When Do You Actually Start to Like Running?

Me & JT out at Hagan Stone Park

To those who run: when does running actually start to feel good when doing it? I feel relaxed after but man does it hurt in the midst of it!

Jennifer Thompson (JT) and I are doing trails last week and this out at Hagan Stone Park, a local park in Pleasant Garden NC. As an aside -- I would run w/ my wife Jennifer but she is way too fast, as she still plugs in low 20s in her 5k. So me and JT are out there doing 30m runs.

I am full 2nd week of running with the goal of breaking into the mid 20 minutes mark (24-26 minutes) for a 5k by the end of my 6-month sprint. [Goals here: Goals]. And while I do feel a bit better while running and have to stop less than last week, it is still a breath issue for me and hamstrings. Those seem to be my weak points. I am hoping after 4 weeks, it will start to feel good, but honestly no idea.

Also, despite my Water Llama app telling me I was plenty hydrated yesterday, I still felt a bit dehydrated. Maybe it is an issue of electrolytes? Regardless -- it is very worth getting out there. During my full time work period, I never seemed to find the time. Of course, I completely buy the concept of 'you make time for what is important'. But there are a lot of competing 'important' things in my life and that is the rub. Given I am not a calendar zealot and don't try to allocate every 15 minute block, the book ends of the work day -- before and after -- were given over to the most pressing important thing.

This is the beauty of a reset --- I can now attend to all the 'important' things in my life without the constraint of the squeezing them into the leftovers of the day between 5a - 7a & 6p - 9p. Besides as a Global VP, I often had to dial into calls at 5a or 6a anyhow to accommodate the EU team. Consistency, in short, was out the window. Finally, it seemed my fellow VP colleagues and the executive team -- for the most part -- looked tired, run down or sick most of the time. The job can rob you of health if you let it.

So loving the window of time to run in a beautiful park, even if all I think about is "when do we finish"? Hagan Stone in Pleasant Garden is home to many XC races in the area and home to the Southeast HS XC team, which Jennifer coaches. Great place to run!

Waterfall at one end of the trail

My Son Jacob running at HSP