by Amy Welch

Newby Mom profiled Mandy Cutler a few months ago when she started training for her first half marathon and began her journey back to being fit. Mandy has two small children, Abby, 5, and Sam, 8 months. As all moms can recall, being a mother to a young child means many sleepless nights and an unpredictable schedule.

The half marathon training began in August. Mandy, as well as 16 other moms in her fitness group, began their training by running up hills through the perpetually hot summer.

Mandy had some tough training moments. She aimed to make bootcamp classes four times a week, but sickness and injuries prevented her from reaching this goal.  However, Mandy pushed through and overcame all of her obstacles. She crossed the Rock n’ Roll Savannah half marathon finish line on November 5th at a time of 2:53:22 and was thrilled to have achieved this goal.

Although Mandy accomplished this impressive feat, her race is not over. Mandy continues to workout with her fitness group regularly and strives to lose the rest of her pre-pregnancy weight. She also has her mind on future races, including running the Savannah half again next fall.

Running Misconceptions:

While training with many women to run their first half marathon, two things crossed my mind: How does someone training so hard and packing on the mileage gain weight and why are there so many injuries.

Weight Gain
Many runners find they may gain weight during their training. Their appetites grow which makes it hard to control food consumption. The important thing to remember is that you need to burn more calories than you consume if you’re wanting to lose weight. I have heard of many runners binge eating after their long runs. If you find that this is true with you, try surrounding yourself with protein packed snack options like trail mix or peanut butter and apples. Get rid of temptation foods in your house and keep in mind running doesn’t give you a free food pass!

Cross Training
Runners, especially beginners, need to make sure they add cross training into their training schedule. Many runners get injured due to overtraining or see that their muscle tone is lacking due to less time working non-running muscles. Your mindset may be that if you get in those extra miles, it’ll make you stronger and leaner. But instead, you’re breaking down those muscles and they need a chance to recover. Add in some laps at the pool, weights or bands for toning or an organized fitness/bootcamp class to give those running muscles a day off and engage the others that need attending to.

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