Crossroads

I am at a crossroads (again).

I will give 2007 a chance but it will have to be my way or the highway. It is not about running. It is whether I will compete at any level again or just give it up and just become the junior jogger I often resemble. I mean I am good at giving up on things and moving on. I gave up on Skiing and climbing after 1979. I gave up on flying this past year. I gave up on the idea of being an employee of any company in 2002. I give up when it doesn't fit it my life anymore. I am a bit of a bastard about things like that. It has helped me move on though.

I don't give up easily but running, while still fun at a social level and also as a way of burning calories, has also become a burden. I keep thinking, well maybe there is one more season in me. I am 61 going on 62 and last year I ran several races and trial efforts that indicated that I was in 20:40 5K shape.

Lousy? Not too bad but at best I am that 8-8 or 7-9 NFL fringe team and I am not sure I want to be that. Sure I make the playoffs now and then but I go quietly in the first round. I never accepted that in my best days even though at times I was just that, meaning 8-8 and out in the first round. But I was a fighter. Now I am not. I get there because I am better than than most runners my age. Not because I am competitive.

So here's the plan and this is really it because there is no other way I am going to get back to see what is there.

Every other day for the most part. (Boring..More of the same old, same old).

AT test runs every 3-4 weeks to see where I am. I would like to get under 20 minutes for 3 miles. I was down to 20:15 in late August.

No speed work. It just doesn't work for me. 6-8 x 100 is fine but that is about it.

I will get back up in the hills once a week. This can be a steady hill run or circuits.

If I see some sizable improvement by the spring I may do cross country next fall.

If my body can't handle it anymore I am going to "give up" and move on.