First Post About My Attempt at Running an Ultra

Well,  here it is.  My first post.  I decided to start a blog so that I can have a space to be real.  Be brutally honest.  This is not only so that I can hopefully help other women who might be post menopausal, lonely empty nesters, career teetering on the bring of covid disaster and wondering, when they reflect upon their life,  'what the hell happened?'.  This blog is for them.  And in writing this, I hope that I may come to make sense out of what is going on in this crazy head of mine.  So hopefully, in writing my craziness, I can not only continue to discover who I am, but help other women do the same.

To begin.  It is Sunday evening October 11, 2020.  Ah...2020, the shit hole year.  Since the 2nd week in January I have questioned everything about my life, my relationships with friends and family, my career, the unnecessary crap I have surrounded myself with...But I digress, it's Sunday evening.  How many of you start Sunday evening with a planner and fill it full of big ideas, hopes and dreams and a to do list to accomplish those said hopes and dreams that you know in the back of your mind is impossible?  But you do it anyway.  So it is Sunday.  Full of hopes and dreams...and a too big to do list for the week that lies ahead..and...my ultra marathon training book came in this afternoon.  On a day I had designated that I was going to rest, read my bible and pray/meditate and embroider like a normal 57 year old woman, I eagerly, with heart palpitations, stuck my nose in this book and could not put it down.  All the while I am on my phone following the Moab 240 Ultra Running Race Live tracker stats and rooting for David Goggins (whom I read his book) and then reading about the leader Michele Graglia who is just 6 miles from the finish line.  I am so excited and have insane visions in my head that I too, a 57 year old, over weight woman can be running like a Kenyan right beside them if not right in front of them!

Sigh...now you know my life.  Full of pipe dreams.  Now, the problem is, they don't just stay as dreams.  I actually am foolish enough to do most of them.  Like when I ran a 5K and said next I'm running a marathon and then from their a Half Iron Man.  Now, let me be very clear and up front.  I AM NOT AN ATHLETE!  Quite the opposite.  I am a struggling BOP, and that, for all you non runners, is a back of the pack runner.  I have never been talented in the athletic arena.  I have always been active, but not good at it.  So in reality, I believe it actually is much harder for me.  My marathon time takes twice as long as a normal person, which means that I am out there that much longer.  This takes resilience, fortitude or you can also say just plain stupidity.  But I do it.  

I have been so busy that I haven't been running consistently for several years.  The last time I ran in an event was 2 years ago in Pensacola Fl were my husband and I did a half marathon.  It was hard.  But hey, now I am looking at running an ultra.  No biggie right?  As I look at all the faces of the Moab 240 runners the thought occurs to me that I am way, way out of my league and way too old for this shit.  But I can't help it.  I am going to give it a try and the rest of 2020 is going to be spent getting a good solid, slow running foundation under me and then 2021 I plan on getting serious about training for a 50 miler and then a 100 miler and then I have my eyes on the Moab 240!

So this my friends, is going to be a space where I blog about my pain, my victories and what it is like for a below average, overweight, 57 year old woman to start to train for her first ultra all the while trying to keep her head above financial waters growing my online Ayurveda business.

I hope you join me on this journey.

A