Big Girl, Short Runs

A blog dedicated to fat & body positive running. It doesn't matter how far or for how long you go, just that you went at all.

[biggirlshortruns]

Today’s Run 1/16/19

Today’s run was great! 

I had crappy runs on Friday, like I wrote about, and a crappy one yesterday (because my schedule is screwed up this week for a couple reasons so I tried to run yesterday early afternoon before work (it was my first time back in the classroom in over a month and damn, I low-key missed work.) but it didn’t work out in my favor) but I woke up today determined not to have a bad run again.

According to my training schedule, I’m supposed to be doing 2.5 miles of running within 3.1 miles. Now, I had to walk a little bit more than .6 miles, but honestly not that much when you take out my warm-up and cool down. I wasn’t really sure I’d be able to do that much running, but I got it done.

I was on the treadmill for an hour counting a 5 minute warm-up and a 7 minute cool down (I wanted to hit the even hour) and I went 3.85 miles. Now, I know that seems slow as hell (I mean, that is legitimately 3.85 mph) but remember, my mile is a 14:11 one (or was, I haven’t run a straight mile in months now) which is only 4.23 mph. So, that doesn’t seem that off base from what I was running when you think about how slow the Planet Fitness treadmills make your cool down if you’ve been alternating between 5 mph and 3 mph.

I started off doing 3 minutes running (so a quarter mile since I was going 5 mph) and then 1 minute walking. I got 1.25 miles done that way and I took that as a win. Then I switched to 1:30 of running followed by 30 seconds of walking for another .75 miles because I was just not getting 3 minutes at that point (I did 1 interval where I tried and got to 2 minutes then did 1 minute of walking) and the last .5 miles of running I did 1 minute running and 30 seconds of walking. So my intervals took me 48 minutes all together. I’m hoping that next Monday (the next time I will be able to run), I will be able to get 2 miles done doing the 3 minute/1 minute intervals.  Or at least 1.5 miles.  At this 2.5 miles of running stage of my training, I want to be doing 3.1 miles within 40 minutes. That’s my goal by February 8th. 

So, what got me feeling better about doing these intervals? Listening to Jill Angie’s “Not Your Average Runner” podcast is a huge part of it. I’m nowhere near caught up to the episode she’s doing now at all, but in one of her earlier episodes, she answers a runner’s question by reminding them they can do intervals. She suggests 3 minute running, 1 minute walking and even though this person was running like, 9 miles a day or some wild shit I will never be doing, it reminded me that that was okay. Before, I had been beating myself up about not doing .5 mile intervals-- like, why couldn’t I run for 6 minutes straight at this point? I’ve done it before! I did 28 minutes straight during C25k! But a) that was in October and this is January and b) that was outside where I could alter my pace at my will as need me which is more difficult to do on a treadmill and c) so what?? If I have to walk more often right now than I did, that’s okay! I’m still running! It still makes me feel better and it’s still good for me. And I can work up to running the whole 5k. My first race this year isn’t until March 23rd (Rockford’s Meltfest 5k) and if I don’t run that whole way, I’ve got another trace April 13th that’s gonna feed me a brat and beers afterwards. 

But along with Jill Angie’s podcast, I also got motivated to make today’s run great because my best friend Kelly has started doing C25k to train for what will be my June race (Chicago’s PAWS 5k) because she wants to be able to run the whole thing then and she’s let me bitch to her as much as I need to and she’s told me “hey, just go do it!” when I need to hear it. Having someone to commiserate with and is going sort of the same pace as me has been great. Plus, she told me to listen to Kesha’s “Learn to Let Go” and honestly, paying attention to that song and just telling myself that if that helped Kelly get through a run it could help me too helped so much.

I’m so glad I went today and told myself I could get back on the right track and reminded myself I was doing okay. My run put me in such a good mood and I am ready to tackle all the projects I want to with the rest of my night.

[biggirlshortruns]

Today’s Run 1/11/19

Today’s run was bad in just about every technical sense; I have no idea how far I actually went, and I did not keep steady intervals, and I didn’t go as long as I normally do. But, I made myself go run and that’s what matters.

I had been in a terrible mood all day (thanks, brain chemistry!) and didn’t want to go to the gym, but I knew if I did, I could wear my cute new Harry Potter sports bra and I knew deep down it would make me feel better. And it did. Not completely, but definitely enough. Getting to see how cute the sports bra is helped too (shout out to Torrid Clearance).

