I’ll admit to you now, before we go any further, that I was planning on writing three or four articles in the weeks leading up to the Student Center for Professional Development 5K this past Saturday morning.  I was going to write one for each stage in my training, describing my preparation for the run and the arduously slow but ultimately rewarding process of getting my body back into athletic shape.  It was going to be really cool–something to look back on and think: that was when I changed my life for the better.

And I guess, since my training for the 5K ended up consisting of buying a new pair of mesh shorts from Target the night before the race, this being my first article on the race didn’t exactly leave you out of the loop.

Let me back up and insist that I wasn’t always this lazy.  When I was growing up, my dad was the cross-country coach for Lynwood High School.  I have fond memories of going with him to try out unfamiliar courses, and trailing behind him for early morning runs during summer vacation, lungs burning with the thin air of the High Sierras.  I was the fastest girl in my class in elementary school, dazzling teachers and peers alike. 

I was wearing Saucony running shoes before they were cool.

When I got to high school, I was placed in a general PE class taught by coach Carl Buggs.  Yes, that coach Carl Buggs.  He’d left his job at Lynwood about five years earlier, and on the first run of the year he caught me walking and shouted across the blacktop: “Hey!  Higa!  Don’t forget I know your dad!”  That year was the peak of my motivation.  I ran a seven-minute mile at the end of my freshman year and never came close to it again.

When I heard about the 5K run to benefit the SCPD, I recognized it as a perfect opportunity.  We’d be running on the Long Beach State campus, something I’d often wistfully watched real runners do.  It was several weeks away, which left plenty of time to find my running shoes, buy some new socks, and get in shape.  In that order.

 “The best thing is,” I told my dad two weeks before the race, “it’s only 5K, so I won’t really have to worry about it.”  He looked at me thoughtfully and said, “I think maybe you’ll have to worry about it.”

As the day approached, and a shiny new $5 podometer lay unwrapped but uncalibrated on my desk, I realized maybe he was right.  And, when I found myself struggling to catch my breath after a mile-long walk from campus to home, I began to suspect that the operative word in “SCPD 5K Run/Walk” might be the one after the forward slash.

Although the Long Beach Poly Jackrabbits had given me an out in the form of a press pass to take photos at the state championship girls’ basketball game in Sacramento, I called Angie the night before the race and secured myself a run-buddy.  Or walk-buddy.  Whatever.

I’m glad I did.  Saturday morning was crisp but sunny, and Long Beach State is gorgeous in the spring.  There were smiling volunteers cheering us on and handing us oranges and water as we made our way around campus.  We jogged for about the first third of the course and then decided to relax a bit and enjoy a brisk walk–we weren’t going to win anyway.  And we didn’t win, we were about half an hour too late for that.  But we still got to wear official runner’s bibs, and we were greeted by a buffet of fruits and breakfast foods when we made it to the finish line. 

I talked to some of the organizers for the event, and they estimated about 250 participants and a thousand dollars raised to benefit the Student Center for Professional Development, which supports the students in the College of Business Administration.  Moments after they handed out the awards, they were already talking about next year, and about the tradition they’d like to build with this event.

If a fitness renaissance feels like sheepishness and sore everything, then I accomplished exactly what I meant to by signing up for this race.  But just in case I’ve got that wrong… here’s to dusting off my old Sauconys and feeling the burn of a cold morning in my lungs again.  Here’s to the rhythm of my feet on the pavement and to reminding my body who steers this ship.  And here’s to starting a new tradition in Long Beach.  If the SCPD 5K is at the Beach next year, then I will be too. 

I’m pretty sure that’ll be enough time for me to train.