C25K - All done

Okay, here's the last installment of the Couch to 5K program I have been babbling about for the last few months (see here, here, here, here, here, and here for the whole ordeal if you like).

We are all done with the program! Biker Boy and I are officially that couple who run for 30 minutes a day three days a week. As I wrote in an email to someone who asked, "I absolutely, positively, suck at running. But I do it. I do it slowly and painfully. But I can tell that my legs and lungs are much stronger than they were when we started."

We are not the fastest joggers on the block. Sometimes I think the walkers are going to pass us. We are not the most fashionable joggers on the block. I frequently find myself in Bowling Green State University sweatshirts that are well over a decade old. We are not the most dedicated joggers on the block. Yesterday we skipped our run because, well, there is no good reason, I must admit. It was only the second time we have skipped since we started, so it's not like we're frequent skippers, but it does go to show you that we don't really have this motivation thing down to a science.

I highly recommend this program to people who want to start running, but just don't know how to start. Get yourself a good pair of running shoes* and follow this program. If you need to repeat a week because you're not ready to move on, that's totally doable. The program even encourages you to do so.

And move on. You have to do it. Sometimes I thought I couldn't go on. I thought that the program was INSANE in week 5 when I first looked at what we had to do, but I was able to do it. When I was able to do it, I felt encouraged by how much progress I was making and looked forward to doing more. I guess this is no different than any other type of exercise, but running has been so much harder for me than all those other things - cycling, aerobics, yoga, whatever.

So, yay for the Couch to 5K!!

*We each invested in ugly running shoes (about $65/each) that we had a person at a specialty store pick out for us. Our store is called The Running Room and it has people who are trained to fit you with the correct shoes depending on how your feet rotate (pronate, overpronate, blah, blah, blah, sports terms). The saleswoman helping us had us run up and down the aisles of the store while she watched. Then she went into the back room and came out with three pairs of shoes for each of us to try on. We tried them on and picked the ones that were the most comfortable. They are hideously ugly shoes, but since we've had no joint and/or foot pain, I think it was worth the embarrassment of the shoes. We also invested in an ugly wristwatch that has a timer/stopwatch function on it to help us keep track of time because, frankly, I have no idea what a quarter of a mile is, running or not. That's it in terms of equipment. What other form of exercise requires so little equipment, I ask you?