This is one of those programs that takes you from total inactivity to running a 5-kilometer race (or 5K) in like 10 weeks or so. So one year I decided to get into shape and this sounded like a really good idea. I downloaded a bunch of stuff to my iPod and arranged my schedule so that I could get to the Employer Subsidized Workout Facility (ESWF) three times a week to follow the program.
And I did. I was damn near religious. I would walk for two minutes to warm up, I would stretch my half-century old body parts so as to minimize damage, and then I would launch into the podcast of the designated day and achieve my immediate term goal. I did EVERYTHING I was supposed to do, exactly as planned.
I even signed up for a friendly-neighborhood 5K. Some sort of civic thing, all praise to the mayor, cruise by many important sights in town sort of thing. I was following my training regimen and it was all going to be good.
This is the embarrassing part - I mean, I took enough statistics to get a PhD, how could this have escaped me? - it wasn't until two weeks before the big race that I figured out that the whole C25frickingK concept is based on the premise that one can run a 10-minute mile. Here's some news: not all of us can run a 10-minute mile. Some of us need more like 15 minutes.
It really sucked to get on a treadmill instead of just schlogging around the neighborhood or the indoor track and find out that although you can run for 28 minutes straight, it ain't nowhere nears 3.1 miles. It's more like maybe almost two miles.
For some reason, I took this intensely personally. How could I have been duped? Why did I mentally buy into a program that could not deliver for me?
I ran the damned race anyway. That's a story for another day. Kind of wondering if I should try for another 5K someday.
Oh yeah, Jackson Browne says "hey".
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