Training Day

In 2008, a few of our friends decided to run in a 10-mile race in Philadelphia. Although I am no stranger to our gym, I didn't pay much attention to entering because I had never run for more than 2 miles without a break. Then January 2009 came along and more of our friends decided to run, and they were very persuasive in their campaign to gain more runners. Before I knew it, Jon and I had signed up for the Broad Street 10-mile run in Philadelphia on May 1 along with 11 of our friends. We trained for over 3 months, completing our long run every Saturday in a multitude of different cities and states. My proudest moment (before the race) was running over the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco while visiting Jon's brothers. We ran over 8 miles that day, and finished the most terrifying run I can imagine especially due to my ridiculous fear of heights. It was a good day. The day of the race it poured in Philly, which was kind of perfect for the actual running part, not so great for the after party when we were trying to tailgate. The race itself was amazing, everyone finished ahead of their anticipated finish time and despite the terrible weather we all had a great time. Although it was one of the most gratifying things I had ever done, I was not looking forward to joining another race anytime soon.
Cut to 2010, when I was sure that I would not be able to participate due to my current extreme distance from Philadelphia. I decided to fly back to the US at the beginning of May, which originally meant I would miss the race on May 2. Then we saw that flights home were US$1,000 cheaper if I left the Thursday before - so I changed my flight and had no other excuses. I signed up for the 10-mile race.

I haven't really kept up with running, especially the longer distances. I feel like it's especially hard here for two reasons 1) The treadmills are in kilometers, which are significantly shorter than miles and so it feels like I'm going really fast and really far (even though I'm not) 2) Training for the race in the US was in the spring, when it was cool and great to run. Here it's the middle of summer and incredibly hot outside - and our gym doesn't have air conditioning. I'm hoping to be able to train in time, last year I had already been training for a month at this time in the year. My longest distance so far is 3.5 miles and I thought I was going to pass out. I'm going to keep posting on my progress, here is the 10-mile training plan that I am very loosely following. I'm hoping to get to 5 miles by mid-next week. Wish me luck! Happy running!