An Incomplete Accomplishment: The road to and through 26.2 Miles

In June of 2008 I weighed 280 pounds. Nary a pound of that was muscle. I tried to put on an XL button-down shirt (of the loose variety) and couldn't fasten most of the buttons. I appeared in a friend's wedding that summer, and today I try not to look at those photos (even though my hair looked amazing). The concept of exercise was to put down the remote and walk all the way down the two flights of stairs from my apartment just so I could drive to Taco Bell, dump 11 bucks, and run back up the stairs again to watch Lost episodes until I passed out.

Now I know what you're thinking: "Aaron, that sounds like pretty much the best life ever. What time can I come over to borrow those DVDs?" Calm down people. It wasn't the best life ever. Not even top 15. The only problem with sitting at home and eating while watching good looking people on TV is that eventually you have to be seen by real people. And watching good looking or athletic people doesn't necessarily make you good looking or athletic. It just makes you realize that you are none of the above. In my Matrix I looked like a cross between Josh Holloway and Steve Nash, but as soon as I went to a wedding or hung out with friends that ideal self-image disintegrated into Hurley and C.C. Sabathia (I am not quite certain why my poor self-image resembled two Hispanic men, but please don't read into that racially-- it's simply a fat joke).

So I did something about it. If any of you know me, than you know this story and have probably scoured through my facebook photos to find some big boy pictures. Long story short-- I lost about 12 pounds during the rest of that summer and another 58 in a two and a half month span from January to March of 2009. I even forced myself down 181 pounds at one point, but I have kept steady at around 210.

I was asked for a long time how I did it. Despite the obvious answer that I was secretly wearing a fat suit for six or seven years, I also dieted and exercised. And when I exercised and started losing weight, I fell in love with running. I had always liked the idea of running but wasn't healthy enough to do it regularly. After the weight loss I maintained the running with the dream (it sounds trite but it's legit) of doing a half-marathon. I achieved that goal in April of 2009 and have run four more half marathons since then.

This post is not meant to be a motivational tool for losing weight (though if someone uses it as such I won't prosecute), and it is not meant to try to convert people to running. But I love running. I find it extremely therapeutic and simple. I suck at stuff that takes a lot of preparation just to try it (this will be funny when we talk about my training schedule). But running is simple. You put some shoes on and move forward. There's really nothing else to it. I can run anywhere if I really want to without anything more than shoes. Can't do that with swimming (need a pool); can't do that with biking (need a bike); can't do that with weights (hmmm...). Running works perfectly for me because I am just too unorganized to do anything else.

The great part about running is that there are personal goals to achieve. After running several half-marathons and improving on each one I convinced myself that I could do a full marathon. The full marathon distance is 26.2 miles and has been that way since 1908 when the path to the end of a race was remapped to make the finish more entertaining for the Royal Family in Britain. 26.2 is more than a mile above the approximate distance of the original legend. The origin of the marathon comes from the legend of Pheidippides, a Greek messenger sent from the Battle of Marathon (that he had just fought in) to Athens to tell the Athenians that they had defeated the Persians. After running that distance (approximately 25 miles) without stopping he conveyed the message then died.

Yeah that's right. I wanted to do this.

So I began training. The program I used was very methodical and smart, incorporating days of rest and other exercise into the running routine. I didn't concern myself with going too fast because the point was simply to cover the distance. I ran an average of 25 miles a week for 18 weeks; the peak week was a grand total of 40 miles over four days. After that peak week I injured my back and sat out for a while but got healthy in time for race day.

Did you read that last paragraph? Do you know who is writing this? I never prepare that far in advance for anything-- ever. I invested a lot of time into this one thing-- sometimes getting up 5:30 in the morning to run in the dark or staying well past midnight to hit the treadmill in the gym. It would be beyond craptastic if I could not finish this race that I took over four months to prepare for.

Finish the race. Either I have low standards or that is just how difficult this activity is. My hopeful race pace was a 10 minute mile. I had done four of my five half-marathons slightly over or decently under that pace. It seemed practical. But I also kept telling people whenever they would ask me that finishing was my first goal. I made up some crap about my back to justify that goal, but the truth was I really did not think I could finish.

On race day morning I was filled with anxiety. It didn't help that the morning temperature was in the 40s and the wind speed was at least 20 miles per hour, or that I could hardly sleep the night before. But there I was at the starting line. They let us loose and I set off on my pace. I was in good shape for the first half because I had done that before. I knew I was just a little above a 10 minute pace which was more than justifiable in my eyes. Maybe I would have enough in me at the end to push it and finish under 4 hours and 20 minutes.

Then people started to pass. People of all shapes and sizes (losing 70 pounds is great and all, but getting passed by a guy who weighs 30 pounds more and/or is at least 30 years older is a deflating feeling). Every mile got tougher from 13 to 19. Once I got through mile 19 I could feel the end coming. Yes I was slower but could still finish under 5 hours (40 minutes off target and I am looking at this positively). Miles 20 and 21 felt great. My brother was there for support, and I got that feeling that people get when they know they are at the end of something and momentum takes over.

But in a marathon, the last part is still a large part. Think about this statement: Only 5 miles to go. That's nothing. That's what I was telling myself, until I reached mile 23. My legs shut down. They had had enough. I forced them along as much as I could, but my mental state was deteriorating. My mind had decided to join my legs in the giant wining fest. And it became an emotional roller coster. I couldn't think rationally, let alone focus my mind on finishing the race.

We have all heard of the walk of shame. It comes up in a myriad of different scenarios. My walk of shame was mile 24. I was defeated (there are a friggin' large amount of depressing "d" words), but I had to keep moving forward because that was my only logical choice. I finished the race because anything else would have been that much more demoralizing (another one!) and embarrassing. I felt like I was disappointing all the people close to me and even people not that close to me, even though this had nothing to do with them.

Did I cross the finish line? Yes. Was my final pace faster than an average walking speed? Absolutely. Did family and friends stress how proud they were that I finished no matter what the time? Of course they did, they're not jerks. But I am not satisfied. I could have gone faster; I could have trained better; I could have paced smarter; I could have remained emotionally and mentally cool. But I didn't do those things. Did I fail in my goal?

In my head I am battling Disney Channel ethics verses Old School Band Director ethics. Disney tells me that I tried and put forth the effort and finished and that is a success. Old School Band Director tells me it wasn't perfect, so it wasn't good enough. I am not sure which side is truly correct, but I think maybe it's both (copyright Forrest Gump). Sitting completely satisfied can't be right, but feeling like a failure sure isn't the way to go either.

In June of 2008 I weighed 280 pounds. In October of 2011 I finished my first marathon and I'm pissed that I didn't finish faster. I'd say that's a step in the right direction.