Like a lot of people who tried to run once or twice before it really caught on, I like to think that I’ve run two “first” 5Ks. I was a senior in high school the first time I started running, and I was trying to lose weight to fit into my prom dress. It worked; I lost probably 10 or 15 pounds and was able to wear the dress, but I didn’t keep running through that post-high school summer.

The running I did do was either inside on the treadmill, where I would go for 30 or 45 minutes a few times a week, never really getting faster, or outside, where I ran as fast as I could for as long as I could, then walked around until I gathered my breath and then sprinted off again as if I were being chased by a bear. Repeat ad nauseum. Looking back now, I’m not sure why it never occurred to me to just slow down or even to look online for tips for beginning to run.

I recall looking up how to run with exercise-induced asthma, which I thought I had because I kept getting out of breath when I ran. I got a prescription for an inhaler and Cingulair based on my testimony and my history with asthma during my childhood. Neither of those things really seemed to do any good, perhaps because the issue was not a constriction of my air passages, but the fact that I was trying to run seven minute miles without having the fitness to do so.

But I set a goal to run a 5K right before I graduated anyway, despite the fact that running outside always ended in me feeling horrible. It was the Stonebridge Memorial Day 5K. I ran so hard I think I threw up at one point, and when a nice lady told me I should slow down, I mentally dismissed her advice and kept on walking until I felt like I could sprint again. It was a long 3.1 miles, and it took me 33:00 on the nose. I came in 6th in my age group, and didn’t really care all that much how I had done. I had just run a 5K!

After I graduated college and took up running again, I used the Couch to 5K app to start running again. I naïvely thought that it was going to be easy after not struggling too much with the first week’s workouts, but it certainly got much more difficult as the weeks went by. I started in May, which meant I was training through the brutal Texas summer, but I got through it, and ended up running the Dallas Running Club Independence Day 5K as my second “first” 5K. It was difficult, and I was nervous because I had actually trained for this one and wanted to do well.

In the end, I finished in a 30:01, and that final second was aggravating enough to push me to keep working to get faster. What really cemented my desire to keep training was the fact that I had placed second in my age group. I left before they handed out the medals, so I didn’t even know until I got an email from the race director asking when I wanted to get my award. I was surprised, and pleasantly so. That award was a glimmer of hope that maybe I wasn’t as bad at running as I’d thought. It gave me a little bit of hope that I didn’t have to be the miserable, wheezing girl from the last 5K, or the girl who had so much trouble running one mile in athletics in eighth grade that she was crying as she finished the final lap. I could maybe be good at this.

I will forever be thankful to running groups and the members who make them up for putting on these small club races, even if turnout isn’t amazing. They helped me realize how much I loved running. I will volunteer for and be a club member at the DRC for as long as we live here in Dallas.

I’m going to be running the DRC Independence Day 5K this year too, on July 2. About 1,000 miles after the first time I ran it, I’m hoping to PR again, only I’m looking for a sub-23 time this year. In 2014, I would never have dreamed that I’d have half a chance at chasing a time a full seven minutes faster than my first time running this race, and ten minutes faster than the 2009 5K, but I’m hopeful that I can continue to improve and maybe somehow help other people realize how much they love running too.