My First Hard Learned Lesson

After I spent the summer proving to myself over and over how out of shape I was by doing P90X, I was ready to go out and run.  I was about a month away from my first 5K and was ready to see if I could make it.  I mapped out my route, a pretty flat 3.8 mile run.  The logic of course was if I could run 3.8 miles, running 3.1 miles would be easier.

 

So one fantastic Sunday morning, I decided to go out for my first big run and I was so excited – I had worked so hard.  I got up, put on my shoes, tied my laces and grabbed a quick drink of water.  I started running, or whatever you want to call it at this point in my training. I got about ¾ of the way through the first mille.  This is where everything started to go wrong.  I started getting out of breath and felt so sluggish and things were not going well. I called my wife for a ride because I wasn’t going to make it.

 

I was so bummed and disheartened that I could not do it.  Why? It made no sense to me. I worked so hard to get ready for this and I was no closer to completing the run than when I had started.  At this point, I could have packed it in and given up and said “you know what, I am just not cut out for this”.

 

In the past, I would have just gave up but this was a quest for me.   I started to think why was this not working and what was the problem?  I started to think about what I had done on Saturday that would have made this not work.

 

Here is the conclusion I came to:

 

We had a fun filled Saturday which included, not one, but two cookouts.  First, we went out to Sun Prairie for an annual summer picnic hosted by some of our closest friends that includes plenty of eating, drinking and being merry! After this picnic, we had dinner with my son’s best friends family and we had a very fun time.  It was an awesome food-filled fun day with friends. And the next day I was going to attempt to run 3.8 miles.

 

I thought about this and came to the conclusion that if I was going to train for running, I was going to have to be aware of what I am eating.  If I don’t fuel my body correctly, then this was not going to work.

 

On Monday morning, after I was not able to complete it I tried it again.  One day removed from some poor choices, I was able to make it the 3.8 miles.  Now I am not saying I set the world on fire or anything, but I completed it and at this point in my life that was a huge accomplishment.

 

I could not have been more happy and I learned a very valuable lesson.  I started out thinking that I would eat what I wanted to, but learned that I needed to start wanting to eat better food.

 

So did I lose weight because I went on a diet?  NO.  I lost weight because I realized that if I wanted to be a runner and be successful, I had to feed my body correctly.  People ask me if I went on a diet and I say I did not intend to the changes in my eating habits just kind of happened because of the exercise.

 

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