Running Man

Matt casually went out the other weekend and ran a half marathon. I think he's what you'd call a "runner" now. I got periodic updates on his progress as I sat around leisurely eating breakfast and getting the girls ready for church. It was fun to follow along... he was done before we even made it to church! By the time we got home, he was back, showered, and cooking up a post-race feast of bacon and eggs, none of which I had earned but all of which I gladly partook.

Picking up the race number.

Look at that pace!

Annie made him the medal at the bottom... she made it a first, second and third place medal, just in case. But who are we kidding, Daddy totally won.

Then Matt casually announced he was entering me into the Peachtree Road Race lottery. He gets an automatic in now that he's part of the Atlanta Track Club, but I had to cross my fingers (I didn't) and hope to get a spot (I wasn't holding my asthmatic breath).

Then Friday morning I woke up to this:

Um, yay?

So now I have to learn how to run!

Fun fact: I've actually run the fabled Peachtree Road Race before. It was... difficult. Sweltering. Uphill. Crowded. I was quite nervous, truth be told. I'm not a runner. I really don't like running. Partly because my exercise-induced asthma tends to flair up when I, um, exercise.  But that fated July 4, 2009, Matt and my dad and I took our places on the starting line, despite my distinct lack of training. Matt eventually abandoned us slowpokes, and even my dad edged past me as I huffed and puffed and churned my way along at what amounted to a walk masquerading as a jog. To be fair, I don't begrudge either man for leaving me in the dust. (And to be even more fair, around Mile 5 I realized that something was quite different about this run, the difference being that I was pregnant - whoops!) I will NOT be running pregnant this time.

But I do need to figure out how this whole running thing works again. So I've designated our resident Running Man to be my trainer. He's put me on the run/walk/run method, in hopes of keeping me below my asthma threshold. I headed out today with instructions to run for a minute, walk for a minute, and repeat for 30 minutes total. Somehow every walking period was downhill and every running round hit during an uphill stint, but whatever, I managed to keep it up for all 30 minutes and "closed my circle" as my slightly pretentious but honestly very helpful Apple Watch would say. I think the plan is to eventually run for two minutes for every one of walking, then three running minutes, etc until I can make it a whole 10k.

So after my first successful day of training, I'm going to go eat some Five Guys and feel good about myself. T minus three months to go.