I Want To Be A Runner Once Again

[bgvanbur]

In college I ran all the time, including my personal best of a 26 minute 5K and 135 minute half marathon. I was exercised nearly every day. I ate a bowl of cereal in the morning, no lunch, and a 12 inch pizza at night (not healthy but not too many calories a day). I was six foot tall and weighed around 165 pounds.

Then in 2006, I graduated, had a kid, started a career and got married. I started to stop exercising. I started eating lunch with my coworkers, I had homecooked meals by my wife, and snacks with TV. I slowly put on weight. Every once in a while I would get motivated to lose weight, and while I would do lots of cardio I barely changed my diet and didn't see very many results.

As of Jan 2012, I weighed 250 pounds. When doing research, I found out I was 30 pounds overweight. I couldn't believe it. Well I decided to level up my life.

I have changed my diet (paleo inspired), walk every day (averaging 60 minutes a day), and do body weight exercises (push ups, body squats, planks, box jumping, jumping jacks). I have lost 32 pounds so far.

This site was a primary source I used to research how I wanted to be successful at losing the weight this time. My epic goal is to wear 34 inch pants like I did in college and to demolish my old running records.

[The Tin Man]

That's great you've already had some success! I was a cross country runner in high school but in college got away from it. I was fortunate to have not gained weight but I was still thinking during the summers when I'd run once in a while "the days when I can just run 5 miles at the drop of a hat are limited!" aaaand here we are. Having started running consistently at the start of the year I can now probably run 5 again, albeit very slowly.

That is my roundabout way of saying welcome, congrats on the success so far, and I can relate to getting back into the swing of running!

[BadWolf]

Good on you! Looks like you've got a good plan of action, so good luck!

[Josh_C]

Welcome! I'm always a little jealous of former fast runners. You know what it was like to be fast. Now it's just a matter of getting there again, which you will definitely do.

[Rosie]

Hey, great goal to work toward, you'll get there

[bgvanbur]

Thanks for all the encouraging comments.

[Chest Rockwell]

Hey dude--I was where you were not long ago. I ran a ton in high school for cross country and soccer. Never really a world-beater, but I was respectable. During college, I switched mainly to weight lifting and, in law school, I didn't really exercise at all. 3 years after graduating, I decided to start back from square one.

I'd recommend starting out slowly with a training plan. I used Hal Higdon's novice 10 mile plan to train for the Louisville Triple Crown of Running (5K, 10K and 10 miler). In my experience, it'll get you ready to roll--I started at square one in early January and completed the 10 miler in late march without having to walk.

Glad to hear things are going well. Keep on truckin'.