I think it’s really important that we still celebrate the “bad” runs; on a shitty day, if you can make yourself go do a difficult thing (and running is hard! it just is!), that’s definitely worth celebrating. If you didn’t accomplish your goal exactly, you still took steps towards it and made an attempt, and with running that is still awesome. Plus, you can always try again tomorrow or the next day. But you still did something today and that’s a great celebration of what your body can do.

At least, that’s how I’m choosing to look at it. 

[biggirlshortruns]

My very first 5k. I finished a solid 10-15 minutes slower than the next person in my group (who isn’t actually in this group picture) I think, but I’m so glad I did it. As I said before, my final time was 43:49.83. The couple on the far right finished 2nd and 4th in their divisions (he qualified for and is running the Boston Marathon this year and only took 4th in his div because he ran with his girl) so I knew out of this group I would be doing nothing impressive, but guess what? I still got it done in my goal time (45 minutes or less) and it was my idea to run this damn race anyway so I will still think of it as a 2018 win. 

It doesn’t matter what I look like in these photos; I spent a Saturday morning in October running in the cold when I could have been sleeping and that’s an accomplishment. Super visible cellulite and my angry looking, no makeup wearing face don’t matter as much as the happiness that I felt when it was all done does.  I’m probably never going to take a super flattering race photo because I will be too busy trying not to lay down on the ground and die. 

I did spend the rest of the day with my friends drinking great Milwaukee craft beer and nothing gives you a better excuse to have a beer at 11 am than having run a 5k :)

[biggirlshortruns]

Today’s Run 1/9/19

Total treadmill time: 65 minutes. 

Total distance: 3.95 miles.

How much of that did I run? 2 miles, which is my goal. My goal for the last couple weeks has been to run 2 miles of 3.1. I think I’ve done that maaaaaayyybe twice? I have had to walk more than 1.1 miles. That’s just how it’s been working. Granted, that total distance also counts my warm-up of .25 and my cool down which was probably .15? But, we’re looking at walking almost 1.5 miles during my “run” time. But I got 2 miles in and that is what counts to me. Because I am doing this at my own pace. 

Also, I’m not doing my first race this year until March 23rd so I have time to work up to running the full 3.1 miles still.

But back to today’s run. I did 1 of the 2 miles at a 6mph/3mph interval. 1 minute of 6mph followed by 2 of 3mph. I tried to do 1 minute then one minute on Monday and it just wasn’t working out-- got about 5 of those intervals in and was fucking dying, so I thought I would walk a little more today. It was doable, but hard. I think I might see if I can do the second mile that way on Friday. 

The second mile my intervals were less regular, but I slowed my pace down to 5mph/3mph and ran at least a minute each time (trying to go 2 or 3) and then walked for a minute or so as I needed to. 

“As I need to” is pretty much my mantra with running, honestly. I try to push myself (I wouldn’t let myself pause the treadmill until I’d run the first mile, for instance), but I’m not racing anyone but myself and I try to listen to my body. So, if I’m getting shin splints, I’ll pause and stretch out. If there’s that voice in my head going “holy shit you’re dying, stop it,” I’ll tell it to hang on for however long until the next minute and then let myself slow down to a walk. Sometimes I get a little ‘tough love’ on myself, but I’m not going to berate myself when the whole reason I’m doing this is for my mental health. And consistently, no matter if my run was hard as hell or felt amazing like I could go for longer (that happens approximately never, don’t worry), I feel so much better afterwards. 

So, good for the dude on the treadmill in front of me going 7mph and looking cool as a cucumber and the girl I saw keeping a 5.5 mph on an incline pace for like, ten minutes. That ain’t me, but I still ran today. 

Now, I’m off to sign up for the Brewers Mini Marathon 5k in September before the price code I have expires. 

[biggirlshortruns]

[biggirlshortruns]

About the Runner

My name is Jackie and I am fat! I’m closer to 300 pounds than 200 and usually wear sizes that start with a 2. Just to paint you a picture of what I mean when I say that-- I’m a big girl. Hence the title of this blog. 

But, I’m also starting to call myself a runner. I did my first 5k (the Milwaukee Beer Run- I love beer a whole lot) in October of last year in a total time of 43:49.83.  Which is not a terrible time, (it’s a 14:23/mile pace) but it certainly ain’t great. I did not run the full 3.1 miles. I didn’t even run the first mile all the way. It was cold and windy as hell and it even rained a little bit and the entire time I was running that first part I wondered why in the shit I had signed up to do this. But even after I stopped running to walk, I started up running again. I have no idea how much of the course I actually ran, but I’m guessing I started off running at a pace that was NOWHERE near what I normally run. Being cold as fuck and knowing you’ll be the last one in your group of friends to finish will do that I guess? 

