SPEED WORK!

Hills. I ran hills today. I haven't run hills since pre season of college field hockey. I didn't, however, forget how hard they are in the 18 years since then. Hills suck.

This blog helped me for the first time last night! I was about to climb into bed and I glanced at it to moderate a comment, when I saw my post about goals for this week. I had TOTALLY forgotten about the 5:30 AM hill workout! I got in bed at 8:30, set my alarm for 4:30 (I need to eat before I run) and at 4:30, actually heaved myself out of bed. Sat and had an english muffin with peanut butter and a banana, and took off at 5:15. I was a little nervous ~ I'm not a very good runner, and I am a very new runner, and running club types all tend to be both very good and very seasoned runners. Doing anything for the first time is a little intimidating (whether it be joining a new gym, trying a new class, or joining 60 strangers in the dark cold rain in pre dawn hours). I arrived at where I thought the meeting place was a few minutes early. As I sat in my car I saw a small herd of runners sprint by me about 3 blocks from where my car was. My heart sank. Had I screwed this up and was out there for nought? Finally, right at 5:30 I got out of my car. I saw a woman come walking up in running gear and asked her if she was there for the hill workout. She said yes, it was her first time. We deduced that we had messed something about the warm up up, but we agreed that hills were supposed to start at 5:50 where we were. We decided to run together. In the short 2 mile warm up we discovered that we were neighbors, she has two small children and that we are both training for our first marathon! So......we exchanged numbers and I now have a new running buddy! We ran an easy 2 then met at the bottom of the dread hill at 5:50. Out of no where the corner suddenly was filled with runners, their bodies and breath steaming up the dark cold morning. The plan was simple, sprint up two and a half blocks to the top of the hill. Jog back down. Repeat 8 times. It SUCKED! But it was awesome. And I did it. And I know that I can get better at it, and that it will make me a better runner. After the hills the pack just took off running, I got another 3 miles in with them, then came home. I made Luke's lunch for lunch bunch today, made some coffee, and am sitting here at 7 with a still sleeping household feeling quite accomplished for so early in the day.

All of last spring and summer I meant to join up with the run club, but was unwilling to commit to the early hours or to admit my own intimidation. I commit. I'm not intimidated. The vast majority of those runners are really, really good, competitive runners. And if I want to get better, I need to challenge myself. So rather than let it make me sad about how slow I am, or how low my endurance is (relatively, of course), I'm going to let it challenge me.