The Continued Balance

(Start of the 2016 News & Sentinel Half Marathon)

One of my favorite quotes from one of my favorite cinemas,

"Sometimes you're flush and sometimes you're bust, and when you're up it's never as good as it seems, and when you're down, you never think you'll be up again, but life goes on".

This quote from the movie Blow is when George Yung's dad, Fred was explaining to George why money isn't real. It rings true to a lot of things that may be thrown your way in life. The hard part that I think Fred was trying to explain was that you have to learn to appreciate the balance of the ups and downs. To not get stuck at the far ends of each spectrum, but to understand a lot of the time life is hard. It is often that in our toughest moments in life, is when we force ourselves to adapt and grow.

I don't want to turn this post into another sob story about how I've once again trained hard, got hurt, then somehow overcame to continue to push towards fitness. Repeat the cycle and add some other life struggles, and you pretty much have my past 8 year life story. No, I want this to help people understand how you find positive outcomes out of every situation regardless of what you may see it as. Learn from it, use that knowledge, and move on because you'll never be truly satisfied when you're stuck in a shallow narrow minded view.

Extensor tendinitis turned from bad to worse to can't run on it. Masked by too many ibuprofen than i'd like to admit, eventually caused my achilles to become inflamed. Eventually getting diagnosed with bursitis. I ignored it as usual and attempting running here and there in hopes of holding onto fitness for the News and Sentinel Half Marathon last Saturday in Parkersburg, West Virginia. As you might have already figured out, the race didn't go well.

As I take this week to finally give my foot the rest it needs, I have time to reflect on the closing summer, figure out what went wrong, learn, adapt, and prepare to once again gear up for the upcoming fall training. I've often struggled to find the balance of the training that works best for me. This past buildup I was focused more on miles, then strength, and in previous base phases I tend to get into the weight room 5 times a week while holding a good bit of mileage. I'm still playing with the balance of the two, but one thing I know for sure is that i'm not able to recover and bounce back as quick as I use to in college. I need to focus on recover, and less on being stubborn. Training can be like balancing on a teeter-totter with a cactus at each side. Too much of one thing can result in becoming an unbalanced athlete often leading to injury. But like George Jung's father said, life goes on.

With the familiar smell of a fall breeze slowly making its way into the foothills of south east Ohio, I'm eager to get on some soft grass and run pain free again. I have one hundred and eight days until Club Nationals, and I don't plan to waste a single one of them.

- BJW