Dave sidled up and assured me it would be OK and that he’d run along side me. After the first lap I asked how far we’d gone. 400m. That was my previous record. Anything after that was record breaking. I asked again. 600m. Wow, still breaking a record. 1km. Ha! I’m in pain, but I’ve more than doubled my record. And so it went. It was a slow jog but I pushed through. I stopped to walk for about 200m, and then started up again. My legs were so sore. My feet were sore (in my 4 yr old runners). My NECK was in bits. I had a darting pain from my shoulder upwards. Actually, that distracted from the blisters that were forming on my soles. Cue the first instance of “why on earth am I doing this again?”
At the end of the 2km ‘warm-up’, Dave gave me a high five and I suddenly remembered one reason why I’d signed up. 2km, for most people, might not seem like a big deal. But for me it was. I had pushed myself outside of my comfort zone.
After a while, I found out that all I needed was a distraction. Dave told me as many funny, boring, non-interesting stories that he could find up his sleeve. The funny ones had to be banned eventually though, because laughing and running is hard. By the end, I kept thinking how easy it had been to self-diagnose myself as a person who “just didn’t have the physical make-up of a runner”!
I jogged a total of 5km on my first training night (with the occasional slow-down-to-walk intervals).
The tone of the rest of the evening wasn’t just as elated. What followed was a bout of legs seizing up, struggling up three flights of stairs, counting four huge blisters on my feet and a 4am wake-up, which could possibly been as a result of my body going into shock. My body must have caught up with the previous night’s activity and said “Eh, hang on, what the hell just happened?”. I didn’t get back to sleep.
“Given the choice between the experience of pain and nothing, I would choose pain"
William Faulkner
I think I have to set the scene here. My CANTOO half-marathon training takes place every Wednesday evening at Chatswood Athletic Field and every Saturday morning, starting from Kirribilli (straight across the harbour from the Opera House).
Our very first training session was Wednesday February 9th at 6:30pm. On the Tuesday night, I asked Dave - who had also signed up - if he thought I’d have to run more than 500m on my first night (given I was a complete beginner). He looked bemused. Not more than 1km though? Now he looked amused. They might...
But I convinced myself otherwise. Why would I have to jump into the deep end. Wasn’t it all about building the strength up slowly?
I had also roped my Drogheda cronie, Sarah, into signing up. She put forward the same reasonable question. As a seasoned Cantooer, I convincingly replied with “Nah they’ll probably have to talk about the program, go through admin stuff and we’ll have to introduce ourselves”. That was probably more self-assurance than anything else.
Yes, the Team Captain, Mentors and Coaches did introduce themselves, but that only took 10 minutes. There was a brief overview of CANTOO and its goals, and that might have taken another 10 mins. And the next thing I heard was “OK, onto the track for a 2km warm up”. You what? I looked at Dave and then at Sarah. Dave’s eyebrow raised and Sarah laughed. The tears had started to well up already. I was still waiting to hear the addendum “and the true beginners, stay behind for some molly-coddling”. But of course that wasn’t said, so I had to follow all the other pro-like half-marathoners with my legs shaking and a sick stomach feeling. Dave sidled up and assured me it would be OK and that he’d run along side me. After the first lap I asked how far we’d gone. 400m. That was my previous record. Anything after that was record breaking. I asked again. 600m. Wow, still breaking a record. 1km. Ha! I’m in pain, but I’ve more than doubled my record. And so it went. It was a slow jog but I pushed through. I stopped to walk for about 200m, and then started up again. My legs were so sore. My feet were sore (in my 4 yr old runners). My NECK was in bits. I had a darting pain from my shoulder upwards. Actually, that distracted from the blisters that were forming on my soles. Cue the first instance of “why on earth am I doing this again?”
At the end of the 2km ‘warm-up’, Dave gave me a high five and I suddenly remembered one reason why I’d signed up. 2km, for most people, might not seem like a big deal. But for me it was. I had pushed myself outside of my comfort zone.
After a while, I found out that all I needed was a distraction. Dave told me as many funny, boring, non-interesting stories that he could find up his sleeve. The funny ones had to be banned eventually though, because laughing and running is hard. By the end, I kept thinking how easy it had been to self-diagnose myself as a person who “just didn’t have the physical make-up of a runner”!
I jogged a total of 5km on my first training night (with the occasional slow-down-to-walk intervals).
The tone of the rest of the evening wasn’t just as elated. What followed was a bout of legs seizing up, struggling up three flights of stairs, counting four huge blisters on my feet and a 4am wake-up, which could possibly been as a result of my body going into shock. My body must have caught up with the previous night’s activity and said “Eh, hang on, what the hell just happened?”. I didn’t get back to sleep.
“Given the choice between the experience of pain and nothing, I would choose pain"
William Faulkner
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