I'm Going to Need Some Gold Bond and a Bottle of Lube STAT

As noted a few weeks ago I am currently in training to run a marathon in March. In high school I was a fairly avid runner, I ran both track and cross country, I wasn’t great but I won a race or two in my day. I continued running to stay in shape in college but after I stopped playing baseball sophomore year my output slowly tapered off to almost nothing by graduation. So basically I hadn’t run regularly in about 4 years when I started training. I’ve noticed a few subtle differences I feel should be pointed out.

First are the fairly obvious ones. Along with not running it’s been like a year and a half since I’ve been to the gym. This was a bad idea. Getting back in shape once you’ve stopped working out is a bitch. When I get in a rhythm of working out I love it, I feel like crap if I don’t. When I haven’t been exercising regularly I hate it, I find sitting on the couch watching the Food Network to be much more enjoyable than kicking my own ass at the gym. It hasn’t quite happened yet but I think I’m slowly getting to the point where I take pleasure in running again, so that’s exciting. Another obvious one is simply the difference between being 18 and 26. I hurt. My knees are all creaky, I’m sore in the morning, it all sucks. Frankly I’m kind of pissed about it. If I achieve only one thing through all the training it will be to stop hurting every time I do something physical.

There was a point in my life where I could run a 5k race in like 16 minutes in June and end up with barely more than a healthy glow. Now I run 3 miles in 50 degree weather and I’m sweating like Lindsey Lohan in a crystal meth lab. It’s disgusting. Seriously when did I turn into Patrick Ewing? It takes me a good half hour after a work out to stop sweating.

Chafing seems to be the most serious complication I’ve encountered thus far. When I graduated high school I was 5’10” and weighed about 125 pounds. If you didn’t know I ran 40 miles a week you’d think I was either anorexic or had a serious heroin addiction. Now I’m pushing 160, not exactly tipping the scales but it has an effect. The point is I never remembered my thighs touching when I ran before, but they do now. I made the mistake of wearing boxer briefs on a particularly long run and now I don’t have any hair on my inner thighs. Ok so I’d be lying if I didn’t say it feels kind of cool, but the process that made that happen hurt like hell and it’s something I hope not to recreate.

I pretty much went balls to the wall with this whole training deal without properly weighing the situation. There are a few unexpected obstacles to overcome.