Dec 15th, 2010 - Training - Tewksbury, MA - 3.1

Day 349 - Since it's that time of year to renew your membership with GLRR, or to sign up for GLRR if you haven't already, here's a little history on why I joined GLRR in November of 2009.

I started to look around for a running club to join shortly after I qualified for Boston 2010, at Portland, in order to take my training to a more serious level. Little did I know that joining GLRR meant having fun and drinking a lot of liquid refreshments.

At the time of my pre-inception into the local running scene I knew of only two running clubs in the area, the BAA and GLRR. I was pretty much oblivious to everything else running related beyond my own running and training. A club for running? Pffffffttt.

So, who to join? Well, why not go right to the top and join the running club in charge of the marathon that I was training for.

I shot off the following e-mail to the membership folks at BAA and told them I was interested in joining.

BAA,

I'm looking to join a running club in the area. I'd like more info on joining the BAA.

Thanks,

Jason

At first, everything sounded positive.

Hello-

Thanks for getting in touch about the club.

Let me know what you are training for (race distances and goal times) and we can take it from there.

BAA

Wow! This could be the start of something great!

BAA,

I qualified for Boston 2010 at Maine and Hartford a couple of weeks ago. That was my main goal for this year. (BAA was probably thinking, wait, wasn't Maine and Hartford 6 days apart this year?!)

My only remaining goal for this year is to break 3 hrs at NYC. (never happened)

My biggest goal for next year is to complete an ultra marathon (50 miler) within 6 hrs 30 mins. (BAHAHAHAHA - see how naive I was back then?)

My long term goal is to compete in a 100 miler within the next 3 years. (currently ahead of schedule)

Thanks,

Jason

And then there was a deafening silence. I never heard back from the BAA again after that.

Since the BAA didn't want to nurture my burgeoning writing career (or indulge in my fantasy of winning the JFK 50), I picked up the beginnings of this blog, took the hometown discount, and joined up with GLRR.

The rest is history.

I never thought that a running club could make such a huge difference in my running and drinking ability, but I can honestly say that after one year with the club that has a chicken as its logo, I am now a full blown alcoholic.

(Fear the Chicken!)