Well I obviously suck at commitment! So much for three posts per week – more like none at all.
In my defense I have been sick, and barely keeping up with the basics of living (my floor really really needs vacuuming!), let alone having any spare inspiration for writing posts.
So I’m going to try again. Here goes….
Running is something that I’ve tried to do a number of times, but never really succeeded at (maybe like this blog!). I was never good at sport at school, and never thought of myself as a “sporty” person. The first time I started to try running was probably in 2002 – starting on the treadmill at the gym. I think that was when I discovered the Couch to 5K program, which made it seem more possible. I joined the beginners run group at the gym that year, and I remember clearly the first time I ran one whole kilometre. It felt like the hardest physical thing that I had ever done.
After a while I gave it up, though – and I still wasn’t able to run anywhere near 5 kilometres.
A couple of years later I started the Couch to 5K program again, and used to go for runs with my housemate at the time. We lived in Carlton, near Princes Park, and I remember that being a goal of mine – to run all the way round the park without stopping, which is just over 3 kilometres. Again, I think I gave up after a couple of months, and I don’t think I even got to the running-all-the-way-around-the-park stage. But I had definitely improved from where I had been 2 years earlier.
In 2005/2006 I lived in Eltham, and started running around Westerfolds Park. This time, again starting at the beginning of the C25K, I got closer to the end of the program, and was running for 20-25 minutes at a time. Once again, though, it didn’t last.
In 2007/2008 I started up again, this time in Yarraville. It felt hard. I was consistently running for over 20 minutes, but not much over. It was constantly a battle – I don’t remember it once feeling easy. Sometime during 2008 I gave up again.
Earlier this year I needed to get new gym shoes. I nearly bought cross trainers because I thought that I would never try running again. The running shoes were more comfortable, though, so I bought them instead. Lucky I did!
At Easter, I went to Kuala Lumpur with a friend. She was doing C25K and told me that there was a running track near the hotel that we were staying at, and to bring my running shoes. On Wednesday 20 April, in the humid early morning, we ran Week 5, Day 1 of C25K: 5 minutes run, 3 mins walk 5 mins run, 3 mins walk, 5 mins run. I wasn’t expecting to be able to do it, but I did, and it wasn’t as hard as I expected. We didn’t go too fast, and paced ourselves. Next day, my legs were burning!
2 days later we tackled Day 2 of Week 5: 8 mins run, 5 mins walk, 8 mins run. Again, not as bad as I thought it would be. Somewhere along the line, we had a conversation with a man staying in the same hotel, and he gave us some tips about running on the balls of our feet, and not going too fast – these two things have really made a difference, I think.
Later that week, we ran Day 3: 20 minutes of running. Going slow. Running on the balls of our feet. Pacing ourselves. I was starting to enjoy it. I don’t think I had ever enjoyed running before!
When I got back home, I kept going with C25K, completing Week 6 and Week 7 (I remember being very excited when I ran 25 minutes for the first time!). I went on holiday with my boyfriend to Vanuatu, and ran for 20 minutes along a jungle track.
Week 8 and Week 9 – and now I could run for 30 minutes! I joined the run squad at the gym again, and started to train for my first 5K, which I ran on 31 July.
Slowly my distances have increased, and I ran my first 8K on 6 November. This is something I never thought I would do!
The past few weeks I haven’t run, because I’ve been sick, and just on Monday this week I went for a small 3k run around Princes Park. Even six months ago, this would not have felt like a “small” run, which is a very exciting measure of how far I’ve come.
Still, I’m very much a beginner runner, and have yet to run 10k. That’s the next goal!