Goals (or My Plan to Get Back in Running and Cycling Form)

With five chemo treatments left to go, you might be thinking, “Jon should you be making a running/cycling plan at this point?” Up until last week, I completely agreed with you. One of my chemo nurses was talking in general terms about goals helping people get through to the end of chemo. As you can maybe tell from my last few posts, things were getting a bit rougher and a goal to look forward to has been what I’ve needed. Before, I didn’t want to think about running or biking again because I didn’t want to jinx anything. My PET scan was clear but I didn’t want to get too far ahead and have any cancer come back.

Something clicked though when my nurse said the goal comment. Why am I worrying about jinxing anything? Throughout my cancer journey so far I’ve made it a point not to worry. Worrying doesn’t get me anywhere. If anything, it prevents me from moving forward.

So after that heart-to-heart with myself, I decided on some tentative running and cycling plans. First off, I’m going to take things real slow. I’ll be in the worst shape I’ve been in maybe ever (I’m not speaking negative, just stating facts) and my legs will have lost lots of muscle mass. My wife (who’ll we’ll call Dr. S. on this blog) has remarked how my legs have lost a lot of muscle. Basically my plan is to ease back into running for the first 6 months or so with a walking to running plan. Then I’ll move up to an official 5K plan, then to a 10K plan, and so on. 2017 will be kept really really easy and I’ll progress into the more serious training plan in 2018. My goal events are to do the 25K at the 2018 Afton Trail Run and then possibly the 2018 Twin Cities Marathon. (Just typing the word “marathon” there seemed crazy.)

Cycling I’ll just keep as a cross training activity. There’s not really any events that I want to work toward, but more of a general form level. It’s also easiest to go on bike rides on the weekends - because that’s when I have large enough chunks of free time - but that also makes it hard to make a real training plan. That’s totally fine anyway as my cycling is more of an escape, while running fits more easily into the daily grind (not that it isn’t an escape too).

It’s worth mentioning that I’ve decided that when I do start running, I will treat myself to a new pair of running shoes first. My feet need lots of support - typically meaning motion control shoes and insoles - so the shoe fitting process is very important. After having lackluster shoe fittings the last few times, I’ve been doing running store research. I’ve been hunting down the local running store with the best customer service and fitting process. It’ll be a little bit of a drive for me, but it seems like that store is Mill City Running in northeast Minneapolis. Their reviews always mention great customer service. They also detail their fit process on their website. Boxes checked. Come early June, that’s where I’ll be heading.

So yeah, that’s my plan. I’m sure it will go off track (as all training plans do), but hopefully I’ve left it open enough that I’ll still be successful. I really wish I could start running now (seriously, I don’t think my body and the deepest depths of my soul have I’ve ever wanted anything more), but I just have to be patient.