Week 1 of running season: 35K in a week

I'm very excited as I've managed to start pulling myself out the rut I've been in for over a year now as far as running is concerned. After doing 12 marathons in six years and dozens of shorter races as I documented in this post https://steemit.com/fitness/@cryptokeepr/12-marathons-and-counting-my-life-story-as-a-runner I got lax on my training and frankly I've not been a very happy person much of the time the past year. That is rapidly changing and I'm happy to say I've seen a noticeable change in my moods and outlook on life the past week.

Up until two years ago I used to run at least 20 miles / 35K per week and when training for marathons I've put in twice that much on a regular basis. I was a beast. I once ran over 65 miles in one week when I was training for Marine Corps marathon in 2011. I loved the endorphine rush that running gave me when I raced and did training runs. And when I lost that due to my lack of running it really screwed me up in some ways.

The past year I've only run 1-2 days a week and only 2-3 miles per run. I've made a conscious decision to change that and be a happier person as running is critical to me not spiraling into depression. I guess I'm addicted to it.

This week I decided I was going to run 5K at least 3 days this week and then do a 10K run on the weekend. Below is what I ended up doing for my 5k runs (4 of them).

As you can see, I started Monday with a 26+ minute 5K time (I run during my lunch break at work) and later in the week I dropped it to 25:40 and 25:44 and then Saturday I cranked out 5K in under 24 minutes. I've found that I tend to regain my speed pretty quickly if I stick to it and this week made me feel like I'm getting back on track (no pun intended).

This morning I went out to do my planned 10K and ended up running about 13K / 8 miles and then my wife wanted to run a mile so I went with her (so I did 9 miles / ~15k today instead of 10k!). I feel great! I'm tired right now obviously but I'm very happy and motivated.

Now that I've proven to myself I can stick to a plan (for this week at least), I'm gonna give it one more week then sign up for a half marathon this fall and next spring and some shorter races in between. I want to run a 5K in under 20 minutes like I used to. I want to shatter those old records from 2012 that I've failed to breach in the past 5 years.

My end goal (for now) and item on my bucket list is to qualify for the Boston Marathon and I'm not running another marathon until I prove I can sustain the pace needed by running a half in under 90 minutes (gotta run a 3hr10 min marathon to qualify for Boston at my age). Marathon number (Lucky) 13 will be my Boston qualifier and I'm not gonna stop training hard until I get there.

This week I'll write out a training plan with 3-4 intense runs per week and stick to it indefinitely (speed intervals, tempo run, long run, and one easy run per week). I'm not stopping except reducing the distance and intensity once every six to eight weeks to allow my body to recover a bit.

I'm going to make Sunday my steemit running post day every week to help keep myself accountable so I hope some of you runners will follow my progress! I'll be happy to see your journey, your victories and personal achievements as well as it is inspiring to me to see other runners progress and see how much it can change a person's life by increasing overall energy, making one sleep more soundly, boosting those feel-good endorphine levels, and giving the runner a sense of personal achievement. When I set a personal record it makes me feel like I can accomplish anything!

How has running impacted your life? Do you regular runners need it to maintain a certain level of happiness and satisfaction in life? I sure do and I'd love to hear your feedback. Also, you don't have to be a runner to comment. I love interacting with people here and I love answering comments on my posts.

Hope you all had as good a weekend as I did!