Injured No More

For the last 10 months I have identified myself as an “injured runner”. Today, I finally removed that label from my bio, and will remove it from my vocabulary.

The recovery process was a million times slower than I ever expected. Back in March I had a marathon training plan printed out for my first spring marathon, and I was sure I’d bounce back in a couple short weeks and be slamming my workouts without worry.

People say you bounce back from injury “stronger than ever”. For me, I was physically at my strongest the minute before I slipped that fateful February afternoon. I’m ... a lot slower now. My 5k tempo runs these days look like my marathon pace a year ago. Thankfully, numbers are just numbers.

You know what’s stronger now? My mindset. No more short term goals, no more focusing on numbers, no more fearing that I am not good enough. I am good because I try, and that mindset can’t be quantified on Strava.