New Challenge

Brian and I have undertaken a new challenge in our lives that will commence (to some point) on May 8.  We have both decided to run in the Fifth Third River Bank Run in Grand Rapids.  I am definitely NOT a runner, so this is definitely a challenge for me.  In the hopes of being more in shape and healthy, we have started running a bit for exercise.  In order to give me some motivation, Brian suggested that we run in the race in order to have something to work toward instead of just my own motivation (which isn't always so good).  Since deciding to do this, I have been running more in the hopes of being able to run the race faster than I can now.

Brian will be running the 10K which is about 6.2 miles and I will be running the 5K which is about 3.1 miles.  Brian is naturally more athletic than I am, so it is no wonder that he is doing a longer distance than me.  This is the first race for both of us.

The 5K begins at 7:30 am and the 10K begins at 8:00 am.  Unfortunately, we won't be able to watch each other run, but we will be able to celebrate together at the end when we've both completed the race.  I'm looking forward to that, but definitely not the early start time!

We continue to try to run more to get the experience we need and running in different places to get different types of terrain in.  We mostly run at our apartment complex and the Metropark near our apartment.  These are both easy places to mark our distances to see how fast we've run them.

I hope to be able to complete the 5K in under 30 minutes, but so far I have only done 3 miles at 30:23.  I have to add a little more distance on and make it a little faster to reach this goal.  I've got a few more weeks before the race, so hopefully a little discipline on my part can make this happen.

We'll update how things went after the race and if you get the GR Press, you may even see our names in there on May 9!