Tuesday evenings.

One time. Two competing running groups in Lewiston – Auburn.

I have had friends in both groups and heard good things about both of them. So, duh, I love running, and I love making new friends, so of course I was going to join. But … which one?

I heard (HEARD!) that the Lewiston group, PR Racing, was a bit more serious than the Auburn group (LA Running, though the Maine Track Club). So I picked the Auburn group.*

*(OK, confession: I went to the Lewiston one, but when I got there, they had already left, because I’m chronically late to everything, so I got back in my car and drove to Auburn, which started a half hour later.)

I am sure the Lewiston group is awesome, but I was really happy with the group in Auburn. First, it was WAY bigger than I expected. I run with a group of awesome ladies in Brunswick on Saturday mornings and I thought it would be something small and more casual like that, but it wasn’t at all: It’s a group of about 70 runners of varying ages and abilities, with a certified track coach.

I saw some familiar faces and made some new friends. Hey, I’m getting to know people in this sport (and town)!

We did a one-mile time trial to see what groups we’d fit in. I heard that you should run it hard, but comfortable, because it would be unfortunate to end up in a pace group harder than what I could manage. I did my mile in 8:20, slightly behind the middle of the pack, and I was happy with that. It’s the first time I did a mile time trial, but I think that when I started running, I probably ran miles around 13-minutes. A 5-minute gain in 8 months is huge and awesome. 🙂

Here’s my pace breakdowns with that mile pace:

That looks kinda crazy. I have few training runs logged with a faster than 11-minute-mile pace. I am optimistic I can keep up, but I know that I will have a lot of growing and hard training to do.