Off and Running

I have no idea why, but I've recently decided to try running.  Sure, I've dabbled in it in the past -- forced cross-country runs in high school, half-hearted attempts to get in shape for tennis, delusional thoughts of actually finishing a half-marathon....  You get the point.

But this time is different.  Why?  Because for the first time, I'm actually enjoying myself. 

It all started about a year ago when I agreed to do a half-marathon with a friend.  Injuries kept me from training, and we ended up doing a half-marathon relay instead.  At the end of my 8 miles, I was dead tired and wanted nothing more than to find a cold drink and a soft bed, not necessarily in that order.  But the weird thing was, as tired as I was, I realized I still had fun. 

Since my original plans to do the half-marathon were thwarted, I decided to give it another go.  The biggest run around here is at the end of February, but I realized that there's no way I would be able to train properly for a half-marathon in time.  So I signed up for a 10K instead.  I'm not kidding myself, there's no way I'm going to be able to run the entire 10K.  But I'm going to get out there and give it a shot. 

In the meantime, I completed my first 5K run today.  I did better than I thought I would.  My goal was to finish in 45 minutes, and I finished in just over 41 minutes!  I know that's not a great time for a lot of people, but it is for me.  Yes, I walked quite a bit, but we all start somewhere.  And that's exactly what this was, a start.