My running journey

According to my family I learned to run before walking. I was high energy, full of speed, and very little direction. My mother can sum it up as “You were a lot.” In junior high school I was encouraged to participate in sports. My grandfather, whom I never met, was rumored to be a good cross country runner. So as a tall and lanky seventh grader I joined the team without any real knowledge of what it meant.

I would like to say I was an immediate success but that would not be the case. The 1.5 mile distance seemed daunting so I preferred to walk it with my friend. Winning, medals, time, personal bests really did not mean anything to me. Until one day. I am not sure why this day was different. Mayby Christina was not available to attend the meet. Maybe it was cold out. Maybe I was having a teenage angst fit and needed to burn off frustration. Whatever the reason I ran the whole race. Not only did I run it but I placed as a scoring runner in our coed team beating a lot of the boys on both teams.

Flashing forward through being the youngest runner on Varsity, All County, All Conference, invited to States, running in college and being a scoring runner on a National Champion team - running became a passion. I am not going to say it was all ups. There were many, many downs. Inappropriate coaches, lack of confidence that hurt times, frustrating time trial misses that would change the course of my life. But I see that all as competition. Running was always there for me, competition and I had our moments. Running is feeling my legs unfold to cover ground, running to discover new places (and snacks), teammates and people along the trails, the air deep in your lungs as you climb. Running had become my version of flying.

On long runs with new people I love to ask what is your running journey? Running is not easy. Running does not call everyone. Yet humans are genetically designed to run. So how did you get here? Drop your journey in the comments. Extra points for long winding tales.