After the Sandy Hook incident on Friday, it’s been difficult to write about anything else other than being thankful and/or sad.  Earlier this week I had planned on writing about a recent health journey but that will again be delayed until later this week because I now have something more pressing….my (lower back) injury is back again.

Some of the reason for my recurring back injury – besides arthritis. Image by neckandback

I have been in a cycle of back injury and attaining fitness for a number of years.  I’ve had to pull out of 3 half marathons in as many years and I was on a self-directed program to get myself strong once and for all.  Hence my #13in2013 declaration earlier this week.

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In 1999, I ran the San Diego Rock ‘n’ Roll Marathon with Team In Training for The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.  The training took over my life but I knew wanted to run a marathon before I turned 30 and doing it for charity was a fantastic motivator.

New York Chapter 1999
Image by: http://dtrick.org/

My marathon race day was awful.  I was so physically sick during the race that my coach asked me if I thought it wise to go on because at mile 6, I looked very green.  I remember having friends and family come to see me along the course and not only did I feel sick, I was dejected.  I trained for 5 months, ran numerous races and wound up walking (and not running) for 20 of 26.2 miles.

I finished memorably.  My finish line vomit fest was completed with a wheelchair trip to the medical tent (after which I felt better and wanted to run).  My finish time was 5:20:15 and while my friends, family and team mates said they were proud, I was disappointed.

Turn the hair brown and this was close to what I looked like post-race.
Image by: gwenboul

Fast forward to today, 12/12/12, the day I decided to something epic.   Today I signed up for the 2013 San Diego Rock ‘n’ Roll Half Marathon.  14 years later I will exact my revenge on that evil course (half the distance, twice the fun?) and finish strong.  In addition, I am determined that I will not have to pull out of my 4th half marathon in as many years (due to injury).

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