6 Thoughts You Have During Your First 5k

By Judy Lee ‘17

My mile time in elementary school was 9 minutes and 8 seconds. Nowadays, getting to a 10-minute mile is hellish. Since then, age and the freshman 15 have not done me any huge favors. So when I signed up for the Santa Monica Classic for $40 (roughly equivalent to almost FOUR Chipotle burrito bowls with guac), I knew the wager was enough to get me going. 

To start off, I was lucky enough to have a lovely running buddy pictured below:

It takes a lot of strength AND stamina to finish a 5k without having a mental breakdown. After a mile, my mind started to wander and my muscles started to speak louder than my thoughts. Here are some other things I learned: 

1. Running is a diverse sport.

I was always under the impression that most runners looked like Nike models. And while this may be true for marathons and such—the 5k and 10k participants around me were of all shapes, sizes, and races. Everyone had clothes that made them feel confident and comfortable and encouragement flowed like water. The feeling of being a part of a larger entity was definitely one of the coolest feelings. 

2. Your inner “emergency” voice isn’t your real emergency voice.

This is obviously to be taken with a grain of salt. When your inner emergency voice sounds, by all means: stop. If you feel cold all of a sudden or faint/dizzy—please stop.

 But that voice that tells you to slow down because your feet kind of tingle in an uncomfortable way, and the voice that tells you to just walk the rest because you’re not going to get to the end anytime soon anyway? They may get louder as time goes on, but they’re certainly override-able.

3. It isn’t a race.

I heard a father tell his young son (who was red in the face with fierce competitiveness): “this isn’t a race against other people; this is a race against yourself”. Wise words indeed.

4. The way you speak to yourself is important.

Everyone speaks to themselves in different voices depending on their level of stress, how they feel, and where they are. Some people do better when their inner voice is a yell, some people do better when their inner voice is a calm, low voice. Figure out which one is yours and also, be more aware of the voices you use on yourself that bring you down.

5. Focusing on long-term instead of short-term will only drag you down.

A little past the halfway point, I began to slow down. I kept thinking “wow, all of this time and effort and I’m only halfway through? I’m already sweating this much and now I have to replay that amount of time over again?” Thinking about the amount of time and effort needed to complete the 5k was driving me crazy. Every checkpoint I got to felt like a teaser to the end.

But as taught to me by my running buddy: shorter goals will not only keep you motivated, but help you stay in the moment. Your mind will wander less when you try to catch up to the man in blue a few feet ahead than when you try to visualize the finish line two miles down the road.

6. All of it the frustration and sweat is worth trading in for those 20 seconds when you cross the finish line and grab a cold water bottle.

Runner’s high isn’t news. But, it’s so worth (literally) chasing. Running is more a mental battle than it is a physical one and conquering that and using your body to prove to your mind that you are more than the sum of your parts is one of the most rewarding experiences I’ve felt.