I am a runner!

I've been researching running quite a bit online of late and have noticed tons of blogs out there. Reading many of them I come to see how much more advanced they are and how much more endurance they have than I have. This blogger does a 100k, that blogger just completed a 50 miler, and the other just completed an Iron Man and an Ultramarathon. I read with awe and I feel so... so... inadequate. You see I too want my endurance to grow so that I can begin running the 50k or the 50 miler. That is what this blog represents to me. My journey from no running last year to long endurance running in, hopefully, the near future.

I also wanted to write a blog from this perspective because lets face it, the ultrarunners are few and far between, leaving most of us runners as wanting to have more endurance and struggling through our Half Marathons or Marathons. We have the bug in us, we want to compete, we want to continue setting PRs. We just don't have the endurance yet. Is this something that you can train for and increase year over year? Or is this something that a few of us are capable of doing, be it because they ran starting when they were young or because they are just natural at it? I intend to put it to the test and find out if I can, someone who ran some cross country in High School (not very well I might add) and has very little experience besides that.

On a side note, I find it funny that an ad for running shoes would try to define what a runner is, seemingly alienating a ton of would-be runners. A runner is someone who has the bug in them. It doesn't matter if they can't run a sub 5 minute mile, a sub 3:30 marathon or can't run a 50k. Its how they feel about running that makes them a runner. I will make the statement of myself: I am a runner! I may be extremely slow compared to what others say are runners, but what do I care? I look forward to running every day. I search for races all the time that I can run and continually try and improve my previous best times. That to me is a runner.

I can already see differences in my speed and endurance. I can only hope it will continue to grow as it already is. This is my Journey to Endurance.