October 21, 2024

Greenfield friends who ran half marathon together say ‘so much of it is mental’

They hope their story motivates other women to reach for their goals and be active

Polly Holmes, left, and Vicki Hepp with their medals received from running in the IMT Des Moines half-marathon this fall. (Caleb Nelson)

Greenfield friends Polly Holmes and Vicki Hepp met a goal, step by step, of completing a half marathon together this fall.

On October 15, the friends ran the IMT Des Moines Marathon’s half marathon, a race of 13.2 miles through the street of Des Moines.

“When I first started running five years ago, I couldn’t even do a quarter-mile. Then it was slowly building up to a 5K, which is 3.1 miles. Then in March or April I was talking to Polly that I was going to do a half this year,” Hepp said. “Polly has done halves and fulls, so we set a goal, signed up and did it.”

The runners wrote down their training in a journal from start to finish and can see that they really began going hard at it in June.

“We started running three miles,” Holmes said. The duo ran in the city of Greenfield but also around Lake Greenfield some days. “It started out that Tuesdays and Thursdays we’d run like three miles, then it ended up that Tuesdays would be six miles and Thursdays five miles. Saturday would be a shorter run. The longer runs were on Mondays, if our schedules allowed.”

“We followed the IMT training schedule for half marathons,” Hepp chimed in. “Once they released that, it gives you four days of running [a week] and you’re running certain miles building up to the race day.”

Hepp said that many times, her goals revolved around local landmarks, like deciding they were going to run from town to Lake Greenfield and back.

“She is more comfortable with hills than I am, so she really pushed me out of my bubble,” Hepp said. “I would run on flat ground all day if I could.”

Holmes and Hepp said that finishing the half marathon is a satisfying feeling, however Holmes maintains that anybody can run these distances if they put their mind to it.

“It’s just to motivate people, get out, move their bodies, and take time for yourself,” Holmes said. “A lot of women don’t take time for themselves. Your body shape, your body size, it doesn’t matter. So much of it is mental.”