dcruzin.com

I know that many of you have been anxiously asking me what this countdown is all about since I started posting it on my status 10 days ago. Well, the suspense is finally over, because I’ve been waiting to re-launch my new blog (with more frequent updates) here at this new address (so please update your links on your blogs), and I figured I’d announce a pretty big day for me (well kind of).

[photo courtesy of kk+]

It’s 90 days left until the Vancouver Marathon on May 4, which I plan to run with my friend Derek. Oh, I guess I should probably clarify that we’re only running the half-marathon. Yeah, I know it’s kind of cheating to say I’m running a marathon when I’m only going to run a half-marathon. But today marks the first day of my 90 day training period. I’m following Hal Higdon’s Half Marathon Training Program for novice runners. It’s a 12 week program, and I have 13 weeks, so I guess I’ll do the first week twice or something. It starts off with about 10 miles/week and ramps up to around 25 miles/week which really isn’t that bad. I mean I played soccer for 10 years when I was little and during most of High School. And my freshman year I was even on the cross-country team. But yeah, that was a long time ago. So I’ll be posting my progress here every once in awhile. Feel free to comment or IM me and ask my how my training is going. I’m definitely going to need support and accountability to stay on track.

I’ve been meaning to get in better shape since I got out of college, and I’ve done alright, but this is a chance to really Go Big or Go Home. So to motivate myself I just put out a pretty difficult goal and I know I gotta get there. I also wanted to run for a special cause. I’m not going to talk about it much until March when I start serious fundraising, but I want to raise money in honor of my older brother Oliver who passed away from colon cancer in 2006 at age 28. So when I start raising money in March, I’ll post some more about the Oliver Cruz Memorial Fund which goes to benefit colon cancer research at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston where he was treated.

I know that there will be some tough times and some pain I’ll go through in training and during the actual half-marathon itself. But I know that this pain is nothing compared to what Oliver faced. His life inspired me to do something great with mine. This is a small step. I’m just getting started.