Running: Health for the Soul

It rained today. I've been meaning to take a jog for a while now and as I walked out with my Zune mp3 player, I knew it was going to be a good run. The athletics field looked beautiful with water gleaming from the surface and I thought... "This is home. A solitary run by myself, with my music, enjoying myself, away from meaningless distractions in the world." I never felt so close to myself before... I just wish I hadn't gone out so late. I was only able to complete 2.5K at the track before it closed so I decided to continue by running around Seafront for a bit.

I suppose I've been pretty emotional lately and sensitive to inspiration. More recently, I've decided to stop playing basketball with the team for a while. It's what I have to do to keep my mental health up because as you can recall from previous entries, basketball has been both a source of turmoil and love--bad combination... just like an unhealthy relationship. Avoiding the mental stress and hard feelings will be good for me. Though.... it really feels like a breakup.

I'm going to run 10K in the Standard Chartered Hong Kong Marathon. Exciting stuff! The only problem is that I haven't really done serious running since high school 5K competitions.

My personal best for the 5K is 23:15 on a course with a lot of hills and even then that was in 9th grade before my knee injury and before surgery. I know things have never been the same since my knee injury but if I could do it before, if I work hard enough, I can be there again. My goal is to get 10K under 50 minutes.

For the months of October and November, I'll probably try my best to work from 3K to 5K (hopefully benchmark my progress by returning to 23:15 for 5K). I'll work on speed by aiming for 68 seconds in the 400m by January. =)

December and January will be dedicated to working my way up to 10K without stopping, once a week.

Let the training begin!!!

On another note, I've really been blessed with roommates who are watching over me and my health (I guess that's what I get for joining Fitness Connection). One roommate gave me some really delicious medicine. Unfortunately, they have been adamant about not letting me eating chocolate and things that will delay my full recovery. I like my chocolate but I love them for caring. :)

Also, Jessica's growing an apple seed.