Adventures in Walking From the Couch to 5K - Chapter 17

It is a warm sunny Thursday afternoon and AJ is outside on the front porch while Carson and Cooper are playing in the driveway. Right then Michael drives up and parks his truck across the end of the driveway. The boys put their stuff in the garage and then give their dad a hug when he walks up the driveway.

“Hey boys, let’s go get some dinner.”

“YEAH!!!” the boys holler.

They give AJ a hug and kiss goodbye and head out for dinner with their dad.

AJ goes inside to get her stuff for walking. Then she gets in her truck and drives to Oakland State University. The parking deck that she needs to park in is in the middle of campus, so she has a bit of a drive once she gets on campus. The campus is nice and hilly. She finally gets to the parking deck and goes round and round and round until she gets to the top deck where Angela’s car is at. AJ pulls into a spot next to Angela’s car, takes her walking stuff with her and goes to Angela’s car.

“Hi!” AJ says to Angela.

“Hi! How’s it going?” Angela replies.

“It’s going great.”

“Wonderful.”

Vicki arrives and pulls into a spot next to AJ. She joins AJ and Angela.

“Hi ladies!” Vicki says.

“Hi!” they reply.

“How’s it going?” Angela asks Vicki.

“Great. I’ve been walking everywhere around town. I take my backpack with me for small shopping trips. It’s nice having everything so close to walk to.”

Slowly everyone arrives. Angela says to her group of ladies, “Today we are going to have a very different workout. We are going to do a few hills on the sidewalk right out front here and then we’ll walk around campus. It’ll be a good workout. We’ll end with our goodies back here that Doree brought tonight. Let’s get walking!”

The ladies walk out of the parking lot from the top deck where they are in the middle of a hill. They walk down the hill to the base, which is right before the entrance to the parking deck. “We are going to do walking sprints up the hill. Go as fast as you can, but remain walking. We will go to the stop sign up ahead. Ready?” Angela asks.

“Ready!” the group replies.

“Let’s go!” Angela shouts. The ladies take off up the hill with Vicki in the lead and AJ hot on her heels. Following closely behind is Kim, Denese, Doree, Sharon and Karin with Angela bringing up the back of the group.

“Ok ladies, we are now going to go back down the hill and come back up. Remember, only walking, no running.” They all go down the hill to the bottom. At the bottom they all wait for everyone to gather before going up the hill. The ladies take off up the hill with AJ in the lead this time following very closely is Vicki then Kim, Sharon, Doree, Denese, Karin and Angela.

“We are done with these hills, for now. Let’s go to our next challenge.” Angela says to the group. They walk across the sidewalk that leads to the Recreation Center and as they reach the sidewalk next to Recreation Center Angela informs the group, “We are going to walk down the hill and come back up the hill.”

Everyone walks down the hill and gathers at the bottom. “When we go up the hill, be careful with your footing. We want to be quick but not injured,” Angela informed the group.

Next they all take off up the hill. This time they are more equal as they have room to spread out. As they all reach the sidewalk they take a drink from their water bottles. Angela compliments them, “You ladies did a great job of getting up that hill!”

“Follow me.” Angela says and leads the group around the front of the Recreation Center to the front steps of the arena.

“Now we are going to go up and down these stairs in a figure eight. So, we will start out going down this side of the stairs, up the other side of the wall, down the last section and then up the middle section and so forth.”

Angela leads the group down the stairs, and they are all in a single file line going down and then up the stairs. This goes on for about 10 minutes, and they end at the top of the stairs. “All right! We’ll go down the ramp and around the building to the right. Let’s go!” she encourages.

Angela has Vicki and AJ lead the group. They go down the ramp and as they go around the building to the right they go into a single file line. As Vicki gets to the parking lot she leads the ladies down the aisle and then to the left and to the right where they get to a wood staircase leading down to the softball fields. Angela takes the lead and says, “We’ll go down these stairs, back up the stairs and we’ll repeat it one time.”

The stairs are in a group of trees and you can hear the squirrels playing in the treetops above. As they are going down the stairs off to the left at the bottom, a couple of deer are walking by, not fazed by us coming down the stairs. They get to the bottom of the stairs and turn around and go back up the stairs, they do it once again and gather at the top of the stairs.

“Ok, we are going to go back down the stairs one more time and then up the hill that we went up earlier. This will take us back to the parking deck. We will do one more hill and then back to our vehicles. Let’s go!” Angela instructs them. The group heads down the stairs with Kim and Denese leading the way this time. They walk across the grass until they are near the south end of the Recreation Center and then hike up the hill.

At the top of the hill they once again take a drink from their water bottles before continuing to their last hill by the parking deck. The sidewalk is nice and empty, so the ladies are able to walk 2 by 2. Sharon and Doree lead the way across the sidewalk and down the hill next to the parking deck. They get to the bottom of the hill and Angela says, “This is our last hill. When we get to the sidewalk from the parking deck we will go to the parking deck and our vehicles. We’ll be done walking for this week. Everyone ready!”

“YES!” the group replies. AJ and Vicki lead the group up the hill and back to their vehicles.

They arrive at their vehicles and gather around Angela’s car. Doree stops at her car and gets the cooler full of goodies, which are sliced strawberries, seedless green grapes and bottles of water. She puts the cooler in the back of Angela’s opened car.

Angela informs her group, “Excellent job tonight ladies! You will be sore tomorrow and/or Saturday. Next week will be our last walk together prior to the race. We will meet at the grocery store’s parking lot by the University. Our walk is only going to be 35 minutes and Sharon will be bringing our goodies. The expo will take place on Saturday, Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. There is no packet pickup the morning of the race. I will send you an email that contains the exact expo times. When you know you are going let everyone know and then some of you can meet up and go through the expo together. I advise taking all the free samples you want, however don’t eat or drink anything new prior to the race including at the expo. There will be a lot of deals at the expo, buy what you want, but don’t wear anything new to the race. This is a 5K and to some it may seem overly cautious for a short race. However, if you get in the habit of doing these things for the short races it will be easier to do when you are training and getting ready for longer races. I’ll see everyone next week.”

Everyone goes to their vehicles and leaves for the evening. AJ drives home because Michael is dropping the boys off after they get done eating.

Continue Reading - Chapter 18