Friends, Fam­ily, and Run­ning Santas

I just found out today that a friend of mine from col­lege was on the Rachel Ray Show because she and sev­eral friends decided to start a run­ning group dur­ing lunch at work — the “Lunch Ladies.” They keep them­selves moti­vated by find­ing a fun run to do each month, and for Decem­ber they chose the Santa Shuf­fle.

If hun­dreds of run­ners in Santa suits don’t moti­vate you, then I don’t know what will!

When you’re run­ning a fam­ily, it’s hard to find time to run. And it’s easy to make excuses not to.

“I have an early meet­ing, so I can’t run in the morn­ing.“
“I don’t know what peo­ple at work will think, so I can’t run at lunch.“
“I’m too tired, so I can’t run in the evening.”

Find­ing or form­ing a group (like the “Lunch Ladies”) is a great way to keep your­self from falling prey to your excuses. If you know other peo­ple are expect­ing you to be there, you’ll be less likely to wimp out. (if you didn’t click the Rachel Ray Show link ear­lier to watch the video, now would be a good time)

And even if you don’t run with a group, you can use friends and fam­ily to keep you on track. Tell them your fit­ness goals. Tell them how often you want to work out. And then ask them to check in on you and keep you hon­est. Of course, if they’re good friends, they would never make you feel bad for miss­ing a run here and there. After all, run­ning should be a way to improve fit­ness and relieve stress — not add to your already high stress level. But just know­ing that they know you want to run, and that they sup­port your fit­ness goals, will make you run more and run better.

Find­ing a wacky race is also a great way to shake it up and add some fun to your rou­tine! There are lots of great local races like the Santa Shuf­fle all over the place. All you have to do is find them, and then sign up! Some­times they can be tricky to find, so if you know of one go ahead and post it in the comments!

Then take your fam­ily along with you, and have a great time together!

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