The Worst Thing Can Be the Best Thing

I put the Santa Shuffle 5k run on my 2025 as soon as I finished it in December of 2024.

Since finishing the flat out and back course of 2024, I wanted to come back, hit it hard, to better my time.

I was curious if I could train sufficiently go under 24 minutes for a 5k which I hadn’t done in about 15 years.

Committed to my running, I was looking to gradually drop my time over the next 12 months. For my run training I like to run on what I like to refer to as the “shredmill” (treadmill) for convenience, consistency, and for speed.

My runs were feeling good, slowly dropping my times into December.

Until about two weeks before the run.

A tug in my right achilles tendon during one of my interval runs got me to stop. I wanted to address it right away. so close was I to having today’s training session done, and so committed to not be derailed by this to the point of not being able to do the race.

Stopping to work on it, I was able to loosen it up by rolling over a ball and even using some “voodoo” floss for compression. I was being so smart about it. Yay me.

After using the ball for a few minutes, it felt okay.

Back on the “shredder” to run. It was fine. .

After this incident my commitment to my recovery practices deepened. I spent a few more minutes warming up and cooling down after for my runs.

Sometimes when training, athletes can ride the line between peak performance and injury. We are pushing ourselves during training and have to be tuned in with rest, nutrition, sleep, recovery, and timing.

Push just enough to get better, but not to much to topple the plan by getting injured.

With two weeks to go until the race, a year long commitment to training to run faster, I was looking forward to meeting this goal then shifting gears to more strength training. Less focus on the running.

In hindsight, I should have bought a lottery ticket.

Serendipity.

This phrase is written on a card that is taped to my desk top computer:

“Let my helpers find me.”

My elevator explanation of what this phrase means to me-I am guided and protected.

Don’t interpret things/events as good or bad, best or worst, but instead your “helpers”, the universe or whatever is helping to steer you along.

Things happen. My helpers are steering me. What may seem like the worst thing can become the best thing.

Maybe not in the moment, but somewhere down the road.

I can reflect on events over the years that seemed the worst or terrible while I was going through them.

Fast forward into the future and they become the thing that shifted me into a new direction. Now it seems like the best thing, the thing that brought me to the lovely place I am in now.

Saturday, December 6th came. Go time!

I thought I was being savvy by parking my car 1 mile from the start of the run to use this 1 mile as my warm up. Walking and jogging my way down the wide open road, now closed off to traffic, my body felt fine. I hoped my achilles would be okay throughout the run.

I felt ready. I also felt ready to be done this race so I could rest my running legs, and make that training shift. This was going to be a fun way to wrap up my commitment, reach a goal, while doing it with a few hundred runners in their Santa suits, elf costumes, reindeer antler headbands, and anything thought of as holiday festive wear. It was a fun scene! Lots of energy!

Time to line up for the start.

I was jumping up and down to stay warm, keep my heart rate a little elevated, and enjoying the music blasting from the speaker I happened to be standing in front of.

The achilles felt okay with the impact of my jumping. My confidence buzzing.

Let’s get this run started!

A few women in my age category, who are fast runners, were near me.

Perfect. I can pace off of them, stay with them and hope they’d be having a good day to help me push my own pace.

The count down, the start, and throngs of red clad runners took off down the road!

My pace was good. I hung with the women I dialed in on at the start.

Mile 1 came and went.

Still I was with them.

The course was a little different than last year with a side jog out and back over a bridge.

We were closing in on the end of mile two. A little dip then rise on the bridge.

It was the rise, the small uphill that did it.

My achilles turned to steel.

Sh*t.

Yowza it hurt!

Hobble, hobble, hobble.

It was not getting better with my hobble walking.

No way could I run.

And that was it.

One mile walk to reach the finish line.

I quickly accepted my injury. Oh well.

Now I wish I hadn’t parked a mile from the finish.

As I hobble walked along the course to reach the finish line, I did see a someone I knew, from high school some 40 years ago, at one of the course intersections. She was a volunteer. She asked if I might need help from one of the handsome firemen also at her station.

Declining, I hobbled on.

It was a bummer, not reaching my goal after much preparation. It did bother me for a hot minute. But it was done. I was ready to make the shift in my training.

It had crossed my mind that for some reason unknown to me at this time that this would in some way help save me from myself somewhere into the future. My helpers had found me.

Two weeks later I reflect on the events of my Santa Shuffle 2025, I can see how it did indeed save me from myself.

The day after the run, Sunday, I spent it with good friends, hanging out, eating yummy food, making each other laugh, and getting out for a walk. Though I was hobble walking, it was restful.

Monday, came and normally I would go back to my running, running on the “shredmill”. But not this day as my achilles was having none of it.

My injury, I like to believe, saved me from getting on that “shredmill”, cranking up the speed and possibly being spit out the back of it when my 1st heart attack hit. Possibly sustaining more injuries on top of everything else.

What seemed like the worst thing-injury during the race-kept things from perhaps being different than what they were. The injury slowed me down, the slowing may have helped me.

So I am going to believe that my helpers found me, protected me by slowing me down with a minor injury to help steer me in a better direction.

I know what you are thinking: you died from a heart attack!

So how is the achilles injury helpful?

The events of the heart attack are another helper moment as I see it, the stars all aligned that day for me as well.

Because here I am.

Knowing I have helpers, knowing I am guided and protected is a very nice place to interpret the world from. (Nicer than believing someone is out to get me).

Disappointment dissolves quickly.

Instead I experience Gratitude.