Since the beginning of this month, Central’s field has been open from 5:30 to 7:30 on Wednesdays for soccer players to scrimmage. A couple of weeks ago, I went to one of these scrimmages and had a lot of fun playing and catching up with some teammates from last season. However, I realized I was very out of shape for running. If I wanted a chance to make varsity for the soccer team this year, I knew I would have to push myself to be faster and gain more stamina. I decided running for six days a week would be very beneficial for accomplishing this goal.  

On September 16, I began my first self guided run. I decided I was going to run for about thirty minutes and see how many miles I could get. According to my running app, Strava, I ran approximately 2.38 miles in 26 minutes and 36 seconds. This run was very difficult for me as I came home drenched in sweat. My entire body felt like it was on fire and I was completely exhausted. Although I was in pain, I was satisfied that my craving for completion was met.  

 With school work usually taking up large portions of my evening, I predicted I would not be able to always run six days a week. Still, I successfully ran for 5 days in a row this week. I have even noticed a great increase in my mile time as these few days have gone by. On my first run, I had an average mile time of 11 minutes and 10 seconds. Yesterday, on my most recent run, I had an average mile time of 9 minutes 59 seconds. It has only been about 10 days and I am already seeing such positive results. I attended my second soccer scrimmage this week and felt way better than last time. I was rarely out of breath and found that my heightened stamina was making it easier for me to play with the ball. Seeing this improvement has served as motivation to continue making progress.  

 I am even benefiting from running in ways that have nothing to do with sports. It is easier for me to sleep at night because I don’t have any pent up energy. Running has surely brought a balance in my life that I did not know I needed. I finally feel happy knowing I have something to look forward each day that will make me stronger physically and mentally.