Running!

Anyone remember this?

Yeaaahhh. That was back in July, when I made myself a goal to run a 5K race. I roped my brother into doing it with me, and I did the Couch to 5K program to prepare myself for it. I had no intentions of becoming a runner, I just wanted to prove to myself that I could do it! And I did, albeit pretty slowly. Since it was a very small race, I ended up actually placing first in my age group. I was definitely proud of myself, because up until that point I had never run more than maybe a mile before and didn’t do any regular cardiovascular workouts. In other words, I was completely out of shape.

Then I never ran again.

Haha, I’m not kidding! I had no desire to get back on the pavement or back on a treadmill. As much as I enjoyed running the race, I definitely did not catch the “running bug”. So I stopped. But recently I started missing that kind of exercise that really gets your heart pumping, and I decided the only way to motivate myself would be to set another goal. Another race!

I feel like this one was meant to be because a 10K would have been a bit of a stretch for me, but a 5K wouldn’t have been a huge challenge. An 8K is just enough to make me push myself, and not so much that I’ll die. The race is in DC right in the monumental core which seems like SUCH a cool place to run a race, and my friend KJ will be running it with me!

My plan was to start “training” like 6 weeks before the race, starting around the 5K distance and working my way up. Unfortunately the flu had other plans for me, so I wasn’t able to start running again until last week! Oh boy. I forgot how much running HURTS when you haven’t done it in a long time. Today was my first 3-miler, and I was feeling the burn.

I was actually happy to see that my pace is almost exactly the same as it was when I ran that race, even though I haven’t run at all since then. I ran the 5K in 35:15 back in July, and today I did the 3 miles in like 36 minutes (I did a walking warm-up and cool-down). So at least I haven’t lost any progress. But I’ve still never run more than 5K before…and the 8K race is in 2 weeks. Oops. But I’m hopeful that I’ll get there and be able to improve my time. Those few miles drained me today, but I felt great afterwards.

New running shoes always help, too. I got these at Marshalls, and I’m still on the fence about them. I LOVED my Mizunas that I bought over the summer but I’ve been wearing them for work so they’re pretty worn now. If these new ones don’t grow on me I might try to get another pair before the race.

When I got home from the gym I took out some tofu to press while I took a shower. Then I used to tofu to make myself a delicious stir-fry with broccoli, spinach, and udon noodles. It really hit the spot. Gotta get that protein in after any workout!

Here’s to hoping that my legs will be very nice to me over these next two weeks.

Thanks for reading!

-Lauren