I have a new barefoot running coach and it's all of you

Speaking of running: Yeah, that. I wish I could say that I’ve been running SO MUCH that I haven’t had a chance to be here, but you’d know I’m lying because I just told you why I haven’t been here. However: running. LOVE IT. Barefoot running. SO AWESOME. If you’re running in shoes and it hurts: UR doin it wrong. Take them off.

No seriously. I’m running a 5K this weekend. I might come in under 34 minutes, maybe. I’ve been training in VFF’s when outside both due to cold and chickenshittedness. I scraped up the side of one of my feet one night, and since I have the run this weekend I decided to train in the VFFs. With the VFFs my knees are sore, so obviously my form is not awesome when not barefoot, but my pace is better in the Vibrams. Ah, the dilemma of speed (& knee pain/injury) vs. loyalty to the cause (&pain-free running).

There’s something else, and I freely admit this would be different if I hadn’t lost all the weight due to side effects; but I have absolutely zero concern with the calories burned or the health effects of the running. I just want to. I truly just want to be out there. But not just out there; out there getting faster and running longer.

Ever since I joined dailymile.com I’ve been plagued by that damned feed filled with my “friends” workouts. “It’s like facebook, but for runners!” is what my friend Lance told me when he invited me. Awesome! Yeah and it was for a week or two, until GoPreGo started posting like every single day his 10 mile runs at 7 minutes a mile and that tri mom with the 8 min mile marathons and the swimming and the 100 mile bike rides I mean what the hell?

All I want to do now is be out there, running. Faster and for longer every day. No, not to BEAT anybody. Yet. But just…because if they can do it, then I can too. There’s just no physical reason why not. So I’m going to. I freakin love to run. Today was cold, but worth it. When I got home I found I’d shaved a minute off my average pace and that was even slowing to walk some. That’s huge. I didn’t know I had it in me. Now my question is, how fast CAN I go? How far CAN I go? What do the ultra runners mean when they say they embrace fatigue?  Penelope Trunk’s latest post about being an expert was actually incredibly helpful to remind me that I’m not gonna jump onto dailymile.com and then run out the door four times a week across the street in the 3 mile loop and become an ultra runner or 7 minute miler. Being an expert takes “dedicated, daily practice” and there isn’t a shortcut to being a good runner. I love daily mile because it uses another tactic she talks about in that post, which is crowdsourcing your coaching. Since I don’t have a running coach, I’m crowdsourcing mine. I think its working. For a while I was so dejected about how my confidence suffered reading that feed every day that I almost quit the website, but I’m over it. Check out dailymile.com if you’re into that sort of thing. I’m SummerP over there.