Before I get into anything too deep I want to give a tl;dr for everyone -
Lately I've been getting the feeling that the reason that I want to keep training is just to prove that I'm "good enough" (maybe worthwhile is a better word? I'm having trouble explaining it). I wanted to see if anyone else felt the same way and what they found out/what they did about it. It's almost like I keep going because I'm trying to regain some past glory.
Here's the long version -
I am a former high school 800m runner. I started running my junior year of high school, only joining because I wanted to be a sprinter and have abs (I used to think that I needed to sprint in order to have abs). I was put in mid-distance and actually had a lot of early success. I would win by a good margin, and people from other teams would go out of their way to congratulate me when I won. I joined my college's club team after high school because I was too slow to join the D1 team (big fish, little pond, though I had no concept of it at that time). I never trained for distance before, and though I enjoyed the club team, I didn't realize that they were formerly fast runners who kind of settled into hobby jogging. By association, I pretty much became a hobby jogger.
Ever since joining, I've been trying to get a PR in the 5k. This is only because there's really no outlet for me to race track after high school, and I'd get my doors blown off at an open college meet. Trying to do distance training, I've pretty much have just been cycling injuries for the past 2-3 years while trying to get my mileage up. While my endurance has improved, I've lost all of my speed and pretty much have a one-gear running stride, just jogging about 9 min miles for 20-30 mpw. I never ended up getting good at the 5k and I've been trying for years, I keep thinking once my mileage is up I'll finally get that PR. That hope never materializes though.
This past year I've taken over the club, and now all of the distance people are gone and I mostly have sprinters. Since working with them it seems like I've gained a new perspective on training. It's like the intense, fast workouts brought me back to when I'd actually have some intensity in my training. It's like back when I first joined track in high school.
This has made me think, am I just trying to re-live my former "glory" by becoming good at distance running? I feel like I love to run, but I'm also feeling like maybe I'm beating my head against this "5k PR" wall because if I accomplish it, I'll feel like I did back when I was getting recognized for winning an 800.
I'm old enough to realize that no one but me cares about my running, and unless asked about it, I don't talk about it with others. It's just that lately I've been feeling like I'm trying to prove to myself that I'm good enough by running a good distance race (before track I was never good at other sports and was chubby, I was never recognized as being athletic before then). The intense training with the sprinters is making me question me jogging around all of the time is worth me holding out hope for that new PR.
I'm feeling like more of an "athlete" now since working with them, and I'm wondering if it's time to switch up my training a bit. I don't want to get away from aerobic work completely, but I am feeling like I'm in need of a change. Has anyone else been driven to train by, if I'm being honest, insecurity? What did you do to address it and how did your training/lifestyle reflect that change?
Thanks everyone, I appreciate any advice given.