Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Adopt A Running Buddy

The benefits of having many “running buddies” are numerous.

This article -- http://tinyurl.com/clgzan made me think about the benefits of adopting “running buddies”. A group of young women formed a group in Oregon to recruit other women to adopt girls as “running buddies”. It’s a fitness mentoring program meets Big Brothers/Big Sisters of sorts.

The benefits of such a program are noble, but you don’t really need anything formal to realize the benefits of running buddy adoption. So many people I have adopted as running buddies are people I consider among my best and most trusted friends.

Running buddies help you stay accountable, while you derive the benefit of acting as a “running elder statesman”, if you will. The sense of camaraderie is immeasurable.

Recently, I’ve adopted perhaps the most important running buddy I may ever have – my oldest son, Jay. As he’s made the transition to junior high athletics, we’ve found that a couple of runs together each week help improve his fitness training.

So, none of us needs to look far in identifying the next “running buddy adoptee”. It may be important to both of you.

1 comment:

Mark said...

My youngest son and I trained together for a while. It was a joy. I miss those times!