Wade Godfrey completed a 5K race for his senior project to prove his gym teacher wrong who had said he would never be able to run faster than his 6 minute and 40 second mile time in 6th grade. He trained with a facilitator who was experienced in long distance running and competed in the YMCA Fall Classic 5K race, completing it in 22 minutes and 48 seconds. Through this process, Godfrey discovered strengths like perseverance, but also learned he wants to pursue social work instead of personal fitness training. He plans to attend Albany State University to get a master's degree in social work.

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Wade Godfrey
Mrs. Lester
Advanced Grammar and Composition
5 March 2012
5K YMCA Fall Classic Run Senior Project
Have you ever been told you will never be capable of doing something? In sixth grade, I
ran a mile in six minutes forty seconds which broke the R. M. Moore Elementary School mile
record. I was told by Mr. Major, my gym teacher, that if I did not train properly that I would
never be able to run a faster mile. I never really ran or trained to run any distances after the end
of sixth grade. To prove his statement wrong, my freshman year of gym I ran my fastest mile in
six minutes and sixteen seconds. After proving this statement wrong and as Senior year rolled
around, I began thinking of running my first distance over a mile. At the beginning of Senior
year, I officially decided to run the YMCA Fall Classic 5K for my Senior Project.
Due to the fact that I have never trained properly and the longest distance I have ever run
was my senior project 5K, I was concerned about the injuries I might have encountered. I wrote
my research paper on how to prevent training injuries in long distance running, so that when I
enter the career field of Personal Fitness Training I will be aware of training injuries that effects
people the most. I found that most injuries are caused by poor running form. I then instantly
started focusing on my running form to create a perfect running form. I chose the topic of how to
prevent training injuries so, hopefully if one day I encounter them in someone I am training I can
help them get through it. Now I’m going to tell you about the process I followed in running my
5K race.

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First, I owe my success to my facilitator, Joanne Beck. When I was looking for a
facilitator, I needed someone who had experience in long distance running, training workouts,
dietary schedules, and in the career field of physical activities and health. I found Mrs. Beck by
going to the G. Cecil Pruett Community Center Family YMCA and asking for someone who had
the characteristics my project required. She was a Wellness Coach and Group Exercise Instructor
at the YMCA, but now is Office Manager, and she has been Race Director of the YMCA Fall
Classic for 5 years running now. She has been running long distances since 2001 including, but
not limited to the Snickers Marathon in Albany twice, the Chickamunga Marathon at the
Chickamunga Battlefield, the USA 10K Classic, and the Peachtree Road Race. After finding my
facilitator, I followed several steps in the process to completing my Senior Project.
First, I established a meeting schedule to look over my course of action for my project.
Secondly, we step up a workout schedule that would result in me being at my peak of physical
ability, and we created a dietary plan to have enough energy to train and compete. After
completing my workout agenda and dietary plan, I followed through by starting to record my
workouts and meals for each day up until race day on October 15, 2011. Next, when we would
pass someone while running and get them to take a picture of us, or get a friend to take a few
while we were running. Then, we sat down and researched how to prevent long distance injuries
on my senior research paper. Finally, on October 15, 2011 I ran the 5K YMCA Fall Classic in
22:48:13. Although the steps I needed to take to successfully complete my project were clear,
there were still problems that got in my way.
One obstacle I encountered was that my little brother bounced over and over on my scale
and broke it. I could not record my weight for several days due to this. I later looked around at

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Walmart and found a personal reliable scale for one hundred and twenty dollars. I also came
across another problem which was that over the weekends I would forget to log what I ate. I
would then sit down the next day with my family and remember what I ate and record it. On
some days I felt like just sitting around and not exercising, but I would get motivation from
family, friends and my own strong will to persevere through the training. Throughout the ups and
downs of this project I take great pride in the fact that I finished a successful race in a respectable
time.
During this experience I have discovered helpful qualities in myself, for example, I do
not give up, which is the number one quality that got me through this project because it was not
an easy process. Another quality I learned more about was my work habits; I found out that
while sometimes I didn’t want to run, I always did, but when it came down to the food logs and
research paper I was much more reluctant to do the work. During the race I was only a runner,
but since my facilitator was the director of the race I stuck around a little longer and found
myself talking to some of the other runners. There was one elderly man that had one a door prize
of a big flat screen T.V., I carried it to his car for him and saw that he lived in a van with his bed
in the back. He began to tell me that his wife was in the hospital and he had to move out of his
place to help pay the bills, even though this has nothing to do with running it touched my heart
and inspired me. This project, although I enjoyed running the race and learning more about the
career I have actually discovered that I would prefer not to do Personal Fitness Training.
Through experiences with life and new jobs I discovered that I actually want to be a Social
Worker.

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After graduating I plan to attend Albany State University. I want to come out of college
making money. I have calculated with the ten thousand dollar scholarship from the Independent
Living Program, which gives foster children that have lived in the system before they were
fourteen years old a chance to go to college, and the cost of college expenses, I will make this
happen. Since I plan on working with foster children I have decided I will get a Master’s in
social work with a minor in psychology or sociology. Albany State also has one of the best social
work programs in the state, which lead me to my decision in going here.
Thank you for coming today and allowing me to present my training in running my 5K
race. Are there any questions or comments concerning my project that you may have for me?