...Or so I thought.

Some time in late 2009, a friend (Tim) of mine was talking to me about a 5k he had run during the summer.  He mentioned that he might do it again the next summer and pitched the idea of me running with him.  At this point, I am 32 years old, extremely sedentary and have been for the last forteen years.  The idea had some allure.  The problem was that everytime I had any spurt of ambition to lift weights or have any level of activity, it was thwarted by getting sick which turned me off to being active.  Not to mention that I never had enjoyed running and could never understand why people would willingly do it.

Tim turned me onto a program designed around getting lazy butts like mine up and running.  The program is called Couch to 5k.  Fortunately, there is an iPhone app by the same name that walked me through the process.  Essentially, it is a three day a week for 9 weeks program that takes you through the baby steps that will get you to the point of running a 5k.

It took me a total of about 13 weeks to get to the point of running my first 5k, which was the Provo Freedom Run on the 5th of July.  Much to my surprise, I ran it in 35:32.  Much, much faster than I had ever anticipated.

Gratefully, I still run every other day and have been able to do some weight training on my off days without being sick.  I don't know that I have been in this good of shape since I hit puberty.  Nevertheless, I am grateful that I had a friend that just happened to ask me to join him this year in the Freedom Run and that everytime he talked about his running, it helped me to get out and do mine.  I can't say that I enjoy running (although I do enjoy the occasional runner's high) but I certainly like the way that I am feeling day-to-day not to mention the flub that has managed to disappear from my bod.