Becoming a "Real" Runner

The real change that matters when becoming a runner is your self-perception. In the end, how fast or how far you run are really and truly irrelevant. What matters is that you run. If you run, you are a runner. A real runner. It took me almost two years to figure out this simple fact. John "The Penguin" Bingham described my former self (and my first 5K race) with frightening accuracy,

For a long time I was embarrassed to be standing in a group of runners with a number pinned to my chest. How presumptuous, I thought, that I should try to join in. How outrageous of me to think that I, a waddling middle-aged [wo]man, could be one of them.

I remember standing at the starting line--no, actually standing well away from the starting line--when the nervous energy began to build at one race. I found myself trying to hide in the crowd, afraid that the race director would spot me, the imposter, and ask me to leave. "Hey you!" he calls out in my nightmare. "What are you doing here? This is a race for real runners."

It never happened, of course. [124, The Courage to Start, John Bingham, 1999, Simon & Shuster]

Now that I've learned my metaphysical lesson about the runner's reality principle it all seems so obvious. I spent hours of anxiety and hours of wasted effort worrying about being "found out." I was worried that the chubby mom on the block would look like a loser running through the neighborhood each day. I was afraid that someone would spot the poseur who had the audacity to pretend she was a real athlete. "Real runners" were those emaciated types with short shorts--a body type and mindset (I thought) that left me out.

But one day I figured it out--somewhere between my second 5K and my daily run in subzero Chicago winter. A real runner is someone who puts one foot in front of the other. And runs. Not as fast as an Olympian. Not as far as a marathon winner. But as fast and as far as she can. And that's more than enough. That's a real runner.