A marathon? Am I crazy?

Now that I don't have a newborn in the house and am getting back into shape (now losing the pre-baby weight, aka the "grad school weight") I thought maybe it would be a good idea to have a goal for when I'm running. Cool, goals are good, right? So what do I shoot for - keeping in mind that even when I was running every day in college, I never did more than 3 miles and no faster than a 10 minute mile. I did the Race for the Cure on Mother's Day, and that was alot of fun (though my time of 32:20 wasn't great), so I thought "sure, I can do this again." And the hubby and I are going to sign up to run the Great Race in September, maybe I'll do the Run Around the Square 5k in August. But then what? A 10k seems like such a modest goal and since we're going to wait at least a year to have another child, I think I can aim a little higher, right?

A few weeks ago, I heard on the radio that after a few years hiatus, the Pittsburgh Marathon is coming back again since they finally found some sponsorship. Mile 21 (or maybe now it's mile 19 - they redid the course a few years back) comes almost right past my house and we've always watched the runners going by, since the time I was a kid. So wouldn't it be cool to actually run in it? Forgetting for a few moments that the farthest I've ever run is 6 miles, and it took me a little over an hour to do that, wouldn't it just be cooler than cool to run an actual marathon? Wouldn't it help to put me and Haakan on equal footing in the running department, since he did the Columbus Marathon 3 years ago, right after Oliver was born? Wouldn't that give me a little bit of bragging rights? And help to get my saggy ass back into shape? And be a good excuse to buy some cute new running shorts?

Ok, so some of those reasons are stupid. But here's the reason I'm going to run the Pittsburgh Marathon next spring. Because I want to, damn it. Because I think I can. Because if I gave birth to two children with no drugs, a marathon ought to be right up my alley. So what you have before you is the blog I'm hoping to keep while I train for the marathon next May. I think Haakan and I are going to run a half marathon in March to prepare for the one in May, but other than that and the Great Race in September, the next 10 months is wide open as far as races, etc, goes. Hopefully I'll be able to keep track of everything here, and all the 30ish moms who happen across my little blog will find some inspiration that you don't have to be a natural athlete (which I am certainly not) to be able to accomplish something.