How COVID-19 Gave Fresh Air to My Lungs
Even though this was never my forte…
COVID-19 has put a damper on many areas of my life. Yet, at the same time, it forced me to look within during this perplexing time.
I learned in my early years that I had to muddle through whatever life throws at me. When COVID-19 broke my sails, I found a new way to garner a breath of fresh air.
Running was never my forte.
For as long as I remembered, exercise has been a part of my life. I took aerobic classes in the middle of the day, then after work, headed to the New York Sports Club to spin, row, and weight lift. But running was never my forte. I don’t think it ever crossed my mind.
I’ve always admired the many brave and inspiring souls as they trek up hills and terrains training for a marathon. Wondering how they managed to keep their organs from jumping around?
My bike now sits in my garage.
Yet I never missed rooting for the top competitors in the winter and Summer Olympics or the New York City and London Marathons.
For me, outdoor sports were Mountain Biking around the lake in Forest Hills, during the U.S. Open. My bike now sits in my garage.
Cory Everson was my inspiration for a healthy body.
My role model was Ms. Olympia, Cory Everson. I thought she had the best physique of the body-building girls and I developed a schedule based on some of her recommendations.
Then, I received a flyer for a fitness challenge at a new gym.
A Fitness Challenge?
You guess it. I was there. I enrolled and only took the classes, yoga, barre, and kickboxing. The new technique was High-Intensity Interval Training (HITT).
I moved through each station seven times in one hour.
Although the workout was arduous, it was a blast and I went back for more every day. Yes, I won that fitness challenge!
Then life took me elsewhere to another state.
COVID-19 hit and online school became a serious chore, and parents became “extended teachers”.
The lockdown of gymnasiums did not help. I needed an outlet.
I began to run on June 13th, 2020 not knowing what it would feel like but decided to give it a try. It was the only option I had left.
That day, I ran my first three and a half miles, and I was elated.
My neighborhood has a .75 mile loop with many unfinished homes and dodging trucks with workers and piles of dirt has not been fun.
Especially, the swarm of worms that feel the road is their vacation home when the grass is soaked from the night’s rain.
On other days, I try to outpace the recycle and garbage pickups.
Sometimes, hovering in circles around my driveway until they go by which was also unproductive.
I found that going out earlier to avoid the distractions worked better.
I increased my miles and ran daily, but then I began to feel aches and soreness. So I took advantage of foam rolling from my earlier HITT days and do so on my off days.
Many times I wanted to call it quits, but I knew I had to keep moving. My body would automatically, slow down to the point of giving up. It was almost as if I was just speed walking up the hills. Yet I pushed on past that hurdle.
I learned that pacing myself with varying speeds allowed me to teach my body how to adapt to different physiological stresses.
My neighborhood has many hills with dips and then gradually ascends uphill to the top of a cul-de-sac. I am forced to reckon with the varying, terrain.
The more I ran, the more I wanted to run. Although I didn’t know anything about running, I realized that I wanted to keep running.
After a couple of months, I decided that I liked the sport, enough, to become educated in it.
So I decided to get familiar with the right tools for the trade. Knowing that if I wanted to get better at this sport, it would require my time and effort.
I learned the nitty-gritty:
1) The various types of running shoes and their benefits.
2) Having the comfort of a wider toe box is critical to running without pain.
3) Knowing the different millimeters of heel drop and their effectiveness.
4) Understanding pronation of the foot when it lands on the ground.
5) How the foot transfers weight by rolling inward or out.
I also geared up with the necessities, even socks.
As the months grew, and it got colder, I realized that the need for special gear allowed me to excel. I tried out different shoes, hybrid jackets, skull caps, and even socks.
Yes, the ones that don’t slip off at the heel and are made specifically for a performance or running.
Most importantly, I learned how critical rest is to prevent injuries.
An injury will always show its ugly head at the most inopportune moment and knowing how to handle it is important. I stretch before and after each run for 15 minutes and weight train to strengthen the whole body.
One of the most difficult things to deal with is a sore knee. The method of rest, ice, compression, elevation (RICE) is good, but for how long?
I found that education is the differentiator for me. I learned that the knee is connected to the iliotibial band (ITB) that runs along the outer side of the leg from the hip to the knee.
The ITB band is a muscle and thus, elastic. One of the main reasons for pain in the knee is a lack of flexibility. Unless there is a larger problem that may entail inflammation. Pain in the knee area can be relieved if the ITB is foam rolled during rest.
Foam rolling is very important to relieve tightness.
Foam rolling from the side of the hip to the knee will relieve tightness and elongate the muscle. It will be painful during the process, but slow movements will help to loosen the tightness and relieve pain.
Therefore, on the contrary, instead of waiting out the pain, it is better to foam roll the ITB and go right back out eating up those roads and hills.
I have run in temperatures as cold as nineteen degrees and revel at the morning, brisk, wind that whistle across my face. A welcome moment of diversion from my news or music podcast.
The morning wind is refreshing and cools me down like my gloves which know just when to warm up so my momentum stays astride.
Four days shy of seven months, on January 9th, 2021, l ran my first half-marathon in twenty-eight degrees and in three hours.
Today, I run five to six miles, every other day, and average twenty to twenty-five miles each week.
In eight months, I have run a total of 580 miles, equivalent to 22 marathons and I don’t plan to stop anytime soon.
I did not know the sport of running could be so immensely, enjoyable.
Now, I understand the love, pain, and sacrifice other runners encountered. Especially, knowing that there aren’t any organs jumping around.
Thanks to COVID-19, I found a new part to me, and you can too!
