A new challenge

What is it about runners that we can't back down from a challenge? Maybe it's part of why we took up running in the first place--wondering what we could achieve. I don't know. What I do know is that due to peer pressure a handful of Team alums, including myself, have signed up for a challenge on the website runningahead.com. In competition with a team in Arizona, we are each challenged to run 1000 miles this year. That's 20 miles per week with 2 weeks vacation.

I joined the challenge team after being clear with Coach Mike that I almost certainly won't cover the whole 1000 miles. I am, however, going to try to hold myself accountable for at least 730, which is (for me) a more realistic 14 miles per week. Crazy? Not really. One of my former Team coaches averages 2,500 miles a year, and hit 2,800 miles in 2009. It isn't entirely clear when a person crosses the line from being a "jogger" to being a "runner," but if I'm going to have a blog called "Joanna Runs," I should be able to handle 14 miles per week.

So far, I'm off to a good start. At the end of January last year I had a paltry 12 miles. I will surpass that this weekend. I have to say, seeing my teammates' training logs on our challenge website does motivate me. It motivated me to drive to the gym through intense snow yesterday.

What the heck, I'm gonna pull my remaining thoughts together via list format--holla Type A!! This list is titled, "things currently motivating me to run."

1. my challenge teammates' training logs
2. the challenge itself
3. a Runner's World article that said that shedding 5 pounds can take 2 minutes off your half-marathon time, combined with my desire to finally run a sub-2 hour half-marathon
4. the discovery that I don't hate all treadmills, just the brand & model I happened to be running on for about 3 years. The renovated gym at work has a new model which I'm actually enjoying
5. the realization that icy roads = treadmill running = a great way to train consistently

Mileage update:

2.2 + 4.0 + 4.0 = 10.2