Blubber To Runner

I love music.  Music is my addiction.  Tuesday is one of my favorites days to wake up because it’s the day new music is released to the masses.  I listen to music over watching TV 10 times out of 10. I have over 5,500 songs on my iPod – to put that in perspective, if I put my iPod on shuffle today, it will not repeat a song for 213 days.  I have everything from Broadway shows to thrash metal that I actually ENJOY listening to… this doesn’t include the music I may not particularly like, yet still have on there as well.  However, there is a problem:

I can’t run to music.

It’s a dilemma I am really struggling with, because I started running due to the fact that I could actually listen to music while I did it.  However, what I discovered was that when I would run, I would run to the beat – my steps would actually be to the beat, no matter how slow or fast it was. 

It was normally fast – something to keep me pumped up and energized.  Bands like Disturbed, Sevendust, Killswitch Engage, etc. made up my ‘5K’ playlist with the hopes that I would be motivated by these energetic songs.  Yet all it did was burn me out.  There I was, rockin’ on the W&OD trail, Five Finger Death Punch’s “The Bleeding” getting me going, only to completely wear me out before it hit the end of the song.  The rest of my 3.2 miles was more walk than run because I was, quite simply, beat.

So after last week’s plea for running help, my favorite Chamorro (there’s your shout-out, Bro!) taught me a lot about running pace.  While this helped me by teaching me how to run the majority of a 5K as opposed to running it as fast as possible, what it also did was show me that Disturbed can no longer accompany me on my runs because I can’t control the pace I have when it’s on!

Little fact about me:  I’ve been playing the drums since I was 13.  I’ve only been behind a kit twice in the last 11 years, but still have a pad, pull out the sticks and do some syncopation a few times a week.  Why is this relevant?  Because I believe this little hobby is keeping me from listening to what I wanna listen to when I’m running.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m a big fan of Buble and Connick, but ‘Haven’t Met You Yet’ isn’t really pushing me that last half mile, and my running steps matching up with the 1, 2, 3, 4 of ‘Black’ by Sevendust was killing me.

So for now, I run with my thoughts and not my music.  The focus needs to be on my running and not my music.  But, it has given me another short-term goal to shoot for:

Get in good enough shape so that I CAN run to Disturbed – rhythm and all.