Exercise is fun?

I beat over 6800 people in a race yesterday! Me! The Girl Who Comes in Last beat that many people. Okay, so 27,500 people beat me in the race, but hey, I’m a glass-is-half-full -kinda-gal. Really, though, I don’t care what place I came in, but I do care about my time for the race. I talked about in my last blog about how I have to change my frame of reference in races now that I am more than halfway to my weight loss goal of 100 pounds. It’s not “just” about finishing now (which is an admirable goal, don’t get me wrong) but I need to push myself to get to a higher level in my fitness and weight loss goals. So I set a goal to complete the Bank of America Shamrock Shuffle in under an hour and I did it! In 57 minutes and 39 seconds to be exact. And, I can’t believe this, but I had fun doing it. A lot of fun.

BEAT MY GOAL!

Now, don’t get me wrong. It was hard as hell, especially the Mt. Everest sized hill that preceded the finish line, but it was also a helluva good time. I raced with three of my closest friends and we dressed up in crazy outfits and it was a beautiful day in downtown Chicago and we were right in the middle of 35,000 people running like lunatics through the streets of the city. It was a blast!

Spending the day, beating goals, with my best girls! Stacey, me, Meg and Draga.

When we hit mile 4, I was actually shocked at how fast it was going and couldn’t believe that we had less than a mile left to finish. That never, ever happens to me. I didn’t have runners high at all, but it was just going by so fast. I actually still can’t believe it. My experiences running at all, let alone in races, were always ones of dying, out of breath, red faced, cursing and feeling slightly humiliated that I was plodding along with my anything-but-graceful stomp of a stride at the end of the pack, wounded wildebeest style. I was still all of those things but I was right in the middle of the pack, running at what I consider a great pace and I was smiling through the whole thing (still am actually). Less wounded wildebeest and more happy hyena. Well, maybe not happy at the end of that hill but once I was able to breathe again and the lights stopped popping in front of my eyes, I held hands with my girls and we barreled through the finish line, laughing/grimacing all the way!

Holding hands through the glorious finish!

I then managed to completely lose my mind and eat my weight in junk food all day. I don’t know what came over me and I felt like complete shit by the end of the day. So much so that I went to bed early thinking I caught the flu. I woke up this morning just fine and was reminded of how important good nutrition is and that I spent so many years of my life unknowingly feeling like shit because I ate whatever I wanted all the time completely mindlessly. I never knew what truly feeling healthy felt like.

This is usually how I feel in races (or running at all).

I woke up this morning not wanting more junk food or feeling derailed at all, which would have been my M.O. in the past and would have led me through a drive thru for a delicious nasty breakfast sandwich. Not anymore, though. I had a healthy protein shake and vowed to eat cleanly to detox my body from the piles of crap I consumed yesterday, which, at the time, were delicious but so not worth the stomach ache, heartburn and fever symptoms I felt at the end of the night.

Epic, indeed.