Am I a runner?

Am I a runner?  Can I call myself a runner?  I remember having these thoughts 5-6 weeks ago, as I was training for the ING Georgia half marathon, and getting in long runs of 8, 9, 10 mile runs during the weekend, and 4-6 mile runs a couple times during the week.  I would run at least twice a week, sometimes more.  And as it got closer to the race, I would easily run 4-6 miles on the treadmill.  And I remember thinking that 40-60 minutes on the treadmill was not a big deal.  I could do it easily.  I enjoyed it.  I also remember thinking that it was not that long before when a 60 minute treadmill run seemed like something that was unattainable.

But I was training.  And getting the runs in.  And the distance.  And started having these thoughts of – am I a runner?  I didn’t feel like a runner.  Not that I had a definition of what a runner should be.  But I definitely was not one.  I liked doing my training – but I wasn’t pushing myself that hard.  I would only push myself to get the distance in.  I didn’t do any workouts such as speed or tempo.  I wasn’t by any means fast.  I knew I was building up my endurance.  I was enjoying it.

As I would recant my training runs to others (mostly non-runners), I wondered if they considered me a runner.  Most people don’t run as much as I was running.  Lots of people don’t even run.  Was I a runner in their eyes?

I think I started to think of myself as a runner, but didn’t let on to anyone that I was starting to feel like one.  I ran the half marathon – with 10,000 of my closest friends!     I felt like I was a part of something – here are thousands of people running 13.1 or 26.2 miles.  And I was a part of this!  I was doing it – no matter how cold or painful it was.  I was running 13.1 miles.  Even though I did all my training runs by myself and not with any running partners or part of a running group, I still felt I was a part of a running community, if you will.

Here I am, almost 4 weeks since the half marathon, and I haven’t run.  The crazy thing is – even though I haven’t run, I now consider myself a runner.  I’m a little bummed that I’ve been having knee problems.  It started while training for the half marathon – got a case of runner’s knee.  I didn’t run after the race.  I was given some exercises to do (I was semi-consistant with these).  I would occasionally do some other type of exercise, but not run, in order to not strain my knee.  I’ve noticed this week that the pain is mostly gone.  I plan on getting back into running, slowly.  I plan on doing non-running workouts for a few more weeks, at least, in order to try and stay in shape and to let the knee heal.  With that, I did a run/walk combo last Saturday – run 2 minutes / walk 1 minute:  repeat a total of 10 times for a 30 minute workout.  I hopped on the elliptical on Tuesday – and surprisingly enjoyed it.  I went to spin Wednesday – and loved it.  My legs were just going – they had so much pep in them from not doing a whole lot for a few weeks.  As for Thursday, the day after spinning – well, that was a different story.  It started that morning in the shower – my knee felt weak.  I was not sure it wasn’t going to collapse under me.  Several times throughout the morning, I was on the verge of tears.  I don’t think it was necessarily the pain, but the fear of the potential of something really painful or of my knee just going out from under me.  As the day wore on, the pain/fear subsided.  Since then, I haven’t necessarily babied my knee, but I notice when it feels like it’s tweaking and slow down and change how I’m moving so as to not cause pain/twinges.

And today – I went out for a 3:1 run/walk.  I set the watch for 10 intervals.  And in the middle of the 8th interval, I was feeling some pain all around my knee.  It was enough for me to consider walking the rest of the way instead of those last couple of run intervals.  BUT, I did the runs, and just didn’t try to push the pace.  I had the thought of not running at all for the next month – to take up swimming (which while I know it’s good for me, I’m not fond of getting up to speed and endurance with swimming – it alwasy feels like my lungs are gonna burst) and walking, only.  But I don’t want to do that.  I just want to get back into running and building up my distances again.  And I’m even ready to start doing training runs – like tempo and speed work.  Never did I think I’d want to do that!!!  I want to run.  I want to work on my speed.  I want to get back up to a 6 mile (minimum) base.  I guess that means I’m a runner.  If only my knee will cooperate, then I can be a runner!