running streak – FIT IS A FEMINIST ISSUE

Answer: Great!

It’s Day 8 of my holiday running streak. And I’m just back from my morning run, all sweaty and smiley.

Freezing drizzle, yes, but offset by the sounds of happy children playing in the schoolyard across the street and guilty pleasure pop music on my iPod.

Today was the usual route in my neighbourhood. The upside of that is that I know exactly where a mile begins and ends. And Strava helpfully tells me if I’m faster or slower than last time. I’ve also taken my running with me when I’m away and I’ve done one of the daily runs in Toronto and another on campus to and from the gym to lift weights, adding on a bit to make the mile.

I’ve got a friend on Facebook who is celebrating 365 days of running, on average just over 11 km a day.

Me, I’m just doing 1 mile a day for the holidays, American thanksgiving through the New Year.

Two thoughts so far, one week in. First, a mile isn’t a short as I thought and yet it barely seems worth getting running gear on. Second, and this is the best news, so far nothing hurts.

Also, bonus, I no longer deliberate if I should run today or maybe run tomorrow when the weather is better. I’ve been writing and running everyday. It’s a good way to deal with the changes in schedules that come with the holidays and the very busy end of the university term. Faced with a grading, and behind with a bunch of my own writing deadlines, it can be easy to miss out on exercise. But a mile? Anyone can do that, I think.

My friends and my cycling coach aren’t convinced. I’ve promised Coach Chris that if my knee or shins (previously injured bits) hurt even a little bit, I’ll quit. As you know, if you’re a long term blog reader, if running and I had a Facebook relationship status, it would “it’s complicated.”

A running friend commented on Facebook about my streak, ” This is wonderful but please watch out too. A few years ago there was a city-wide “run 30 min for 30 days” that started in Jan. No days off, and you could only make up a session if you left 2 hours in between the make up run and the day’s run. A google spreadsheet was being circulated; not only did it get competitive but among my fit friends (sample of 6 I know I know) we all started feeling things in places we didn’t normally feel sore or hurt as regular runners (eg regular: knee; everyday plan: hips). Re-read this post on that day life gets busy and you can’t make your run smile.”

So far, no pain.

But it doesn’t take my 30 minutes to run a mile. I’m slow but not that slow.

And if anything hurts, I’ll walk instead. After all, Cheddar, needs his exercise too.

Some of my serious running friends on Facebook have incredible running streaks. There’s a professor at Cambridge who ran everyday from 1980 to 2002, twenty two years straight, five miles a day. He’s had other streaks since but none that long. Really though with some short breaks he’s run every day since 1980, since before I finished high school.

The longest running streak has been going since the year I was born. Ron Hill, the 1970 Boston Marathon champ has averaged more than 7 miles a day since December 1964.

Wow. Just wow.

Less impressively, but still beyond my imagination, I’ve got a friend with a running streak almost a year long. He’s been running for 355 days averaging 11.
6 km/day.

I can’t do that but I have wondered about the holiday version. It’s American, of course, which is a good thing because it’s a shorter streak. Canadian thanksgiving through to the new year would be too long, for me.

How’s it go?

“The run streak is designed to keep you running through the holiday season, and to bridge the gap between fall races and training for the spring. It can be difficult this time of the year to keep your running on track—but it’s much easier if you have a goal and a plan.

The goal is simple: Run at least one mile per day, every day, starting on Thanksgiving Day (Thursday, November 26) and ending on New Year’s Day (Friday, January 1). That’s 37 consecutive days of running.”