The Last Day

Overlooking Rose Lake

Not bad for a last run eh? Today was my last run in my hometown before I move back to college.  I ran on the trails around Rose Lake today. Otherwise known as Dorothy Carnes Park. Yes I ran there yesterday too. But I can't get over how much I love it there. I always feel like I could run for hours and hours. Today in particular I got there and watched a storm roll in for the entire hour and 4 minutes of my run. Right as I left it began to downpour.

I'm all the more thankful for running when I look around places like this and realize how lucky I am that I can run around for hours. My last day running in my beautiful town, and I'm going to miss it a heck of a lot. I don't want to go back to the concrete jungle that is Milwaukee. I don't know how I'm going to survive without my peaceful, awe-inspiring runs at places like this.

So here's to the summer where I never thought I'd run again, but at the end rediscovered all the reasons why I truly love to run. Happy Trails :)

Clouds rolling in at Rose lake

"This part of my life... this little part.. is called "happiness" 
                                                           ~ Pursuit of Happiness

In the Long Run

"You won't realize the distance you've run until you take a look around & realize how far you've been."

First long run back. So I'm going about 50 minutes today. As I head onto a pathway in the woods, with my music blaring I suddenly see a set of eyes staring out at me from the trees. Of course my immediate, irrational thought was "bear". (in Wisconsin? Come on, Katie). But as I stopped and paused my music what it really was, was a huge horse. Now, I love horses, so obviously I'm not afraid of them. Still though, it was 6 in the morning and I was alone and the last thing I expected to see on a path in rural Wisconsin was a horse. So what did I do? Jump on it and ride bareback into town? No, I turned and ran the opposite way. Chicken.

Second long run back. It's been hot all week and by 2 minutes in I'm soaking wet. I don't think I'll ever run in anything but a sportsbra again its SO hot. My ipod is broken. On this run today however, I realize that I don't need an ipod. Sometimes there's just something about running in silence. I listen to the rhythm of my feet and my breath and somewhere along the road I make up my own song to run to. It was only a few days before that I hadn't run with a watch or music. I mean I am starting over. I might as well start from square one. No music, no time, just me and the sound of my feet.

My runs are getting longer. So now I'm actually starting to get tired on them. I'm up to an hour. My next one I head back to my old high school bike trail and crank out the run. To my own surprise I actually start out at sub-7 minute pace. At the 2.5 mile mark I'm able to stop and gather myself and pull the reins a bit. But overall I'm sweaty and exhausted and I just covered about 7.5 miles in 55 minutes.

And finally yesterday was the best one. I did the first 3 miles relatively relaxed. Once I reached mile 4 I was still feeling really good and was going a bit to fast. So I decided to tempo it instead. Each mile I even brought my pace lower and lower until by the end I ran the last 7-8 minutes at about 6min/mile pace.

By some miracle it seems like I'm running healthy again. I never expected that I would get better so fast. Interestingly enough, once I gave up on being bitter about running so little and forgot about running to win and because I "had to" was when I started getting better. Coincidence? I'd like to think not. My leg couldn't heal until my mind was. Once I started appreciating running and loving it for what it is, my leg slowly followed my heart on this path of recovery. I never would have believed it those weeks ago when I was doing 1 minute on/1 minute off barefoot around a high school football field. But still, here I am.

It's been a long journey for me this summer, back into running. But one, I think that I had to take in order to get where I am now. I love it now more than ever. All I have to remember is that we run because we love it and for no other reason.

A fall, a rise, and a pit stop

"The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man's heart"- Albert Camus

Slowly but surely, I'm getting myself back on track. Back to running, but more than that, back to loving running. This past weekend proved to be a huge breakthrough in my recovery, the beginning of getting back on my feet if you will.

The Fall....
Let's start with my getting knocked off of my feet first. The initial knocking off came a long time ago. Even before patellofemoral...I think it came at the beginning of IT band syndrome and I never got up.

The literal version of me getting knocked off my feet came this past Friday. That's right. It finally happened. I fell off my bike. I always knew that this day would come, though it wasn't as dramatic as I always pictured it. Looking back, it's actually quite comical. I was on a bike path going quite quickly if I do say so myself. The path was going to cross a track so they made the fence into an 'S' shape so that bikers would slow down and watch for trains. My first mistake was thinking that I might be able to make it without stopping. My second mistake was actually trying it.

Obviously I didn't make it. As I was about to hit the fence I quickly grabbed a pole to stop myself and down I went. My foot got caught in the pedal and in almost movie-like slow motion I just tipped over. I didn't even crash. I just fell. Embarrassment. HUGE embarrassment.I surveyed the damages quickly, a scrape on the inside of my right calf, bleeding slightly and really ugly. Fortunately no one was around so I jumped back on my bike. I told myself that this kind of thing happens to even the bikers in Tour De France, and secretly I wished that my first bike accident came with a better story to go along with my bloody, scratched up leg.

The Rise....

So I get up and get going and finish my 34 mile ride.

The next day I did my longest run since....May? I don't even remember anymore. Armed with a new pair of purple Saucony Kinvaras and a slow-growing confidence level I trotted down the bike path in search of my pace. By the time I got to one of my favorite trails it felt like things were almost back to normal.

The next day, not only did I run 2 days in a row for the first time but also 40 whole minutes. Months ago I would have scoffed at 40 minutes. Today I'm thankful for every step that I got to run during those 40. Isn't it amazing how drastically one little thing can change your perspective?

The pit stop...

One thing in particular shows that everything is headed in a positive direction. Forty minutes is not really that long of a run. But it's long enough. For what? For me to have to stop and pee in the woods during a run. I know that's not really something that I should get excited about but it's my first run in a long time that's even close enough to being long enough to need a pit stop. You see why it was exciting?

Really though, my other pit stop took place on my bike ride this morning. The sun was rising and mist was lifting from the fields as I rode up a hill that I'm still not sure how I got to the top of. Once I got to the top I stopped and marveled at the scenery surrounding me. The miles and miles of green fields filled with life, the bright sun rising to my right, and the ginormous hill that I just made it to the top of.  In running, in life there will always be hills, obstacles, and falls. The important part however, is making it though and finding a way to get back up.