Ringing in the New Year

Staying up all night, dancing in dress shoes and then walking back to your car a few neighborhoods away isn't the best way to celebrate the New Year if you plan on letting your body recover enough for good training the next day. But it sure was a heck of a lot of fun and a rare chance to hang out with my sister and get to know her. Oddly enough, I'm pretty certain it was the dress shoes that got me. I was up early enough and running just fine New Years Day, but the left achilles wasn't having any of it. It had gone from semi-OK to bad after the long night. Bad enough that I didn't even want to bike on it. But I figured not a big deal, this will become the second rest day that I needed as I had only ran 5 miles the day before. The next day would be big and back on schedule. But as soon as I got to laying around and resting it, the mental fatigue of solo training seemed to catch up with me and I could barely get off the couch all the way through the next day as well, despite being plenty healthy and rested in actuality. Which, at this time and place in my training, is likely a good thing and will only end up helping. However, at some point and at some times, I am going to need to push through the mental and physical fatigue that, when it catches up to me at the right moment, lays me out for whole days at a time by destroying motivation even after I am physically ready to go again. And that has caused me to realize that I likely won't be able to do this alone. I am going to need to find others to train with on a consistent basis in the future. People to keep me accountable to my training and to keep the mental fatigue of solo training at bay. I am going to need to find a team. Or the closest thing to it. To see the amazing effects that a team can have on a person, one only needs to look to superstar runner Desi Davila and what the Brooks-Hanson running team has done for her (http://www.runnersworld.com/cda/microsite/article/0,8029,s6-239-569--14169-0,00.html). I am not sure yet where I will be able to find this team or group of people to train with, but for now, my goal is simply to build up my body to be strong enough to have a chance of keeping up. And in the meantime, I am allowing myself to falter, if only ever so often, if that's what it is going to take, to keep me going in the longterm. So today, with less than 15 run miles over the past four days, it's time to bring the long run back in and match that. With a nice swim to cool down. Yes, for now I will have to settle for simply being disgusted with laziness to bring my motivation back when the joys of training itself aren't doing it. But I have a good feeling that once I get through smoking today's workout, it'll be there again.