5 years

Today is a sort of anniversary. 5 years ago, I ran my very first running race. It was the 2006 NYRR Women's Mini Marathon. It was the end of my 1st year in grad school, I was still fencing on and off occasionally, but I wasn't really exercising very much and I was getting a little depressed about that. It was spring-time, my first one in New York, and I somehow got this idea to sign up for the race. Back then, these races weren't so popular, and I could just decide the day before the registration closed to do it. My roommate at the time was somewhat of a runner, so I talked her into doing the race together and we went out on an early June morning to Central Park together and I finished my first race ever - a 10K - in just about under an hour. I kept my race bib, as a reminder of how far I had come since that day and I had it taped on my desk at my old place (I recently trashed it b/c it got pretty gross over the years).

As they say, the rest is history. Soon, I was running regularly, signing up for more and more races. In 2008, I first got the idea to do a marathon. I finished my first half that spring in Brooklyn, in about 2 hours and 5 minutes. I also started "collecting" my races to qualify for the NYC Marathon the next year. With the exception of one year when I had food poisoning on that particular day, I ran the Mini every year. Last year, I PR'd at 52:35 and was very happy with that. Since last year though, especially since the marathon in November, I felt that I have been getting faster. I think I jumped over some invisible hurdle and now my body knows exactly how to run. What I mean by that is hard to explain. Before, I thought too much about running: I would decide how to run a race. Start slow, try to maintain my pace, try to finish strong. However, I think I didn't have quite enough experience yet to really "feel" it rather than think about it. Even at last year's marathon, I think I started out a little too slowly. For a marathon, the problem is, no matter how slowly you start off, after 3+ hours, you get so exhausted that it might actually work better to start at a faster comfortable pace and try to maintain that so that when the exhaustion hits in, there aren't 2 more hours to go.

So today, I just went out at a pace that felt good. I wasn't intentionally slowing myself down or pushing too much. It just felt right. Which is rather surprising, given that just 2 hours earlier, I woke up with a pretty significant hangover, thanks to happy hour in the lab last night. Thankfully I had the good sense to eat a big omelette and drink several cups of gatorade before going to bed, but still, I had quite a few glasses of wine. More gatorade, coffee, bagel, a shower, and my morning was looking a bit brighter but still, I had no clue how I was going to run 10 kms. Not only was I hungover, but I hadn't been running very regularly in the past few weeks. Busy with graduation, parents visiting, moving, taking a college class (long story), transitioning into life as a postdoc have taken their toll on my running. Despite this, and the 96% humidity in the park, when I crossed the starting line with 4750 other women this morning, I felt great. My legs just kept taking me forward and after just 50 minutes and 38 seconds, I crossed the finish line and could not have been happier (ok, maybe if I broke 50 minutes, I would have been even happier, but given the circumstances, I totally beat myself today). Not bad for a 5th anniversary. Hopefully many more years and races to come, with many more PR's.