More Training

I just got back from a pretty good training walk. It’s a cloudy and humid day here and so I wasn’t all that fast, but I was consistent. I started off at a slow pace and gradually built on that, doing the 6.25 miles in a pretty much ordinary 1:24 (13.44 minute/mile) Then I decided to tack on some more mileage and went for another 30 minutes at about the same pace. That gives me 8.5 miles total for the day. My plan is to try for a 14 mile walk tomorrow and then a 19 miler by the end of the week. And I can’t forget to get in a fast 4 mile walk sometime this week as well.

I’m including a photo of the marathon medal from a few weeks ago. It’s pretty nice, though grandson, Steven, said, “Where’s the other shoe?”

Sure, I will admit that I do marathons for the “jewelry”. It’s not the sole reason, but it certainly helps. In fact, the reason I did my first marathon was because of a medal (not my own). And if you’ve heard this story before, just click on your browser’s Back button.

It was about 1999 and I was in our Tigard, Oregon office and training some estimators to use computers. I needed a temporary office and I found an abandoned office on the second floor, in the back. It had a telephone and an internet connection so it would be my “hangout” when I wasn’t training. After setting up my computer, I spotted a large bronze medal hanging from a bulletin board nearby. It was a medal from the 1997 Portland Marathon. I looked at it and wondered…first; who left this medal behind? and then, could I ever do a marathon? I saw that medal all week; always fascinating me. And it was still there when I made a repeat trip in about 6 months. It seemed to challenge me. And in 2001, I received my own finishers medal!