My First Post!

Welcome to my running blog! I chose to do a blog for a few different reasons: 1. It seemed like an alternative to journaling or scrapbooking. 2. It's a great place to share my accomplishments and post pictures for other people looking to start running just like me :) 3. And it's fun!

What motivated me to start running was a few of my friends and family. My main motivator would have to be my mom however. A few years ago she decided to take a learn to run course with the Running Room and graduated to a 5 KM course. Then she did a 10 KM and two years later she completed the Half Marathon course. Her goal was to complete a Half Marathon run before her 50th birthday and she did just that! So I figured if my mom, who is double my age and not as athletic as I was (before), can do a Half Marathon run then at the very least I can do a few 5 or 10 KM runs! After I got that idea in my head my friend Alison told me that she signed up to do Oasis Toronto Zoo 10 KM run in September of this year. So of course I thought maybe I should sign up for it too! So that is when my running journey began and I started training for the big September run!

While all of this running business was going on my mom actually underwent foot surgery to remove a bone spur on one of her feet (she has to have both done). So not only could she not run, but I couldn't run with her either! Although I am partial to running alone she did provide me with several tips on running and on races.

And then it began! I began running 1 and 1's for 3-5 km to see how I could do and it seemed pretty alright. So I went a little further. I started getting really into this whole running thing. My mom started to see my excitement. After running a few runs I decided that September was a little too far for me to wait to do my first race. So I began searching through the Running Room and My Next Race websites for fun and enticing races to do. Basically, if they gave you a free t-shirt and a finisher's medal then it was on my to-do list. And it was high on my to do list if they gave away chocolate and had firefighters hand you cups of water!

Needless to say, I have since then I have signed up for the Sporting Life 10 Km run and the Pearson Runway 5 Km Run. Although the Sporting Life 10 K is before the 5 K Runway run, I really wanted to do the Sporting Life 10 K because it supports kids with Cancer and raises money to send them to Camp Ooch. What a great cause and excuse to run, right! Also, it has a pretty shirt and a lovely medal. Count me in! I also decided that I would try and fundraise some money for this run. It costs $250 a day to send one child to Camp Ooch, so I thought I would at least attempt that. If you would like to sponsor me and help put a smile on a child's face then click here!

After signing up for a few races and accomplishing a 10 KM run with 1 and 1's I decided that I better start really doing some proper conditioning. So I began following my mom's Learn To Run program following the running intervals. It starts out with a ton of walking, but I felt I was past that stage, so I began with running with 1 minute of warmup followed by 7 sets of 2 and 1's (aka run 2 minutes, walk 1 minute). Overall it equalled 22 minutes of interval training for my first true week of conditioning. Now I only got about 3.3 km but I know you need to start somewhere! I graduated to 5 sets of 3 and 1's today (run 3 minutes, walk 1 minute) and I ran about 3.23 km. I've got only 2 weeks today until my first 10 km race so this should be interesting!

Amongst all of the excitement and me registering for a few races my mom mentioned how it was her dream to do the Disney World Princess Half Marathon. After she put this idea in my head i thought to myself...hmmmm, trip to Florida, pretty medal, pretty shirt, RUNNING THROUGH THE CASTLE, I'm so into it! So we kind of half decided that that would be my future goal. Since she has proven that she can do a Half Marathon run it is all left up to me. Realistically speaking my goal is to do at least one Half Marathon run before the winter of 2015/2016 so that we can participate in the Princess run in February of 2016. I'm super excited and this is my main motivator now :)

So that's my first post! I hope you enjoy following me on my journey. Like I said, this is kind of a place for me to journal about my journey. Who knows, maybe it will motivate you too :)