Alaina Browne

Honestly, I wasn’t so sure I would ever achieve this goal but I didn’t want to admit to officially giving up either.

After many months off from running, I realized that the only way for me to stick with a marathon training schedule this year would to become a morning runner. As much as I love running in the evening, it’s hard to stick with it when social opportunities pop up.

One of the main barriers to morning running for me is awakeness. I don’t enjoy running when I’m not fully awake and I’m likely to cut my run short. Statistics also show that morning runners are more injury prone, I assume because they’re not awake yet.

So I came up with a 3-part plan. The first part of the plan entailed getting used to waking up earlier for my run. So I set my alarm at an appropriately earlier hour and started getting up at that time, but not going for a run. Once my body and mind adjusted to this new routine, I got up at the new time, spent 30 minutes drinking my coffee and waking up while doing my morning internet surf, THEN headed out for my run. The third part of my plan was ease back into running by not pushing myself to run to hard/long or too often before my body is ready.

This is week 3 of the new plan, and it seems to be working! I’m going to give myself one more week, then call it done.

I was just there this weekend, and it’s definitely “worth doing”—wild flowers or not. The landscape ranges from majestic to otherworldly, and overall unforgettable.

This morning, I woke up before my alarm AND managed to get on my running gear and head out the door with the dog. Getting out of bed and out the door is the hard part. Running is easy.

The run itself was ok, and I know it’s going to take at least a month of regular running for the fun and speed to come back. In the meantime, I’m wondering where the body that carried my 26.2 miles in November is hiding!