Floatrun events and post sponsored by Reebok, however, all opinions expressed are always my own.
On Sunday, April 30th five members Ragnar Niagara's Team Endoprphriends gathered at the Rosedale Running Room, arms loaded down with water, milk, cookies and special gifts from Reebok.
It was a cold, drizzly blustery morning which made the turn out of runners rather impressive! While I'd pretty much run for a cookie, not everyone is motivated by white chocolate chips and macadamia nuts!
The store quickly filled and Sava, the store manager introduced Allison who would be chatting on behalf of our team.
Allison had sent me what she planned on saying the day before, and I admit, I'd stood in the middle of the grocery store parking lot with tears in my eyes as I read it. If you'd like to read her very touching words, they are detailed on her blog here. She'd been worried that people would just want to get on their way, but having read what she was going to say, I disagreed. Within a couple seconds of her talking, people quieted down and listened to her story about why, as runners, we are better together.
After her story, Allison chatted a bit about Ragnar (amazingly no one in the crowd was registered!) and then about the funky Floatrides our team was all wearing. She passed a couple around for the crowd to see as she went over points of what makes these shoes unique, which you can read in my recent blog post here.
We then all headed out on various distance runs. Many of the runners would be racing at Goodlife or Mississauga half or full marathons in two weeks, making this one of their last long runs. There were other groups doing 10K, and other learn to run groups.
I'd run to and from the track in my Floatrides a week before, but it had been an awful day, so I was excited to give my shoes a fairer test! I needed to get in 8K with 2K at race pace for an upcoming half marathon. My route was sidewalk, gravel, packed earth and the last two kilometers were downhill at a very fast pace. They delivered! I was very, very impressed with the performance of the Floatrides on this run!I had a small spot that on my arch that felt like it was starting to rub, but I suspect it was due me tying the shoes a bit tighter than necessary. The last time I'd left them too loose, so I will be sure to find a happy medium next time!
When we arrived back at the store, the team set up the goodies for the returning runners who were quite happy to see them upon their return! We were there to answer any questions they had about Floatrides.
Here are a few photos from the great morning! Can't wait for the next one!
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If you missed out on the first run, don't worry! There are another two fun runs planned this month--all before Ragnar!
Our next Floatrun takes place on Monday, May 8th at 8:00 pm. It's a very easy 5K loop through the streets of downtown, meant to be either a shakeout run for those running races the day before, or tapering towards Ragnar. The best part is that we will be lighting up the night with glow sticks handed out at the start. You can find more info on our Facebook event page here.
