My love of running was a love that developed over time. Very slowly over time. And actually started with a fight and a severe dislike. The first race I ever ran was the “Smile Mile” when I was 11 years old. From what I remember, there was absolutely nothing that I smiled about during that race – and there were definitely tears when I dropped out at about 1000 meters. I failed. And in my 11 year old mind, this was an embarrassing fail in front of a lot of people I knew.
Looking back – this was a significant situation in my childhood. It built boundaries in my mind about what I was capable of and it determined my next steps in running for years to come. A couple years later, I ended up joining the track team. It was purely a decision made out of peer pressure because all my good friends joined. But it also seemed like a way to redeem myself because I knew I was pretty fast for very short distances. And I held to this sprinter mentality through each track season until I finished high school. I was fast with a baton exchange, and could run like my life depended on it for 13.5 seconds to finish the relay. I absolutely refused to run more than a 200 meter race and I remember very few times where there was ever more than a mile that I ran consecutively during a practice. (I was definitely a lazy sprinter.) I was afraid to race a longer distance because I was afraid to fail again. And I’m fairly certain, I never considered running or any sort of physical activity “fun”. I did, however, enjoy the social aspect and a small seed of run love had been planted. In college, my mindset changed. I had gotten over my aversion to running more than 200 meters at a time and had started slowly running longer distances after the very real “freshman 15” turned into an alarmingly real “freshman 25” for me. I started slowly. Putting the treadmill speed at 4.5 (yes, that's 13:20 minutes per mile) I would jog for 30 minutes. I did this 5+ days a week. Over the course of a year, I added distance and speed until I was actually running 6 miles in 60 minutes. This start to truly running - and motivating myself to do so - may always be one of my biggest running accomplishments. Starting can be the biggest hurdle. It was during this time of physical transformation that I also started to shift my mindset. Changing to "I can run 3 miles today and I am going to do so, for fun" was a huge step. And my love for running was starting to grow. When I was still in college, I met a group of women that were very strong runners. They asked if I wanted to run the then called Mad City Marathon as a relay. I was excited. And I was so nervous. This would be the longest race I'd ever run and I would need to crush through long term mental barriers of my own limitations of running more than a mile in a race. But I did it. I joined them. I trained. I ran the first six miles of a marathon relay in a 9 minute mile pace and my all women's team won the relay division. (In fairness, these other women were really fast. But I didn't hold them back much and ran much faster than I expected, so it was a success all around.) After getting a feel for the environment on race day - and running among people that were setting out to run four times the distance I did in that race - I started to re-define what I not only thought was possible for myself, but what I actually wanted to achieve. And I set a goal to run a marathon by the time I was 25. I did – and over the course of a few years ran a handful of half marathons and a few fulls. I struggled with injuries - mainly with my knees - throughout this time. But I finally considered myself a runner, and I was firmly in the "I love running" camp. It wasn’t until moving to San Francisco that I truly started breaking down the barriers of what I thought I was capable of in terms of running. It started with joining You Can Run - a half marathon training program that benefits Girls on the Run. I ran a PR race (by seconds) and made the majority of my friends I would have in San Francisco through this organization. The woman that I met through this organization became part of my fitspration and they introduced me to Classpass - a service that finally motivated me to get the strength I needed to start running injury free. I wrote it about it here. It wasn't until 2015 that I started to grow my relationship with running into something real. Something that impacts my every day life. And now, two years later - with a Boston Marathon and sub-1:30 half marathon under my belt (post about that here) - I can truly say my relationship has blossomed into true love. Running is something I have in my life every day. Even on the rare day that I don't run (or am in a forced rest period), I am thinking about it and my actions that allow me to continue to run at the potential I know I have. This is not to say that we still don't have fights. It can be super complicated at times. I still get minor injuries and deal with muscle pains. I still have bouts of low motivation to put on my shoes and get out the door. And running will always be a part of my life but not define me completely as a person - so there is a balance that must be struck with those other important parts of who I am. But the fact that it makes me so happy in so many ways makes it worth the fight for balance. I can say, with complete confidence, that running has helped define me and my path in life. It's not always easy. And sometimes it hurts. But it is always worth it. #runlove #eatrunlove
1 Comment
11/4/2022 02:06:20 pm
Conference eat increase still item.
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AuthorA Midwest girl gone global. I choose happiness everyday: I run, eat well, travel, and love completely. Archives
March 2022
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