Running Commentary

Why Run? November 22 2004

Having had an unreasonably boring weekend. I find myself, this monday morning with NOTHING to blog. Nothing.

So instead, I will tell you how I started running…or maybe why.

while pregnant for my youngest (and final) baby, I gained 60lbs. SIXTY POUNDS. That’s a lot not matter how you slice it. And the breastfeeding was not making it magically disappear. I had gained 60 with my first baby but it pretty melted off soon after birth. I couldn’t figure out the difference. I was walking at least as much probably more considering our first was born in Canada’s Arctic in January (you don’t take a newborn for a walk in those temps). But still the weight was stuck. Then it hit me, I was suddenly over 30. And my metabolism had finally caught up with me. BLAST!

I saw an ad for a couch to 5k clinic at our local running store and I quickly called the number listed.
The woman assured me that I would NOT be the fattest person there and to come out in three weeks when the next clinic was to start.

My baby was 6 months old, I was still breastfeeding (a lot) and I hadn’t run since highschool. The clinic started with about 30 people, all shapes and sizes, some a lot bigger than me, some smaller. Oddly the majority of the other people were older than me. I was very surprised by this.
The first night, we had a little pep talk, learned about form (stay up right) and set off. We did 5 km that first night, 1 minute of running and 1.5 minutes of walking for the first 2.5k and then 2 minutes of running and 1.5 minutes of walking for the last 2.5km. Those were the longest minutes of my life. It was SO hard to run for a full minute! She even let us walk up the hills (that one night).

When we got back to the store, she assured us we did great, but that we could possibly hate her a lot come morning. She suggested a hot bath with epsom salts and some light stretching.
I followed both pieces of advice.

Holy mother of god. Labour was less painful than walking down the stairs the next day. I hobbled around for two days. Eye watering sore muscles. I walked our little person to and from school…sometimes he came home for lunch! It was agony.
And on wednesday, I did it all again.
For 8 weeks.
Over time the group got a lot smaller. And by the end we were a group of 6 that came out regularly. No one talked to us, the “REAL” runners were too used to beginners coming and going to notice us. We ran our 5k three nights a week for 6 months, until I suggested we take the 10km clinic.
what a snizzy that started.
We had dinner meetings. Email conversations and much debate. In the end they all agreed, we would take the clinic.
It was 8 weeks to add 5km…double our current distance. It seemed an impossible task. But somehow, it wasn’t. Somehow it was easy. Well not easy, but no where near as hard as it was to be a beginner. It was just runing and adding .5km. I mean that an extra 5 minutes (yes we were THAT slow).
Around the end of the clinic I started to make noise about a half marathon. I was poopooed at our monthly dinner meeting. And yet…not entirely.
Fast forward another 6 months, and our 1 year anniversary is marked with our very first “LONG RUN”, at 7 am on a summer Saturday. The “REAL RUNNERS” ran with us the whole time, telling us to not worry about stopping for extra water breaks…telling us how hard it was their first time.
And eventually that got easier. 12km no longer constitutes a long run. It’s just a run. 5km is a distance I rarely do anymore. It’s my least favourtie. By the time you start feeling good, it’s all over.
And now, I run because it feels good. I did lose weight with running, but then some of came back with all those cookies. (enter weight watchers)

Since starting a year and a half ago and I have done many things that amaze and surprise me.
I’ve run 2 10k races (meh) and 2 half marathons. I have run longer distances than I could ever fathom before. I’ve run with Doctors, Teachers, Nurses and one guy that is constantly travelling and is a little ambiguous as to what he does.

I no longer run just for weightloss, I guess I run for fitness but mostly I run cause I want to.