Proud Father

Sunday mornings are the best. Not every Sunday mind you. It's only every other Sunday (at best) when the ducks line up for me the way I like.

That's when my two kids from my first marriage are with me. Faithful readers will know that my initial interest in the martial arts was sparked by watching my son at his karate class. Well, he is growing up and he's getting ready for the final run towards the black belt (ok, he's still a brown belt so it'll be a long run).

Running. Running is todays topic. Running is one of the big bagaboos for many people in our school. To get your black belt, you need to be running regularly from red belt onwards and you need to get your time for a two mile run to under 16 minutes. So my son and I have started running together on our Sunday mornings together.

We run early enough so he can still make it to Sunday school. Today, for the first time, we drove to the back of the dojo which is the official site for timed runs. I was hoping that we could break nine minutes for one mile. I'm out of shape and he is still getting started running.

So, how pumped was I when after the first mile, the watch showed 4 minutes 20 seconds?!?

Then, at the three quarters of a mile spot, my son says, "Time to kick."

And whoa! He goes shooting out in front. Better acceleration than I've got. Or had in a very long time.

I chased after him and we finished together at 8:02.

I particularly liked the discussion afterwards when he showed, for the first time, an understanding of what a nine, eight, and seven minute mile actually meant. And one versus two miles. No longer abstract to him, we talked about how to work our times down. And how to start targeting the two mile distance and time. We agreed that we need to do three distinct types of runs for the near future:

• Long runs. Two mile runs at first to get use to the distance. He liked the idea of signing up for a 5K and frankly, I think we can probably jog through it now, albeit with a walk or two.
• Timed one mile runs. Our next goal is to beat the 8 minute mark. Since my best time for the timed two miles was 14:08, he knows that 7 minutes is near my limit. I think he's planning to beat it. I'd bet on him beating it within a year.
• One to two mile runs with intermittent short (25 yard) sprints.

I'm over the moon thinking of regularly running with my kids. I've rarely had such a pure dose of motivation.