Walking on a bright morning on the last day
of March was brilliant!
I
walked with a few folks who are getting back into a training routine after some
time off. It seemed that we had fallen
far behind our former pace and would never regain our speed; that all we had
gained was lost. We started sharing our
stories of when we had first begun - how difficult it was to build our distance
and our speed. We laughed at memories of
wondering if we could ever walk a brisk 5K, let alone finish a marathon.
On reflection, I know I’ll never do another
marathon; maybe not even another half.
We’ll see. But I also know I’m in
better shape than I was when I started down this path ten years ago. Ten kilometres is now a pleasant walk, not a
distant goal. My pace is slower than it
was when I was training for long races but still better than the woman I was
when I began.
As is our wont, we soon moved on to other
topics: the news of the day, family life, plans. And discovered when we finished that, without
too much effort, our pace had been 10.6 minutes per kilometre. Not a personal best for any of us but
certainly a pace that could be shaved into respectability, since we weren’t
pushing hard. And certainly, one that
the woman ten years ago would have been astounded to achieve.
