Run worth a thousand miles

Pre-workout breakfast: Cinnabon Cream of Wheat with sliced bananas
Workout: Ran 4.27 miles; average pace, 9:01.

Somewhere between Covington, Kentucky, and Cincinnati's Paul Brown Stadium, I ran my 1,000th mile of 2010. My first real year of running and I ran a 1,000 miles. Well, 1,006.5 so far if you want to get picky.

Wow.

I never set out to be a member of the 1,000-mile club. As others pledged such goals, I'm wouldn't even consider joining the club. My mileage - not even 60 miles in January or in February - would get me there. March was just shy of 80 miles. I was a novice, struggling to train for my first half-marathon, the Flying Pig. I just needed to get there, to 13.1 miles. A thousand miles wasn't for beginners like me.

And though I'm still a beginner, somewhere along the way I became a runner. A girl who heads out in the dark, desolate cold to log miles. A girl who finds satisfaction in the sound of her feet underneath her. A girl who looks up at the pink feathery clouds and thanks the powers that be for the chance to see things she wouldn't have seen otherwise.

With every mile that my legs carry me, it's a lesson to never underestimate yourself. To never limit yourself. To always look down the road and look past the stop sign.