By Dave Graves, Special to the Register
Jan Froehlich’s suitcase carries
bumper stickers from San Antonio, Huntington Beach, Calif., and the
shores of Lake Superior.
She’s been there because of the
countless times the 57-year-old educator has run around the gravel
roads of her Colman farm home. The admittedly nonathletic mother of
four grown children has run three marathons and six half marathons.
Furthermore, Froehlich didn’t begin
running until she was 50 years old.
“I knew as old as I was starting that
I was not going to be competitive.” But that doesn’t make running
less enjoyable for Froehlich. “I set a goal, sign up for something
and keep working for it.” Her next goal is completing the Brookings
Half Marathon May 12.
It will be the first time she has run
the event and is being joined by race partners Colene Reiser and
Peggy Whalen.
The women are members of Turtles Rock,
a Brookings-based, non-competitive walking and jogging group founded
in May 2009 for beginners and intermediate runners with the group’s
runners having an average pace of 10- to 12-minute miles.
“Once the Turtles started and I met
other people my age and skill range, then it turns into a social
activity and that makes it more fun too,” Froehlich said. “I’m
not sure I would do as many events as I do if didn’t know the other
Turtles.”
She said she lives too far out in the
country to do her training runs with fellow Turtles. “I don’t
know anyone around here that runs.
Races give reason for travel
“Even though I run alone, it’s fun
to visit with people at the events,” said Froehlich, who ran the
Surf City Half Marathon in Huntington Beach this February with Reiser
and more than 14,000 others. She noted that these large races attract
thousands of slower runners.
“I’ve done the Jack 15 and you
bring up the rear. So it was fun to see people coming behind me” at
Surf City, she said.
Such destination races keep her
motivated to stay in training and give her an excuse to travel. Her
marathons have been at Duluth, Minn., Deadwood and San Antonio.
Future half marathons include Deadwood in June; and, in 2013, Sedona,
Ariz., and Savannah, Ga.
Sustained by cross training
In addition, each year she runs eight
to 10 five-kilometer races in the local area.
“All the 5Ks, I view as charitable
donations anyway. If they have one in the area and I’m home, I do
them. I’ve been giving away piles of T-shirts,” said Froehlich,
who also has competed in three indoor mini-triathlons and one outdoor
triathlon, all in Brookings.
She also does yoga twice a week;
spinning or biking twice a week; and swimming once a week.
“I don’t think I would be running
if I didn’t do the cross training because I was having trouble with
injuries,” said Froehlich, who said she runs “lopsided” and had
been having headaches, and leg and hip pain before doing cross
training at the SDSU Wellness Center.
“I trained more for the Surf City
Half Marathon than I ever have and didn’t have any injuries,” she
said.
Using a 16-week program that averaged
20 miles per week, she logged about 300 miles, “which for me is a
pair of shoes,” said Froehlich, who has been doing part-time
tutoring at South Dakota State University since leaving a position on
the engineering faculty ten years ago.
Conscious of injury prevention
Early in her running career, she had
trouble with shin splints before finding the right pair of shoes.
Froehlich said she was inspired to
start running because her sister enjoyed running before being forced
by illness to quit. With Froehlich’s children grown, she started
running at 50, ran her first 5K that same year, and ran her first
marathon three years later.
That was in Duluth and “it was hot.
The temperature when I got done was 87 degrees,” she recalled.
But it wasn’t reason to throw away
her running shoes and sit in the shade. “I don’t do (marathons)
to the degree I would hurt myself.” While she has had some
injuries, she has only backed away from running a couple months, long
enough to heal.
As long as the body holds together, and
there are friends to chat with and travel with to races, Froehlich
says will continue to run.
