OH HI! It's been a long time, hasn't it? I've written a lot of posts in my head (I need something to occupy myself on long runs, and, yes, I am still in it for the long run) but they haven't perfected the thought-to-word-doc technology yet. YET. At any rate, I was all prepared to come back strong in February with a post-half marathon entry but got slightly derailed. I'll circle back.
For now, let's go back to last summer. While on an after work run with a friend, she suggested we run/walk intervals for the second half of our 4 mile jaunt. I agreed, though to be honest, I thought of intervals as maybe not real running. Let me explain! While I've always taken walk breaks during longer runs, I also tried to push myself to run as long as I could without stopping. I thought that was the real mark of success (for me anyway). Regardless of pace, I figured running 7 miles all the way through meant I was a legitimate runner. Runners run, afterall. And I had read enough internet comments to know that there were plenty of running "purists" out there who considered any amount of walking blasphemy (my fave: "if you walk any part of a half-marathon, you don't get to say you ran it").
But something changed that day. I enjoyed the intervals. I felt good. I was preparing for half marathon and decided then and there that I would incorporate intervals into my training. I bought and interval timer! And a Jeff Galloway book! If I was gonna do this, I was doing it right. Intervals got me through a summer of training, my July half, and beyond. Intervals allowed me to PR at both the 7M and 10k race distances. When I signed up to run February's Hyannis Half, for the third time, I had fully embraced the Galloway Method. Maybe I would even PR. No matter, I was definitely going to blog about it, in total support of all interval running.
The morning of the race, however, I woke up and could barely walk. I couldn't even bend my leg enough to get my pants on. It was painful to sit, stand, or lay down. My husband ran the race and waited for him on the sidelines. I cried, from pain, from frustration. I was pissed. Mostly at myself. If you're wondering what happened, the short of it is that I had been ignoring back pain that made itself VERY known that day. Turned out to be sciatica and after weeks of physical therapy, I am getting stronger and running again. Intervals are a necessity now. Eventually, I will get to a place where I can increase the running intervals, and even run a few miles through. But I'm not going to abandon this method. Intervals runners are real runners. You want to run all the way through? Cool! You wanna try intervals? Cool! However you're running, keep doing it.
(Oh, and this past weekend, I PR'd one more time--at a 5M race. Intervals for the win!)
