Run Meghan, Run

My two New Year's resolutions are to write more and to commit myself entirely to training for the Boston Marathon, which I'll be running to raise funds and awareness for my organization, Sport in Society. So, I said to myself, "Self, why not just blog about your runs?" Bingo, bango, bongo.

What makes me most excited about training for the marathon is that Suzanne is also in training; she's going to be on the Dana Farber team, running in honor of her boyfriend's mother who recently passed away after an inspiring fight with cancer. There is no better way I can imagine running a marathon than running it with Suzanne by my side. Suzanne has the ability to keep me thoroughly entertained throughout the entirety of a run, regardless of the distance. Although I once feared running with a partner because my running is a time for reflection and meditation, I do not lose that with Suzanne, a person with whom my conversations range between deeply religious and philosophical questioning to frivolous jokes about flatulence.

I'll also be training with Mark, who works for Northeastern's athletic department and recently graduated from Sport in Society's Master of Sport Leadership Program. While Suzanne's Dana Farber team is made up of about 500 people, Sport in Society's team is just me and Mark! I'm excited to have him as a partner, not only because he's able to swing us free burritos at Qdoba, but because he's also completely committed to and confident in our ability to raise a combined $10,000 for SiS. We've already got a number of fundraising events and campaigns in the works!
I may wind up shifting my running blog to a Meghan and Mark training blog, but I figured I'd start here.

People keep asking me if I've started training yet, and my answer has been that I'm kind of in perpetual training. For just over two years, I've been running about three times a week, between 5 - 8 miles during the week and usually around 10 on the weekends. Plus, three times a week I do an outdoor work out with a group of friends, which consists of a lot of body weight training infused with sprinting and core work (lots of push ups, sit ups, and stair workouts!). So, I'm kind of always training. BUT running the marathon takes it to a whole new level. Now I HAVE to run at least three times a week and my weekend distance runs will start making my weekly 10 milers seem miniscule. So today, I suppose, I started my "official" training. From here on out, I'm dedicating myself to going to bed early, eating like a champ ("eat like a champ, play like a champ")...maybe even stepping off the booze bus until the Marathon in April...and running til my legs fall off on Saturdays.

What am I most excited about? Breakfast. Breakfast is good, but breakfast is AMAZING after a long run on a cold winter day. Saturday breakfasts for the next few months are probably going to seem like the best tasting food ever!!! Although I run for ice cream, this training has breakfast written all over it.

Ok, what am I REALLY most excited about??? Getting other people excited about Sport in Society. For a while now, one of my tasks has been developing outside networks of SiS supporters, from people who work in similar fields, to young professionals who want to use their passion for sport to do something for the community. Although there are only two of us running the marathon, I see this as a perfect opportunity to get people excited about helping out...joining our fundraising team, running our water stops during training runs, helping us plan our events, etc. We have a gender violence preventio campaign called Leaders Act. The idea behind Leaders Act is that everyone has a right and responsibility to take a stand against gender violence. Really, however, it relates to everyone's responsibility as a citizen to do what they can to take action and make a difference. So, in this intance, Leaders Run....and my hope is that others will step in and Act in whatever way they can to support our cause. I really feel that this past election and all the attention focused on participation and service has made the atmosphere ripe for community involvement. I want to seize that wave of excitement and get people excited about Sport in Society. And, if you are excited about Obama, then you should be excited about Sport in Society, an organizaiton with a core mission of Social Justice. Listening to Obama speak is like listening to one of our facilitators lead a discussion with youth about "becoming my brother's keeper" by helping one another out, finding ways to engage in life with the eyes and ears of compassionate understanding, and taking action to solve those problems you see around you. Because Leaders Act. I am excited every day to work for an organization that, for 25 years, has been empowering youth through adults to make a difference in their communities and which uses sport and athletes to do it. And now I'm even more excited about getting others just as enthused about having this fantastic organization as a platform to make the changes they are ready to make.

Today Suzanne and I had our first official run back after break. I planned out a route, as I mentioned, focused on breakfast. We went from my new 'hood in JP, all the way through the City, and ended up in my old Somerville 'hood, where we got Acai at Modelo, the fantastic Brazilian bakery on Winter Hill. Acai, if you don't know it, is a "super food" form the Amazon rainforest. It's a berry that is jam-packed with Omega 3's and is blended into a smoothie like meal and mixed with fruit and granola...it's kinda like eating ice cream for breakfast!!! According to facebook, it's the new diet of the stars, so if you eat it you might just turn into Oprah. But, hey, if that happened, then I'd be rich and wouldn't have to do all this fundraising!

The run was, on the whole, great! It was fantastic to see Suzanne after a few weeks, and the 10 miles gave us plenty of time to catch up. We were on the South West corridor bike path for quite a while, so didn't have much traffic to worry about, and then we were in the Boston Public Garden (Suzanne's favorite spot) and running down Beacon Hill's Charles Street, lined with great restaurants and gorgeous brownstones. We were on the Charles for a bit, which every time I'm on it and taking in the gorgeous view of Boston, makes me SO glad I stayed here! At the museum of science we crossed the river and then ran through Cambridge and Somerville, through Inman Square and Porter Square, and then finished with an end of the run uphill push to Peter G. Piro Square....mmmm, Acai. The sun was shining and gorgeous which made for a soul-filling experience. The only down to the run was that we were running against the wind the entire time (since we just went in one direction the whole time). We wound up finishing much slower than we usually do, so either we were talking far too much or the wind was slowing us down as much as it seemed to. When we got there, Caitlin was primed and waiting with warm sweatshirts and a credit card to buy us some Acai. Of course, the support team is the most important part of the training experience!

Below I've posted the map of our run. Suzanne took a picture, but I'll have to wait til she sends it to post it. Thanks for reading and, when we get our page up and running, donating!