How did I get myself into this??

I must be crazy.
How else would you describe someone who has never run a day in her life, all of a sudden decide "I'm going to run a 5k race."
Crazy.

I have never been a runner. I have never had any desire to want to run. I still don't in all honesty, but somehow I have had it in the back of my head that "one day" I would like to sign up for a race and actually do it. Somehow I convinced myself that this was the time to do it.

Did I mention it is January?? In Calgary? And that we are about to be hit with a wicked winter storm with temps dropping to -25 degrees after an unseasonably warm start to winter?

I told you... Crazy.

I was talking with a good friend today about how she was dying to get back out and running again, but needed some motivation to do it. I casually mention that I was actually considering doing the Couch to 5K program and signing up for a 5K race this year... For something to do..
Before we both knew it, we had committed to each other to do it together. 45 minutes later, we were finding a race in the spring and punching in our credit card numbers to sign up.

Who does that?? Who just all of a sudden says "I'm bored with my step class.. I think I need to be a runner" .. Yeah.. apparently me.

Now I'm not completely out of shape. Prior to getting married 4.5 years ago, I had lost 100 pounds. Pretty big deal. Then I had kids. For anyone that has kids, you know that sometimes you lose who you once were, and your life becomes nothing but your children. And if you have kids and you are overweight, then you also know just how hard it is to get yourself back on the wagon and turn your life back around. I have been an avid Step Class Enthusiast. I have been going to Body Pump for a few years and have finally worked my way up on the weights to a point where I "feel the burn" each class. But somehow it just doesn't seem to be enough for me.

I am at the point I wanted something to look forward to.. I have always been ok with staying on my weight loss program and doing what I needed to do, but I have never really set out any goals. It was always the mindset that the weight will fall off in its own time, I don't need to rush things, etc etc.. But now I wanted something to push me to work harder, push me to do something I was not comfortable with.. push me to reach a goal..

Hence my hasty agreement to run.

I have a secondary reason for pushing myself into this as well. I am part of a Biggest Loser Challenge with a community of online women I have been chatting with for years. In fact, I'm the event coordinator. We have 60 women who each paid $15 to compete over the course of the next 12 weeks to shed the pounds. The kicker... First place takes home 50% of the money paid.. which stands at about $440. So I wanted to push myself to really give this contest a good shot, push myself to do whatever I can to get the weight off, push myself to get off of the couch more.
The great thing is our BL challenge ends the week before I run my very first race. It would be amazing for me to not only win the challenge and take home some much needed clothing money, but to go into the race the following week a good 20-25 pounds lighter than I am now.


So here I am.. a overweight mother of two, who has never run a day in her life, always picked last in sports, couch potato extraordinaire... about to embark on a journey to become a runner.

See?
Crazy.