Well I never thought I’d actually start a blog, but after about a month of browsing through other people’s thoughts, I decided I might as well give it a try. Besides, I need somewhere to talk about all my running related things and not many people in my real life care to hear all the minute details.
As an introduction...I never liked running growing up. I played field hockey in high school and the long training runs were quite possibly the worst part of my day! I was also overweight in high school, which certainly didn’t help. When I went away to college, instead of gaining the freshman 15, I somehow ended up losing the freshman 20, mainly I think by just walking everywhere and not having mom’s good homecooking to pig out on! I did however acquire the legendary beer gut by my senior year, so after graduation I started to run simply to lose the gut! I was too poor at that point to join a gym, so I just did what was cheapest- headed out for a run! For the next few years, I never seriously ran, didn’t do any races, just ran a couple miles a few times a week and was able to shape up pretty well. 2 years ago I ran my first race, a 5k and finished in about 27 minutes.
Then, I took about another year off from running, for no apparent reason other than I was just plain old busy and lazy. Fast forward to this spring, when my boyfriend asks me if I want to run the Peachtree 10k with him and his father, something his dad has done for the past 4 or 5 years. I decided that was good a reason as any to start running again, and trained pretty decently for it, although nothing serious and never running more than 3.5 miles leading up to the race. Still, I managed to finish in about an hour (the exact time is hard to get when you don’t wear a watch and you’re running surrounded by 50,000 other people!)
The energy and excitement of the Peachtree lit a huge spark in my running. When I finished the race in a pretty decent time, I decided to see what I could do if I really trained hard and followed a schedule. At first I thought I’d do another 10k, but then I just decided to take the plunge and go for a half marathon. I’ve officially been training now since July 7th (yes, I started that Monday right when we got back from Atlanta after the Peachtree) and things are going pretty well so far. I’m using Hal Higdon’s novice plan and I’m now about half way through.
I still haven’t picked a half marathon yet…I know, I’m getting a little bit late now. I’ve narrowed it down to two choices that coincide with my 12 week training plan ending…the Maine Half Marathon in Portland, or the Hartford Half. Both have pros and cons and I just can’t seem to commit to one…so if anyone’s actually reading this and has any advice, I’d love to hear it!
Well, that certainly was long-winded, but I still want to post a race report for the Cigna/Elliot 5k in Manchester that I did last Thursday, so I think I just might keep going this afternoon!
