New runner plods on in search of passion

Last March I paid the Florida Striders $30 to turn me into a runner. And though my slow jog puts Herculean strain on the definition of the word run, the Striders have more than earned their money.

With their expert help, I went from barely being able to run for 60 seconds to pounding the pavement for more than 60 consecutive minutes at a time.

I am a runner. They even gave me a t-shirt that says so. It says "i Run." Now I just have to figure out why.

Don't get me wrong. As far as I'm concerned, what the Striders did for me was a not-so-minor miracle, and I truly believe that they've added years to my life. I feel that running has made me fitter than I've been since the day I got my driver's license and dust began to collect on my old Ross Eurosport 10 speed. Where there used to be fat, something resembling muscles seem to be taking shape. Where there used to be fatigue, there is now energy.

The Striders' program of building up a new runner minute-by-minute is as pain-free an entry into the sport as you will find, and the fellowship and guidance from so many genuinely caring people, not to mention some world-class runners, goes far beyond what anyone could reasonably expect to get for $30.

Problem is, I think I know what's going to happen. And you probably think you know what's going to happen. People don't change, right? How long will it be before this overweight desk-jockey finds some excuse to sit back and start packing on the pounds again?

Health should be a good enough reason to keep going, right? But it hasn't been for 20 or so years, so I'm not sure I can rely on that. If I were a competitive person, I could keep hitching my wagon to the date of the next 5K. But even if I were competitive, it's doubtful that I could be in a race, and after my umpteenth last-place finish, I fear I might just have more incentive to quit.

I guess I'm not just looking for a reason to run. I'm looking for inspiration, desire, passion. I know it exists in runners. I've seen it in their eyes, and I want it.
 Bob and Vanessa Boyd, the organizers of the Striders' class, have so much passion for the sport that even now, more than a month after the class has ended, their residual enthusiasm is still inspiring me to keep putting one foot in front of the other."Life is good," Bob says. "I get to run today."

I hear ya, Bob. And I do so want to feel that way. But there's this little voice inside my head that's trying to drown you out. "It's too hot out," it says. "I'm too old, ... My little toe feels funny."

"Running is its own reward," says Strider Jay Birmingham, the St. Johns Country Day track coach who runs across deserts, canyons and continents. Now this is a guy who has passion. How could anybody run 3,000 miles without it?

In his book about his 1981 Death Valley run (www.badwater.com/stories/1981/1981birminghambook), Jay talks about breaking through perceived limits of endurance, tapping previously untapped reserves and discovering "a land in the mind that is beyond science; a place for spirit, inspiration, motivation, passion."

That certainly sounds like a place where we would all like to be. Problem is, most of us mere mortals are not going to run through Death Valley to get there. Most of us would likely need a short cut. And, while I'm pretty sure there are a variety of roads outside of Death Valley which lead to this amazing place of which Jay speaks, it seems that, by its very nature, it is not a place you can get to easily, or by way of a short cut. By definition, it seems to be a place on the other side of the most extreme place you've ever been to, and the road to it apparently leads straight through your soul.
...?
So, those 5Ks are really only three miles, right?