Yesterday, it was beautiful beautiful beautiful. I actually was dying to run home from work. I had fresh legs and 8 miles from door to door. It was perfect and luckily, I came prepared.

It was kind of a weird run — sporadic in speed and not nearly as fast as I felt — but I still enjoyed every minute, feeling free and joyous and capable to bounce down the familiar Mt. Vernon trail.

I wish the distance was more like 6 miles instead of 8 but I work with it. After-work runs are always a little harder on my body. Either way, I had “that running feeling” — why we love it so much. I come bounding in the door like an excited puppy, full of thoughts that haven’t yet had a chance to come out!

I feel like those Nigerian girls up there…even without having won a medal! And I’d love to be like these guys, in an “over-the-hill” running club when I’m in my 80s! Their oldest member is 92 — yikes!:

As I sat reading last month’s issue of Runner‘s World, I just felt inspired. The stories are always so well-written and most often, by people like me who cherish and love the sport of running for a myriad of reasons.

As I’ve seen echoed so often in the blogosphere lately, YOU define the runner in yourself. We are runners and it helps make us better people. You don’t have to run to be a better person, obviously, but I’m saying there are many things about running that CAN help. Discipline, determination, goals, clarity of mind, etc.

I read this story about a runner who had struggled with an eating disorder, took a photo and wanted to share because it really made sense and resonated with me:

People easily associate exercise as a negative factor for folks who have (or have had) eating disorders. As I mentioned before, it was a problem for me in the past. Now, it’s such an important part of keeping me balanced and clear and confident. 
I make time for running/exercise because it’s like medication for me. Is that a bad thing? Maybe some would say yes. To me, as long as I can — I will. If one day, I can’t — well, then I figure it out then. 
Let’s #MakeItHappen
Speaking of making time for working out, let’s talk about the #MakeItHappen Challenge that many of you have signed up for with me! 
Some have mentioned it’s hard to do all 100 situps and pushups at the same time. I have a couple of suggestions for you:  
1) Break it up by doing half in the morning and half at night (or even more sections)
2) Turn it into a circuit: 10 push ups/25 situps one after the other so they aren’t stuck together! 
For those that want to get more bang for your buck, add a few other items to your circuit for a full body work out. Pick some form of something from this list to do 10 reps of as part of your 10/25 circuit. If you pick something from each category for every round, you’ll end up with a pretty sweet workout circuit!

Even if you are not doing the challenge, how will you/are you going to #MakeItHappen with fitness this weekend?

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