I've been running, and it's fun.
Several things have happened in my world of running in the past few months.
First off, I enlisted the help of
Running Start to speed up! Jane set me up a schedule to start some serious speed work. Let me just say, I had never done the speed work stuff. Whoa nelly, that is NOT easy. But it's kind of a fun hard, it's also a kind of "I think I might die" hard, but I like it, and I'm seeing results.
A few weeks ago I did a 5K, hoping to improve on my PR. Um, not so much, but completely my fault. I didn't have my watch and I started out like a wild woman, 90 to nothing. Needless to say, I couldn't hold that pace, and people started passing me. Note to self, don't start out at a 6:30 pace when you run 10 minute miles. Looking forward to the next one and pacing myself a bit better. It was a fun day, with fun friends (who, let me brag, ALL placed in their age groups), followed by a delicious breakfast, great Saturday morning in my opinion.
At the end of April, I did the country music half marathon in Nashville, TN. This was my second half. The fun part, I knocked over 13 minutes off my last time and set a new PR (thank you speed work!). The not so fun part, it rained the WHOLE time. I mean non-stop. The actual run in the rain, not so bad. The beginning and the end, of just standing and freezing in the rain, not fun at all. But, I do think the rain encouraged me to run and little harder and and little faster.
Then two weekends ago, I did my first relay. It was really fun, and at the end of the day, I still had friends. You see, I first read about this relay on this great
blog. I thought it sounded like so much fun, 5 friends and 53 miles, supporting a great cause, the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. I kept it in the back of my mind all year, and early this year, I looked it up. Several of my favorite girls from high school run, so I had this vision of us bonding, enjoying each other, pictures, running. I just can't tell you how much fun we were having in my visions, so I send an email about it... crickets, I hear nothing back from any of them. So, one by one, I begin calling them. And it went like this, 3 phone calls in a row...
Me: Did you see my email on the relay? I didn't hear anything back.
Friend: That wasn't a joke?
Me: No
Friend: Are you crazy?
Me: No, it will be fun!
Friend: What part of 53 miles is fun?
But eventually, after much prodding, all 3 said yes. I added to the group a friend from work who loves relays, and we had our team! I had commitments from the team members and just needed to fill out the paperwork. I was having so much trouble with a name. In the meantime, a very close friend of mine's father passed away. His father had had Type 1 diabetes, so in tribute to his dad, who was also a runner, our team name was born, Ronnie's Road Runners.
Race day, we were at the school ready to go. And it was raining. And it rained 50 of the 53 miles on us! Running a relay is so very different, and I know there are things we could have done better (like the van not getting lost trying to find the next checkpoint), and we probably could have been a little faster (we finished middle of the pack of the all female teams, darn tutus beat us), but overall it was so much fun. Great to hang out with old friends I don't see enough, great to want to push yourself for your team, great to jump back out in the rain for another leg, great that my mom let us borrow her van with heated seats! I can't thank my friends enough for being willing to join me in this adventure. Looking forward to next year!
Our team's donation page is still open if you want to donate. A goal for next year is to do a better job fundraising!
Ronnie's Road Runners
