Saturday, 4/18 - Megan and I ran in the Northshore YMCA 5k as a part of their Healthy Kids Day event. We arrived about 10 minutes early and I had the tiniest feeling of "I don't belong here" as I looked at a medium sized group of what appeared to be serious runners. In my moment of self-doubt, I thought to myself, how many people casually say, 'hey, let's go run a 5k today!" After all, Megan's never expressed an interest in running before and I certainly don't love it. As more and more people arrived, I realized I was being silly - the thing I'm learning to love about running is that it's an activity open to everyone - all body shapes, sizes, kids, grown ups. Feeling confident again, we finished stretching and got ready for the race.
We were a few minutes (10?) late starting and I didn't look at my watch - but we were done by 9:50 - so certainly couldn't have been more than 40-45 minutes on the course. We jogged virtually the whole way and I found it's actually good for me to jog with Megan - it forces me to keep a slow, steady pace. I tend to want to run in bursts (like she does).
Favorite memories of the event:
- "My little legs are tired," said Megan about 3/4 of the way through
- Watching her respond with a new burst of energy whenever there were volunteers cheering us on
- Watching her confidence level raise through the day as she started telling people that she ran the 5k
- Watching grown-ups reactions when Megan told them she'd ran a 5k
- Megan asking if we can do it again the next day.
I think her favorite part was the Jamba Juice at the end - she was about to bonk and the fruit smoothy totally re-energized her.
Mother's Day 5k in Kirkland is next. By the end of the day, I had myself comitted to the Cougar Mountain 5 mile run too - May 16.
No comments:
Post a Comment