Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Operation Jack & Bad Math

I feel I must do my duty as a runner :) and try to encourage all of you to run as well. Actually, I just wanted to get the word out about Operation Jack. I just learned about this yesterday and this guy, Sam, has an amazing goal! He has a little boy who was diagnosed with autism at age 3, and now Sam is planning to do 60 marathons in one year to raise money for Train 4 Autism. If you want to be part of this, you can sign up for one of the 60 races he's doing. He's doing them all over the country throughout the year so there's a good chance that there will be one close to you, and you don't even have to do a marathon. If there's a 5k associated with the race, you can do that or whatever distance you want. He's doing two of his marathons within half an hour from here (Provo and Park City) so it's got me thinking about doing one myself.

Just think about it.

Today I was supposed to do a 4 mile temp run at 9:45 minute-mile pace. I didn't trust google maps after our last encounter so I thought I'd just go for 40 minutes. But then, I got thinking that if I was really doing 9:45 minute-miles then I wouldn't need to go for 40 minutes. (Uh, I'd just need to go for 39 minutes.) Of course, I wasn't thinking and didn't do that math in my head while I was running so I ended up cutting off a lot more than one minute. I turned around after only 15 minutes, and got home after 31:57. I was hoping I had done 4 miles, but there's no way I could have done 4 in that time. What am I, crazy? It was just a really hard run. I was really pushing it so I had my fingers crossed that I really was going fast and not just hurting.

Anyway, the kids and I rode our bikes to the library later, and we took the same route I did my run on so I could measure it, and it turns out I only did 3.2 miles. I'm such a dork sometimes. I just don't think about things clearly when I'm running. 

Still, I guess that is almost as fast as I was supposed to be going, I just needed to stick it out for one more mile. Or, actually .8 miles. Next run I will map out before I go.

5 comments:

  1. Ok so I'm thinking that I would like to sign up to do one of the races. Are you signing up for one? How much time do you think that it would take to train for one? Remember I won't be running again until about December and I've never ran in a race before. Do you think it's possible for me? I guess I could do a 5K or 1/2 marathon too. I just want to have a goal to reach that will MAKE me do it.

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  2. You could totally do it! The Provo on is in June and that would give you 6 months which is totally enough time. They do have a 5k or a half at that one too, though. The Park City one isn't until August so that would give you 8 months, and you could do the half if you wanted. What one would you rather do, and I'll sign up with you? The Park City one sounds really nice.

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  3. The Park City one is fine with me. Then I have more time! :) I'm excited but nervous but this will be good for me! Thanks Colleen!

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  4. Alright, sounds good to me! It will be good for me too. I just had such a bad experience with my first marathon, the thought of doing another one doesn't sound fun. It's weird. I like the thought of doing another Ironman better than doing another marathon even though the Ironman contains a marathon. Weird.

    Oh, and I've got Katie thinking about doing it too!

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