Posted on: Tuesday, December 7, 2004

ABOUT WOMEN
Next year I'll beat the clock

By Catherine E. Toth
Advertiser Staff Writer

This month, I've decided to get a head start on an elusive New Year's resolution.

It's not even January and I'm already thinking about quitting.

I've abandoned my hopeless aspirations to fit nicely into anything Abercrombie & Fitch. And that other one about saving enough money for a down payment on a house. (Yeah, right.)

Now my list has dwindled down to another thing I haven't been able to accomplish for years:

To run for at least 45 minutes and not feel like flinging myself in front of a moving car just to stop the pain.

OK, so it's not the most glamorous goal. It's not noble like joining Greenpeace or life-changing like becoming a freelance writer based in Florence. (That's more of a dream now than anything else.) But it's something I need to do for myself.

No, not to lose weight, though a resolution is one of the fastest ways to shed post-Thanksgiving pounds. And no, I'm not running the marathon. That would be suicidal.

This is purely a personal point I'm trying to make with my body. I CAN run without igniting my internal organs. I WILL make it around Kapi'olani Park twice without collapsing from the lack of blood in my legs.

Or something equally dramatic.

And maybe if I can do this one simple thing, I could accomplish bigger things, like writing a network sitcom or, even better, organizing my photo collection from 1998.

It's not that I don't run. I'm just not a runner. And there's a distinction.

I'm more of a recreational jogger, someone who incorporates running into a regular workout but without any motivation to get better at it.

I started running in high school — ironically — for the cross-country team, desperate to uncover the mysteries of the "runner's high."

As it turned out, my "high" was figuring out that if you dropped back in the pack, you could make up the distance catching the next bus that came down the street.

After enduring a month of three-mile warmups — warmups! — I decided to be true to myself.

I quit and got a job.

It's taken me years to build up to three miles. And despite running at least twice a week for nearly a decade, I still haven't gotten any faster, any stronger, any better.

Signing up for 5K races didn't help, either, except to train me to accept my inadequacies.

Pregnant women have beaten me. An 80-year-old man passed me once. And mothers pushing strollers seem to always get ahead. (Though I'm convinced the stroller's wheels may have something to do with that.)

But not anymore! Not next year!

I'm finally going to break the 9-minute mile! I'm going to push past three miles without my lungs exploding! I'm going to show my critics — mainly me — that I can do it!

And by God, I'm beating those strollers!

Reach Catherine E. Toth at 535-8103 or ctoth@honoluluadvertiser.com.