Saturday, January 7, 2012

First long run of the year

I haven't done many group runs since I started running, partly because there weren't that many close to me and partly because I was worried that I would slow the group down.  The answer to that?  Sole Sports opened up a store at 59th and Union Hills that is 10 minutes from my house, door to door.  I've been to two of them so far.  The first one on December 24th, where there were just two of us plus the group run leader.  Today it was just myself and the run leader.  On the 24th I was self conscious because I hadn't put in many miles since my Half Marathon so I knew my pace would be slow, but the group didn't seem to mind.  They were very incouraging, even though my pace was just over 11 minutes per mile.  I kept begging them to leave me behind, because we all knew that at the pace they were capable of running they would catch up with me on the way back, not to mention pass me. They wouldn't.  I hesitated going back to run with them again, but this morning dragged myself from my warm bed and headed over to the store.  I was at first concerned because I didn't see anyone in the store so thought they had already left, but nope, there was Jeff coming up from the back of the store.  I think we were both happy to see eachother since both of us really wanted to run this morning. (If no one had shown up, he would have had to stay at the store and not been able to go running)  The first mile was 10:45 and I asked him to keep me right about there since I wanted to improve on my last long run.  Apparently my legs had other ideas, because Jeff said that I controlled the pace keeping us at 10:30 and under finishing the last two miles in 10:20 and 10:18.  What a great run!  I learned a lot about the new guy from Sole Sports, and I learned that with proper nutrition and a consistent training plan I'm capable of more than I thought.  Can't wait for the next one. :)

Happy Running!