Training...the beginning...

I was not sure in the beginning that I would raise enough money to participate in the walk, but I realized 2 things. I'd better train just in case, and I could stand to lose a few pounds and get in better shape anyway.  So I had nothing to lose in starting to train.

So while my fundraising was just beginning,  I started walking.  I learned one thing immediately:  I HATED walking in the cold!  But in February, I started anyway.  Then of course, the big snow storms came.  Well in 4 feet of snow, there are no sidewalks to be found to walk on.  So early training had to be put on hold almost as soon as it started.  But it was a long time till October, so no biggie.

Once the snow FINALLY melted away, I began again.  I started with just doing 3 miles walks.  3 miles was not hard, and didn't take very long, so I was able to do it a few times per week.  A few weeks later my teammates and I started walking together on a weekly basis.

Team Me and The Girls on one of our early training walks

Recommendation:  The Susan G. Komen site has a suggested training schedule starting 24 weeks before the event, which once it started, helped to keep us on track, even if we didn't follow it to the letter.  There was even an option to have the schedule emailed to us on a weekly basis, so we didn't even have to go to the site to check it.  I recommend using this schedule, even if you can't do everything exactly as it is mapped out, you can at least use it as a guide to help you see where in the training you should be.  Another thing that helped us out was the site "map my run," which helped us to map out routes to walk and told us the mileage of those routes.  Worth checking out!