Unslumping yourself is hard to do

And when you’re in a Slump,

you’re not in for much fun.

Un-slumping yourself is not easily done.

 From Oh, the Places You'll Go! by Dr. Seuss

For about a year and a half I've been in a running-slump. During that time there's rarely been a week when I haven't got a run or two in but I've struggled with lack of consistency and loss of mo-jo. Since 1999 I've compiled over 12,000 running miles and during that time there was a day for me when a long run might be a 10-15 miler on a Saturday morning. These days you know things aren't good when 4.5 miles represent your long run for the week. A year ago at this time I was struggling with an injury that kept me out of the Fishy Four, our community's celebrated 4 mile race held during the annual Liberty Fest festivities, for the first time in many a year. As I cheered on the racers as they left the starting line inwardly I was a bit forlorn because I wasn't out there with them.

Only a spectator last year

The truth is for the first time since I started running again in '99, I didn't race a single time last year and only compiled 358 road miles. Nearing the half-way point of 2015, while I've recorded 67 runs I've only accrued a little more than 200 miles. Even I recognize the disappointing math in these figures. Some mornings it's been too cold, on others its been too hot and then sometimes, I tell myself, I'm just too tired. And then I think of Solomon's proverb:

“Loafers say, 'It’s dangerous out there!

There could be one out there...somewhere

     Tigers are prowling the streets!'
     and then pull the covers back over their heads.”

“Just as a door turns on its hinges,
     so a lazybones turns back over in bed.” 

     (Proverbs 26:13, 14, Msg)

Guilty. Too many times over.

I thought about it...a lot

Last fall, at the completion of the Cross Country season, I took out a membership at our local fitness center. My plan at the time was to go there twice a week to build upper body strength as well strengthen my quad and calf muscles so that I would be ready for the snowshoe racing season. While I've stuck to this plan to some degree, the snowshoe season came and went and I never once donned my Redfeathers. I'd like to blame my son's indoor track schedule for this (Ed runs for UW-Superior) but the real reason is simply lack of running consistency.

During this slump I've put on a good 12 pounds, my waist size has gone up by 2 inches and at my annual check-up for the first time in years I was informed that my cholesterol was a bit high. While never fast by any way you define the term, my pace is slower than ever. Gosh, it's hard to get old but I know some much older folks who run faster than me! What's a runner to do to un-slump himself?

Here's to the dreamers

My niece is helping me. Hannah is a recent high school graduate who cares deeply about the issue of human trafficking. She cares enough that she concocted some crazy plan to run from Superior, Wisconsin to Milwaukee (a distance of 400 miles) in order to raise awareness of the reality of trafficking in our state as well as raise funds for Exploit No More, a nonprofit organization in Milwaukee, working to establish an after care home for juvenile girls who have been rescued from sex trafficking. It's an audacious plan to address an audacious and sad reality that exists even in Wisconsin.

A good, kind of crazy

Her plan is to run 20 miles a day and recruit others to run an additional 20 miles so that within 10 days she can finish in Milwaukee. Personally, I think she's bitten off more than she can chew but I'm for tilting at windmills and so this Sancho Panza (Don Quixote's sidekick) for the last two months has been trying to get himself ready. My hope is to run 10 miles a day for her while she is up in our neck of the woods – 5 in the morning, 5 later in the day – and I think I'm in relative enough shape to do this. I haven't done anything out of the ordinary except talk myself out of staying in bed and getting out the door for my morning run. In the last two weeks I've recorded runs of 6-6.7 miles on a consistent basis only because I know Hannah is coming and I can't let her down.

I feel a lot like that guy on the right

I don't consider myself out my slump yet. Just this morning during a casual 5K run I almost started walking (almost) which kind of surprised me. Nope, I'm really one run away from calling it quits which is why I'm grateful to Hannah for appealing to my unclehood to come to her aid in this “impossible dream” of hers.

“Do you see over yonder, friend Sancho, thirty or forty hulking giants? I intend to do battle with them and slay them.” 

      - Miguel de Cervantees Saavedra, Don Quixote

To learn more about Hannah's Rescue Run follow this link The Rescue RunAnd if you're a runner in the Chetek area and looking to run some of the route between here and Superior give me a call at 715-925-6078 to determine how you can help!