The One-Week Streak

Since I suffered my stress fracture, life has been weird. A stress fracture is not an injury to mess around with, so I've been dutifully cutting back on time on my feet in the hopes of healing it quickly. Having lived a life so centered around motion for the past year (debatably longer), sitting still is unfamiliar and unsettling. I've been swimming, cycling, and walking as much as my foot will take, which, thankfully, is a little bit more each day.

In an effort to start adding some structure to this aimlessness, and in the spirit of New Year's resolutions, it was after a bike ride on New Year's Day that I decided that, after two weeks, my foot was feeling much better, and that perhaps it would be time to try to run a mile. I went out to the end of the block in front of my house, the beginning of a quarter-mile stretch along the side of Patterson Park, and ran back and forth, twice. One mile, a little over 8 minutes. A little bit of weakness in my foot, but no serious pain. This was encouraging. I could do at least this tomorrow. And the next day. And the next day. And the next day . . .

And so began my running streak for 2011. I'm now one week in, and my mile time has steadily dropped, to 6:16, as my foot has been feeling stronger every day. More importantly, I now have a daily devotion. Running at least 1 continuous mile each day of 2011 is, for me, easy. But committing to it is not trivial. While my dedication to running has always been there, my consistency, especially over the past few years, has not been up to that level. At least 1 mile per day for 2011 is a good start . . . and the success that I've seen through this method so far has me excited for big things to come.