Dead men tell no tales (they don’t run too well either)

Dead men tell no tales (they don’t run too well either)

Last week I was camping at Port Crescent State Park and did not keep up on my posting. Sorry to the 0 followers I have. The park is a lovely palce to camp, as every campsite has a view of Lake Huron. Here is a picture of one of the sunsets from our trip.

Not much to report here. I haven’t really been able to train in a few weeks.  I’ve wanted to train, but life keeps getting in the way. Strike that. If I wanted to train bad enough I would find a way. I’ve been making excuses to avoid it. The thing is, I know that once I get out there, I enjoy it. Its just getting suited up and taking the first steps that is hard. This reminds me of volunteering at the hospital.

Let me explain…

I volunteer 4 hours of my time every Tuesday to work in the ER of a local hospital. Nothing too intense, just changing bed sheets, stocking each room with supplies, moving patients around and general help as needed. Anyway, each week lately I hem and haw about going in. “its too hot.” “I have other things to do.” “The work will be too tiring”, etcetera. Well, each week I end up dragging myself up there after work and guess what? I have a lot of fun! Well perhaps not fun, but I get a satisfaction that puts a smile on my face and I walk out of there feeling so much better for having forced myself to just go.

Training is the same way sometimes.

Don’t get me wrong; I don’t have to force myself most of the time. Usually I look forward to getting off work, hitting the shower and running/biking/whatever, but Sometimes it is hard to get myself up and go. I tell myself the same lies I do when I don’t want to go to the hospital. The only difference is that lately the lies have been winning on the training front. THIS HAS TO STOP! I know I’ll feel better about myself after I go; I just have to get past the lazy part of my mind. Just as volunteering at the hospital makes me feel better about the world and myself, getting up and training for an hour improves my mood and gives me a feeling of accomplishment.

What makes me go to the hospital each week is the commitment I made to others that I would be there. I know someone is watching me, and if I don’t show up, they will know. I don’t have that in my training. I pretty much train alone, but this week I got a little boost to my training through Runkeeper.

Runkeeper is an app for Iphone and Android that tracks your outdoor activities with GPS. If you don’t have a Smartphone You can still use Runkeeper by going to the website and adding your mileage manually. What is nice about Runkeeper is that you can share your workouts with the world and interact with other athletes out there. It’s nice to see what other athletes are doing and find new routes in your area. Another nice aspect of Runkeeper is “street teams”. Street teams are groups of people who friend each other on Runkeeper much like facebook. You can search out people in your area and use them as incentive to work harder or even find training buddies to work with.

 I have been using runkeeper on my phone for a few months now and this week someone invited me to be in his or her “street team”. I am hoping that having someone that I know is watching me will encourage me to get out on the days I don’t want to go; much like the times I don’t want to do my volunteering at the hospital.

I realize that there are a lot of groups in my area that do group training but I haven’t felt strong enough to train with them yet. I am hoping that by the end of summer I will be confident enough to go out with them and then that can be encouragement too. For now though, my street team might give me the boost I need to get going.