C25K, Vibrams, and barefooting

I just wanted to throw a quick note in here about our latest adventure! Mike and I are currently doing the Couch-to-5K program. We just started week 4 and we have had fun with this! I've been posting about it on my Facebook page, but I thought I'd put an entry here since this blog is more or less a journal of our family. I was inspired by a few nurses I work with (and I'm still inspired by them) and decided to give this program a shot. It helps that I found two people online who are about my size and succeeded in doing this. See the above link for a breakdown of the program. But basically, it turns a couch potato into a 5K runner in about 9 weeks (or thereabouts... some people take a little longer and that could VERY well be me!)

I started this on August 3rd. I ran the first day at Twin Lakes Elementary and simply ran around one of the school buildings. To top it off, I did it in my hot pink Crocs! Yes, these guys:


I did that for a couple of reasons. To start with, I hate the running shoes I have. And I read about a couple of people who have run whole marathons in Crocs and like them better because they have less pain. So I did it... and had no pain. AWESOME! I ran the first week and the first day of the second week in those Crocs and never had any pain at all. But in the interim, I had done a bunch of research and somehow, some way I discovered the barefoot (or minimally shod) running movement. Being the minimalist that I am in so many other areas of life, this appealed to me and had an air of truth that I couldn't deny. So I read and read... and read... and then read more and finally decided that I had to try it. I also got myself a pair of Vibram Five Finger Sprints shoes to wear for running in. No, they have no support whatsoever and that's the way I like it. I've been running in them for two weeks now and I don't have an ounce of pain at all. They are funky looking for sure! They are certainly conversation starters.


I love them to pieces. What's more... I can toss them in the washing machine and they are dry by the next morning! Yippee!! I'll post more about my C25K progress. For now I'm just sticking with the program and loving it. Our goal is to run the Seattle Jingle Bell 5K in December.

Anyway... we have run the majority of the rest of our runs at the Decatur High School track. It's a great track! It was crowded on Monday and so we went over to Lakota park and I never want to do that again! The boys go with us and we make them move the entire time we do. It's been good for them too. Here are a couple of shots of them on the track last week sometime:



I plan on writing more as I go through this program!