A New Adventure, Now With New Shoes!

Well, the title of the blog says it all. I'm beginning a whole new lifestyle with the overall goal of losing weight and the long-term goal of becoming a marathoner. After my sister-in-law, Andria, completed her first marathon in January, she inspired lots of her family (including me) to complete our own marathons. And so the newest adventure of my life begins! :)

I've never been a runner or an athlete of any kind- not even close. Throughout my academic life I was always the one couped up in my room, studying, and I made stellar grades. I ate my mom's amazing cooking, gained weight, and never made the time to exercise. Essentially, it's caught up with me now, and I'm changing my habits.

So far I've been running 2 miles a day about 4-6 days a week, around the track at the gym. It's been going well, and I've really enjoyed it - something I never thought I would say about exercise! I started out just running in my old sneakers, the same shoes I wore everyday to class. I knew the shoes were totally inadequate for running, and I was at the point where I needed new everyday sneakers anyway. So, when A and C came down to visit this past weekend, we finally went shoe shopping! Andria had found a great running store in OKC, 'The Runner', so we basically went up there and dropped a couple hundred dollars on all kinds of goodies. :) Bobby picked out a pair of Asics and I got a pair of New Balance 817 with phantom liner. They're motion control sneakers, because I found out that I'm a severe pronator. (Kenny, too bad we have that in common!) We also bought some clothing, and, best of all, Bobby bought a Garmin 205 for us to share - a very awesome toy that I'll let him tell you more about.

When we got the shoes I had the feeling that I was like Harry Potter, buying supplies for wizard school. He had to get a proper magic wand, so he went to the best store and spoke with the owner. On all the walls was a huge selection of many kinds of wands, and the owner picked one out that he thought might work. Harry held the wand, said a spell, and the wand went totally haywire! It flew around the room, made a mess, broke things - it wasn't the right 'fit' for Harry. The next wand, though, was perfect. It felt right when he held it, and would turn out to be a great companion for him on his adventures. This was how it felt to put on my new shoes - they were a fantastic fit and made my feet really happy! The guy who helped me at the store was great, he let me try on three or four pairs and let me run around outside in them to get a feel for each one. Anyway, I chose the New Balance after some careful consideration, and now that I've run in them a few times I'm even more happy with them. :)

Over the weekend I also bought two pairs of sneakers at Rack Room Shoes for everyday use...so basically I bought more sneakers over this past weekend than over the past year! Needless to say, now that I'm a runner I'm taking a much greater interest in shoes. Andria and I also did some bra shopping, but that's a whole other story that I'll cover in a later blog. Right now it's time to do some homework.

Thanks for reading!
Hayley