Lex Lata

I think that I have finally decided to come to grips with reality and recognize that I won't be able to pursue "major" athletic accomplishments while in the current career path. Surprisingly, I'm ok with that. I'm referring to things like Lotoja, an Ironman, Ultramarathon etc... when I refer to "major" athletic accomplishments. I just don't have the time to train to finish those things the way that I like to finish athletic things. So, I'm going to just accept that fact and move one.

I have decided that I am going to pick up 5K racing again and see how low I can cut my time. I have previously run well under 16:00, but I doubt that I will be able to reach those times again as my training time is much less now than when I was doing this in high school. I hope to be able to run a few 5Ks throughout this year and next. After that, I will see if I continue to run 5Ks or want to jump up to the 10K distance.

My reason in doing this is two-fold. First, I decided that I would pick and compete in races only to keep me honest in my exercise and to make sure that I had some type of motivation to continue exercising. I didn't do this to do wild and crazy races. Second, as previously mentioned, I just don't have the time to train for all of that other stuff the way that I would like to. I don't like limping through events just to finish and check it off of the bucket list. I don't particularly have a problem with people who do that, other than the idea that they are primarily the reason that race fees have been skyrocketing over the past 5 years because the number of people that are doing a race for the first and likely only time has turned racing into an industry rather than a fringe activity that was largely unprofitable and reserved for weirdos.

I have decided that I will spend the next month in a base-building mode in preparation for my benchmark 5K. I will call this my "post-Competitive life" P.R. I'm going to run the Rex Lee Run with my wife and a few friends. Actually, I'm going to race it, so we'll probably be strewn about the course. I'm excited to pick up a manageable distance and not feel like my entire day is going to be consumed with trying to fit everything in around my training session.