I didn’t start this whole running nonsense until about late August of 2018. I played sports in high school, but only softball the last two years and I was a catcher who got a pinch runner every time I got on base; my ass has always been slow. Plus, high school graduation was over 10 years ago (I turn the big 3-0 later this year). I haven’t played sports since. So, I did what every person who decides to do a 5k when they haven’t run in a while: use Couch to 5k (C25k). Whoever designed that app is awesome, yes, but they’re also delusion as shit. They claim they’ll have you running a 30 minute 5k in 8 weeks....I’m NEVER going to be able to run a 30 minute 5k. Do you know how fast 6mph feels on a treadmill? Mad fucking fast, okay? I can do that shit for about a minute then it’s back to a walk. A 10 minute mile is not in the cards for me. But I’m getting ahead of myself. 

So, I know I must have started off this beer run way faster than normal because by the end of the C25k program when it asks you to run 28 minutes straight, what they think of as 2.75 miles, I’d only made it 2 miles. And it was the longest run I have ever done in my entire life. I wanted to jump for joy when I finished it because I was so proud of myself. Of course I had nowhere near the energy to jump for joy because I barely made it up my street for a cool-down, but you get it. When I timed myself doing a mile the first time (on a C25k off-day) I got it done in about 14:11. So the idea that I didn’t even run the whole 5k and still got it done in under 45 minutes means I was hauling ass. At an unsustainable pace for me. No wonder I had to walk before I even made it a mile. 

But I got it done and I wasn’t dead last (which I am thankful for because there were people who walked the entire time and if they beat me, I would have felt like shit.). And I decided I was going to keep this going. 

I’m signed up for 2 5k races this year as of today, and I’m planning on signing up for at least 2 more, if not 6 more (one of my friends who I got to run this beer run with me is trying to go 12/12 this year and I said I’d do March-October along with her). I’m running at least 2 days a week (the holidays screwed up my 3 times a week habit, but I’m getting it back).

But I’m not trying to run any more than 3.1 miles (the 5k).  In fact, I’m working my way up to that. Or trying to. 

Right now, I’m running 2 miles of the 3.1 and I’m not doing it continuously. I’m doing intervals and they’re varying. I know that I should be aiming for consistency, and I should definitely be trying to get more than a quarter mile of a run done at a time. But I’m not. Some days to run 2 miles, I’m going farther than 3.1 miles. But I’m running. And I’m gonna go ahead and say that makes me a runner. 

[biggirlshortruns]

About This Blog

Hello all,

I’m Jackie (you’ll learn more about me later) and I’m a fat girl who runs.

There are actually plenty of fat and/or bigger women who run on the internet and that’s fucking amazing! Mirna Valerio is a fucking icon; Jill Angie is absolutely spectacular; Julie Creffield is super great. There are so many more women (and men!) out there showing that fat people can and do run and doing it unashamedly. What a time to be alive, right?

But in my quest to find blogs and podcasts and the like to get me through my first 5k (more on that later too), I was confronted with this: so many of these people are running long distances. They talk about training for marathons, or ultra-marathons, or 50, 100ks. Which is great and amazing! 

But I’m not trying to do that. I’m not sure I’m ever even trying to run a 10k, to be honest. And hearing about “recovery runs” that are longer than I’m running ever was a little disheartening. 

So, this blog was born.  

What I want this blog to be is a space of encouragement. If you’re struggling to run a mile, or two miles, or some distance that feels like a “short” one to anyone who is a “real runner,” I want this blog to be here to tell you it’s okay: you’re a real runner too!  

Now, to get this out of the way: I WILL NEVER GIVE A FUCK ABOUT WEIGHT LOSS.

That is not what this blog is about. I am not running to lose weight. I’m not. I’m running because as it turns out, it’s LIFE CHANGING in terms of my mental health. I never thought I would be that girl, but here we are: I feel better on days I run. But I have not lost weight since I’ve been running, and I don’t care if I ever do. I care about feeling better, no matter what the scale says. I’m a big believer in fat positivity and body positivity. I’m not running to be “healthier” in the physical sense, (though I’m sure it is making me healthier by some standards,) because I don’t owe health to anyone for existing in this world; I’m running because it gives me a sense of accomplishment and combats the intrusive “what’s the point of anything” thoughts that can try to invade my brain. 

I’m probably always going to be that big, red-faced bitch trucking along slowly getting passed by the “typical” runner. But that’s okay, because I’m still doing it. And if you’re doing it too, then no matter how fast or how far you’re going, as long as you’re feeling good, you’re killing it.