Two Lapper

Just woke up.  It's two days since I ran the Carolina Mudder twice.  First lap started at 8:20 and finished at 11:45.  Second lap started at noon and ended at 4:30.  I must admit, much of the second lap was spent walking - although, I could have arranged a slow trot if my teammates had been up to it.  Only ended up skipping one obstacle (the second Berlin Walls on our second lap).  At least attempted everything else.

Additionally, this was also the first time I was injured during a mudder.  I got a gash on my eye in the very first obstacle, Arctic Enema.  I jumped in and hit a submerged chunk of ice.  Opened up a cut on my right eyebrow about an inch long.  Right after the second obstacle, I was stopped by some guys in a truck and asked if I wanted to continue.  Of course, I wasn't going to quit 15 minutes in - unless I was in serious trouble.  They cleaned out the cut and put a piece of tape on it (which fell off a few miles later).  I realized I had been cut, but didn't really understand how deep it was until I got back to the hotel afterwards.

I'm sore right now.  I'm starting to feel a big toe injury and my left calf really hurts, but all in all, I think this was a good effort.  I think that I actually feel better overall now than I did at a similar point after my first Mudder.

Results!

I played basketball, football and ran track when I was in High School.  Additionally, I spent a good amount of time outside riding my bike, running around, playing with friends, etc.  I wasn't necessarily the most athletic kid (even in my own family), but I wasn't purely an uncoordinated wall-flower either.  Having said that, though, I can say - unequivocally - I'm in the best shape of my life right now.  I'm consistently running 11+ miles (with a high of 13 this past week) and I'm a week away from being done with the Insanity workout regime. 

I've tried to document the fact that I was motivated to start my whole weight-loss/training regime after hitting a high point of 235 lbs, but I never really thought I would go so far into it that I would get into the kind of shape I'm in right now.  I remember being able to run for hours when I was in High School, but I feel stronger, sharper and more in-shape than I can ever remember feeling before.  I'm almost sad to see Insanity's end in sight.  I finish two days before the mudder on the 27th of this month, and I'm already starting to think about restarting the whole thing.  It's been intense (as the name implies), but I can honestly say it's been amazing at the same time.

Mid-Life?

I was talking with a friend of mine the other day - a friend who has known me for a very long time - and she implied that my transformation is the result of a mid-life crisis.  This made me think, because I hadn't really thought of that before.  Obviously, I would guess that most people who are going through these kinds of crises don't actually do so knowingly, so it's relatively easy to imagine that I wouldn't realize that I was going through one. 

Nevertheless, this was the first time that I even considered it.  And if I'm honest, I can't reject the idea out of hand.  Having said that, though, I have reflected on it and I'd like to believe that if any sort of "mid-life crisis" is involved it is only part of a much larger, much more complex process.  The timing is right - if you buy into the idea that mid-life happens sometime around 40 - but I'd also like to believe that I have been on a lifelong mission to improve myself.  I've tried to tackle every problem that I've ever had, and overcome it.  And I have some pretty big accomplishments in my life - things big and small that make me proud of who I am and what I've created with my life.  Also, I've always like to make people question their perceptions about who and what I am.  For example, I remember working at a hotel front desk when I was much younger - while I was working on my master's degree.  At the time, I was very young-looking, and I tended to grow my hair long (more out of laziness than style).  I remember telling my boss that I was working on a particularly difficult paper in one of my classes, and him being surprised that I was working on a master's degree.  When I asked why, he said that he knew I was smart, but didn't think I was SMART.  I still recall that anecdote like it was yesterday because I remember being very happy that I was able to shock him out of his preconceived notions. 

All of this is prelude to saying, I have no real idea if what I've started here is the result of a mid-life crisis or not.  But, I also have come to the conclusion that I don't really care either way.  After all, we have this negative perception of men going through mid-life as they cheat on their wives and buy unnecessary cars, but if that energy can be harnessed into more healthy and positive behaviors, then a mid-life "crisis" doesn't have to be a crisis at all.  Instead, I'd like to think, if anything, to whatever extent it does play a role, my mid-life events are more of a mid-life adventure than a crisis.