Learning in Training #2

My second week of race training is complete...and in truth, the third week is almost done, as I write to you now. I've decided to do a weekly update about this adventure, because it's teaching me so much, and I want to share with you the lessons I'm learning.

These tales are from last week...week two.

We are finally experiencing summer here in the Midwest. After weeks of wearing jackets instead of swimsuits, real summer has finally descended, with all its humidity, all its heat...all its unrelenting full sun. It doesn't bother me...except when I run. I've learned that I'm such a fair weather runner. I keep track of all the conditions of each day's run, and I'm learning that I'm partial to 70 and sunny with a good breeze and a decent cloud passing over that sun ray now and then.

And last week? According to my notes, the first day was "super hot and humid." Second day was "87 but feels like 91 with full sun and no breeze." The third day was true Indiana all the way. In the space of three miles, I ran in "hot, humid, rain, sun, breeze, and no breeze." FINALLY on the fourth day, I got my perfect conditions.

It was no wonder to me, then, that the verse God kept laying on my heart was the end of Hebrews 12:1 - "let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with preseverance the race marked out for us."

It came to me during the first run of the week, on day "super hot and humid" as I clopped along gripping a full water bottle in my hand. My fingers ached and slipped on the sweating bottle, and I felt like I paid more attention to it than the run. I came to an area where I passed a set of aluminum bleachers, and the words "throw off everything that hinders...and run" came to mind. I smacked the bottle down on the bleachers and took off {think more in terms of a pig to the trough rather than a gazelle through a field} as fast as my lead-feeling legs would carry  me.

I ran and ran, feeling the truth of this lesson settling over me, and then I circled back toward the bleachers to retrieve the water and take a sip while running forward toward that last mile.

Alas, as I ran past the bleachers and leaned in to grab the bottle, my knee bent and my body inched in more than I realized...and my knee crashed into aluminum. I grabbed the bottle and kept running, glancing down to see fresh blood and the sweat rolling down my leg stinging sharply when it hit the open wound.

I wanted to stop, but the verse came back again...throw off everything that hinders - including a skinned knee - and run.

As I told you last week, I'm trying to pray for the people of Haiti as I run. Pray for the patients who have to walk to medical care. My leg throbbed a bit as I pounded across the last mile, and with each pain, I thought of people walking with broken limbs...with injuries far worse than a skinned knee. I prayed and I ran.

The weather wasn't the only thing against me last week. I caught a cold at the lake and had issues with a clogged ear and a stuffy nose. And then, of course, the knee.

There's always something to throw off. Injury, illness, bad attitudes, lack of focus...always something to use as a reason to quit. But I believe I'm encouraged to keep going. Keep running. Keep praying for these people who endure far more for the sake of their immediate health. They press on through illness, through injury, through humidity, through heat, through rain, through wind, through stillness. And I will do the same.

{Previous Posts on this Topic...}
The Haiti Half
Learning in Training #1