nOg Running Group: 10/25

Hiro and I joined  The nOg Run Club, which is a social running collaboration put together by the folks at Fleet Feet and Tir Na Nog Pub in downtown Raleigh.  They host weekly runs on Monday night through the downtown streets of Raleigh.  Wendy, one of the runners from last weeks Thursday group run at Fleet Feet gave me the details.  You pay $1 when you sign up, and the give you a little key chain scan card, then every time you take part in the run you scan your card, after you come to 10 runs you get a technical running shirt with the club logo, and after 25 runs you get a Run Club Mug.  The run starts at 6pm, but there is a straggler run that starts at 6:30pm, and they have course drawn up for 3, 4, 5, and 6 miles.  They even give you small had held laminated maps.  After the runs you return to the pub and pay one more dollar and get a buffet pasta dinner.  It is an awesome deal!  Basically, the only thing that you pay for is your bar tab, which for us will always be minimal because Hiro is allergic to alcohol (Asian Glow) and doesn't want esophageal cancer, so can anyone say Greg has a life long DD and I rarely drink, so we are talking minimal expense.

Today was our first run, so we had to fill out some waivers, which made us late to the start.  We didn't feel like waiting for the straggler start, so we left at around 6:10 with some like minded folks.  You run in the streets opposite the traffic, and the organizer have tried to put you on less traveled streets, but this is still the downtown, so awareness is key.  For this run we did the 3 mile route, which both of us completed with no problems at all.  In fact, we were shocked that it was three miles because neither of us felt too tired by it.  I didn't time it because I just wanted to have a good run.  Honestly, I doubt that I'll ever time one of these runs, this is just more about enjoying the run.  The Oct. 18th run had 271 people, no totals for this one, but my guess is that it was shy of that mark because of the rain that we got earlier.  The weather was perfect for the run, however, and the sky was just awesome.  The nOg Run is sure to become a fixture of my week from here on out!