I think.
It didn’t last for very long, but let me tell you, it was – excuse my language here – fan-fucking-tastic.
I guess my motivational speech yesterday worked, because even though I wasn’t even ready to head out yesterday until 5:50, and I was expecting a guest at 6:45, I knew I couldn’t skip my run. So I laced up and headed out the door.
My intervals were eight minute runs, one minute walks. It’s longer than I’ve run continuously for more than three years. Eight minutes might not sound like a very long time, but it’s a lot longer than it seems, and one minute isn’t a very long recovery either.
The trail by my house goes through a nice little nature preservation area, behind some baseball fields, and over a major road. Usually I would hit the last baseball field before the bridge that went over the road and it would be time to turn back.
Not this time.
My runs were a little longer, meaning that my distance was further. And the farther I got, I started to realize: I was going to have to run over the bridge.
These pictures are very, very lame. The first one is the view from the top, looking down, and the second is a terrible one of the bridge from the road. I’ll have to take my camera out one day and take pictures for all of you. But trust me, these do nothing to show the true horror of how hard the bridge is to run. After it curves in that first picture, it still drops quite a ways before it hits flat ground again at sea level.
At first, I thought I would just walk up the bridge, then run down. After all, even riding my bike over this thing can be pretty tough, let alone actually propelling my short and stubby legs up it. But I didn’t want to wimp out, and glancing at my watch, it seemed that I had just enough time left on my current interval to reach the top of the hill.
My climb started pretty slow, I’ll admit. But once I got about half way up, I felt amazing. I picked up speed. Before I knew it, I was practically sprinting to the top. I finished out my minute and I felt amazing. I was on a bridge suspended over a highway, watching the cars and trucks pass below. I wanted to jump up and down. I passed a woman walking and couldn’t wipe the huge grin off my face. I’m sure she thought I was on drugs, and it felt like I was.
I can’t remember the last time I felt so good while I was exercising.
Then my minute of walking was up. It was back to running, and about two minutes into the new run I started to feel crappy again. Running was hard, and I forgot for a moment how great it felt to accomplish something that had once seemed so impossible. I thought about not doing eight minutes; since I had actually run up the hill, maybe I could get away with only doing six.
But I did my eight, and then instead of finishing with three, like I was supposed to, I finished with five minutes. I felt great.
I had to call my friend because I was running behind. I couldn’t put any makeup on for when we went out because my face was bright red.
But I felt great.
I hope that I can hold on to that feeling, and always remember how amazing it felt to stand on top of that bridge, as if I were on top of the world, feeling as if I finally was a runner.
And because I often wonder why I do it:
