by Kristina Pinto | Last summer, like many people, I became a devotee of the town farmers market, my only hope for attempting to eat locally harvested food. Every Tuesday, I headed to the common with my reusable grocery bags and stocked up on organic vegetables, regional cheeses, the freshest seafood, and grass-fed meat from a farm down the road…

by Kristina Pinto
I’ve been a runner for upwards of ten years and asserted over and over that I am not a competitive person, even though I participate in several races a year. But in the last year, something small, but radical, has happened in my running…

by Kristina Pinto
The other day I begrudgingly set out for a run in the pouring rain. My mood was as gray as the sky, and after about a half hour of procrastination, I was out there just to tick off the miles on my week’s training plan. Let’s just say my glass was not half full. Yet, about midway into the run, my tank made its way from half empty to half full as I remembered the rafting technique I’d learned as a total novice who was handed a paddle and some unexpected rough water…

by Kristina Pinto
There’s an oft-referenced quote from running guru George Sheehan, who said, “The difference between a jogger and a runner is an entry blank,” instructing us that daring to join the race entitles you to this awesome identity. But Sheehan also told us, “Everyone is an athlete. The difference is that some of us are in training and some are not…”

by Kristina Pinto
I love being outdoors on a bright, crispy winter day–running, cross-country skiing, snow shoeing. I love the blue sky against the evergreens against the snow; the colors look as clean and pure as the air feels inside my lungs. Even though I complain ad nauseum about black ice, shoveling, and the New England ice storm that knocked down power lines for days, I know my body and spirit need winter…

by Kristina Pinto
Like many women, I started running for the most basic of reasons: to stay fit. In a relatively short time, I realized that being physically fit is one thing, but as a whole person, I can be much more fit if I translate my running into community service, and running races to benefit various charities has become important to my fitness routine…

by Kristina Pinto
I am a mother who runs. Like many mothers out there, I use running as an escape from things I’d rather not be doing—whether it’s work stressors, scrubbing my floor, or playing another ever-loving game of Candy Land with my son…