Welcome

I've been using RunningAHEAD to track my runs which I will continue to do, and blogging about it on my MySpace blog. I think most of my friends on there are tired of hearing about it and I wanted to move it to something that I could access a little easier so I decided to start this blog. I will probably move all my blog entries over eventually so if this post is stuck in the middle and seems out of place, that's why.

When I moved back to Nashville on July 12th I decided to make a change that had been needed for a while, start eating healthy and getting serious about it. A little over a month ago (July 28th) I decided it would be a good idea to start running, mainly for my overall health, but also for selfish reasons like being tired of looking at flab on my belly :) What I was not expecting was to become addicted. As someone on the RA forums suggested recently the difference between a runner and a jogger is that a jogger has to convince themselves to go run, the runner looks forward to it and hates it when they can't run. If that's true then I'm definitely a runner. Having an injury or a scheduled rest day sucks and makes me look forward to the next day even more.

One other reason I wanted to run is because I knew if I got hooked it would give me more motivation to quit smoking and make it easier to do so. Last Wednesday at 1:51pm (yes I'm weird like that) I decided the smoking was going to have to go because I want to be healthier and run farther. So my trifecta is 1) eating healthier, 2) running, 3) not smoking and I plan on continuing all of those for a long, long time.

Right now my running goal is to get below 23 minutes in a 5k by the end of the year which I know I can do. I'm also thinking about training for a half marathon (probably the Country Music Marathon) as my first goal of 2009.