It made me

feel victorious!

How I did it: Let's just say--as a self-entitled "non-athletic person," I was in for a rude awakening. During the first week of class, we ran a mock test that represented the final in which the class had to complete a mile and a half run in a appropriate amount of time for their age group. The next day after the pre-run test, I headed to the gym with the intent to improve so as to NOT fail this class. I was a 4.0 student, and I was frustrated to think that personal fitness class would make me lose my gpa. That day, I forced myself to go 30 minutes on the treadmill. Grant it, most of it was at a fast speed for walking, but I would raise the pace whenever I felt capable of increasing my strides. I never focused on mileage, just minutes. I put in about 30 minutes of running 3x a week for 2 months. Each time I ran, however, I would lessen the time for when I'd drop down to a fast walk. By the time the final came around, I was able to run the entire distance and make a adequate 8:15 min/mile. That summer, my mom got me involved in tri-training, so I upped my intensities with running. I started focusing on increasing my mileage, and I left the gym and spent most of my running times out around parks and neighborhoods. I ran with my mom and brought the family dog. Younger brothers would go with us and bring their bikes. We always tried to vary our routes, and never let it get too dull. Between the two of us, Mom and I had a set of goals that we would want to complete for each run. I would clock our pace on my watch, and would report to her whenever I felt we were going sub-par compared to the day before. I had remembered a quote: "Go to the point where you beat the guy you were the day before." Any desires I ever had for giving up on a run were squelched by my desire to see the run through for my mom's sake. After all, as a mom of 6 kids, the time that she had available for exercise was very scarce, and I didn't want to be the cause of her not enjoying a run solely because her daughter "wimped out." We both knew that if one person gave in to defeat, the other would not be too far behind.  Over that long summer, we fed off of each other's stamina and rejoiced in our small victories on the road. Finally, there came a day where, after months of enjoying our habitual running expeditions, I looked down at my watch and was pleased to see that we had broken the 7min/mile pace for over 2 miles. Read how I did it… 3 years ago