Running - Ready or Not

A few months ago my friend AJ recruited me and another friend, Patty, to run a relay marathon in Vermont on July 10th.  Once upon a time, I was a serious runner and broke my high school records for the mile, two mile and two mile relay.  Since then I've had an on and off love affair with running.  I love what it does for my body, but starting to run again after a long lapse is killer.  I decided I would partake in the relay marathon in order to get back in shape for the summer.  I was especially out of shape seeing as I sustained a significant hematoma falling down icy stairs to the hot tub and was unable to ski for a month.  A very cold rainy spring gave me another excuse to put off training for the race.  Seven weeks before the race I tied on my old sneakers and started running in the park with my dog.  It didn't go well.  I was running about a mile and just dying.  I decided I needed new sneakers.  I went to Dicks and got very frustrated.  The salespeople were terrible, and I walked out.  I decided to go to Fleet Feet which is a small specialty running shop in Montclair. Awesome place!  They asked what kind of running I do (or in my case, wanted to do), examined my feet and measured me.  They brought out a few pairs of sneakers for me to try.  They encouraged me to leave them on for awhile and to go outside and run up and down the block. They were all about me taking my time to make sure I was getting the best sneaker for me.  What can I say?  I LOVE my new sneakers!!!  By the end of the first week with my new sneakers I ran 2.6 miles and was very impressed with myself.  I never ran much more than two miles before EVER!  I informed AJ of my progress, and he said he was worried for me.  I'll show him!!  I gave myself an additional week to meet my new goal of 4 miles. I very quickly realized that my middle age knees couldn't take the daily pounding, so now I run every other day.  My knees are much happier.  I ran 4.2 miles on Sunday, and then again on Tuesday.  I'm going to try to keep running 4 miles every other day to build my endurance.  I'm hoping to run 6 miles on Sunday, but we'll see.  It may be a little too aggressive a strategy, so I'm going to listen to my body and play it by ear.