It’s been a very busy (for me) running season. It really started last October when I ran Chicago, then I had the WDW Marathon in January, the Princess Half Marathon in February, and just last Saturday, the GE Irving Half Marathon. So that’s a lot of big goals in only 6 months and a lot of consistently training for SOMETHING.

But even with all that, I get VERY easily bored. Long term motivation is a constant challenge for me and I have to mix it up frequently to keep my eye on the prize. The prize, in this scenario, is keeping fit and keeping my running base where it needs to be as I head into the summer months (which temperature wise, starts in TX in about a week;). Keep in mind I am a full-time Pastor, a mom of three teenagers, and my husband is an airline pilot so the schedule stays pretty crazy even in the summer. All of these things provide convenient excuses for me to skip a workout. Add the heat into the mix? It can make for true lazy days of summer!

I’m now embarking on the biggest break of my year and won’t have another race until August when I do the Disneyland Dumbo Double Dare. Which leaves me with 4 months to hold onto my base and keep after it, hopefully working on speed and strength in the process.

I was tempted to just run a few more races but they cost money and as the temps rise in North Texas, they become less attractive. So what to do?

Well, I’ve always been an every other day runner and I’ve always wondered how my body would respond to training every day. I’ve actually been kind of scared to try – afraid I’d get hurt or my legs would fall off or something. It’s not that I’ve never run 2 days back to back, but it’s been few and far between and I’ve always taken 2 days off after hard or long runs.

So, per tradition, when something scares me I put on my big girl pants and go for it! My goal is to run a 5K minimum (3.1 miles) every day for 30 days. No break day. No exceptions. It’s a bold plan but I am a girl who likes extremes (remember, I was a vegan for almost 2 years and tend to like the all or nothing approach!). And besides, 3.1 miles is only about a 35 minute commitment. Surely even I can find 30 minutes a day, right?

Here are the things I’m afraid of:

1. I’ll get hurt
2. I’ll get sick
3. The weather won’t cooperate
4. My schedule won’t cooperate
5. I’ll get sick and tired of waking up and doing it every morning!!

But hey, it’s only 30 days, and then I can go back to my 3 – 4 day a week habit. Unless, of course, I find that the daily dose of keeping me off Prozac therapy makes it worth continuing!! And when June comes along, I’ll come up with some other crazy plan. Because remember, we do this for “fun”!

Here are my “rules”:

1. I’m doing this for myself so if it falls apart, I’ll just blog about my failure (no beating myself up!)
2. If I get hurt, I will compromise by filling in a 3.1 mile WALK but ONLY if I’m actually injured (“I’m really sick of running” is not a reason for this caveat)
3. I need to continue to do at least 6 miles every other week, once a week, to keep my base where I want it. (don’t want the ramp up to 10 miles before the DL half to kill me)

And that’s pretty much it! Pretty simple, actually. The time of day may vary and the treadmill will most likely be employed at least a few times simply due to schedule and/or weather. But I’m very blessed to have a great, almost fully operational (incline broke last year) treadmill here at home and a whole bunch of great ones up at the gym.

I would love to know if anyone is joining me! If you’re just starting your running, you could still do the challenge and consider alternating run days and walk days. Or, if you’re just trying to be more consistent with your daily exercise, you could walk every day. The important thing is not how you choose to do it, it’s knowing that we’re in it together! And I think it will be fun! I think . . . it may turn out to be an unqualified disaster. But either way, it will make for a good story!

Oh, and don’t forget, we’re giving away the BIG BIRTHDAY BOX on May 18th to celebrate the one year anniversary of this blog! Which is crazy to me and we need to celebrate together. To be entered to win, go to the FB page, “like” it, and that’s it! With only 145 likes right now, your odds of winning are pretty darn good;).

I’m going to close with a quote that Brene Brown used in a talk I was blessed to hear live today at a conference. It’s from Theodore Roosevelt and it kind of rocked my world, not just about running, but really about anything I set out to do. So I leave you with this.

Happy Running!!

Jen