I'm glad to be back.
It's been long enough, and my ankle is iffy enough, that I did a walk/run. That meant 1.45 miles in 20 minutes, which is a 13:48 pace. I'll take it.
Today was one of those days that remind me why I do this. The weather was perfect. It was just cool enough this morning. The birds were chirping their heads off. Dogwoods are blooming here, and the leaves are just coming out on the trees. There was a black vulture circling over my head, but I don't think I was THAT slow. If we move somewhere urban, I'm going to miss this.
I'm going to end this post with a gratuitous dog picture. I let myself be convinced that Murphy needed another dog. Our new dog had been living with 17 other dogs. She didn't even have a real name. They just called her "little white dog." So now she lives with us, and we've christened her "Annie." She's got to be the sweetest dog I've ever met. She really is just love with fur around it.
She does not, however, play with Murphy at all. They're both people-focused dogs, and they completely ignore each other. Oh, well.
There's no way that I'm going to be able to Shave my 5K time of 28:14. I am competitive enough that this bugs me, but I'll get over it.
I went back to look at my race times, and for whatever reason, this year has been my racing-est. I have run six 5K's total, but four of them were this year. My slowest 5K was in 2006, at 37:15. My fastest race, where I won my age group (ahem), was this year when I ran it in 27:38. However, during my most recent race, I ran 5K in 31:50.
All of this is to say that the problem with the Shave your 5K challenge is that to do well you need to run your slowest 5K in January and then your fastest 5K in December. I peaked in April - much too early.
That's my excuse, and I'm sticking to it.
Oh no! Today's my first real run on the Couch to 5K plan. I'm supposed to run 20 minutes straight. I've been looking forward to this, and I Really. Hate. Rain.
I get up and consult the Internet to assess my chances for a break from the rain. It looks like it might slack off briefly around noon.
That gives me time to eat this nice big breakfast, watch my political shows, and do some grading.
I leave the house dressed as if it were 20 degrees out rather than 45. I dutifully start walking for five minutes, but then spot my neighbors. This is a problem. I am wearing my running tights. I love them, but nothing says "I'm too slow for my pants" like being spotted walking along in running tights. I pick up my pace until I'm safely past my neighbors.
Hey look, deer! They look more wet and miserable than I am, and faster too. Really, you don't have to run away from me. I run like a laboring freight train, and you run like... deer.
My stomach reminds me that only some kind of an idiot would eat a big breakfast before a run. My lungs remind me that picking my hilliest route for this run wasn't so bright, either. I remind my body that I have run a half marathon, dammit, so running for 20 minutes shouldn't be a big freaking deal. My body suggests that perhaps I should have been more faithful about swimming laps. I begin to wonder if other people's bodies talk to them during their runs.
My last two tenths of a mile, I'm running up this completely ridiculous hill. I can't drop into a walk with only two minutes left in my run, but I really want to. Surely I could have planned this better.
I count down the last few seconds and lurch to a stop. My Garmin says that I ran 2.09 miles in 20:02. That's a 9:35 pace. Yay!
I can't wait until my next run.
It was thirty degrees outside, so that made it just a bit chilly for me. My blood has gotten thin down here. Still, it could be a lot colder and I got to run under clear blue skies. I'm far enough along in my Couch to 5K program that I actually feel like I'm running, even though there are still walk breaks.
I'm so glad I decided not to be slothy. <---Not a word, but it should be.
Oh yeah, sure. Not at all. I worked out maybe six times in the whole month. If I flunk, maybe I can blame the poor blood circulation to my brain due to my inactivity.
I am back at it, finally. I'm trying not to be bummed about some of the strength I've lost. My bench press is down from a not-so-impressive 85 lbs. to an even less impressive 75lbs.
I'm also running, after a fashion. I decided the hell with this not running crap. I'm doing the Couch to 5K plan, and just icing my knee after. I plan to do a Reindeer Run 5K in December. I can tell you now that I'm not going to be shaving my 5K time from earlier this year, as I had hoped. Ah, well.
I haven't run since August. I haven't run regularly since June. I've been filling my time with weight lifting and swimming, but they're just not the same.
Today, I ran.
My knee seems okay, so I decided to put myself on the Couch-to-5K plan. It's great for people who are starting running and for idiots like me who are prone to hiting it too hard when they come back after an injury. My knee seems fine so far.
I decided to run in the brand new, enormous development that has gone up near my house. This has the advantage of almost no traffic. (Total car count for 30 minutes = 2.) It has the disadvantage of being kind of hilly.
The first part of the plan calls for a 5 minute walk to warm-up, then 20 minutes of 60 second runs alternated with 90 second walks, with a 5 minute walk to cool down.
I did the walk/run portion at a scorching 13:04 pace for 1.53 miles. A couple of the runs wound up being on the steepest uphill portions of my route.
I ran uphill, grinning.
I have a sore throat, and I'm kind of feeling run down and ill. So, I didn't work out this weekend. I didn't work out yesterday. This morning I ran 1.5 miles and I lifted weights for probably 40 minutes. I ran 1.1 miles on Saturday at a 9:50 pace.
I feel like I'm not working hard enough. I really worry about it. I haven't been in the pool since Friday. I meant to swim today, but I just couldn't make myself do it.
Part of the problem is that I can't figure out what would be somewhat equivalent between swimming and running. Should I be swimming as much time as I used to run? That would mean being in the pool for an hour three days a week, and then a long swim of an hour and a half on the weekend. I think the longest I've been in the pool was 40 minutes.
I also have a problem because I essentially don't have access to the gym on the weekends. This weekend would have been different, because Becky is out of town and I have the car. Otherwise, I'm out of luck. How do I balance weight lifting and swimming with only five days a week to work with?
A friend of mine is doing the Couch to 5K thing, which has the advantage of requiring me to slow down. So, that 1.5 mile run today was actually a run/walk at a 13:38 pace. I'm refusing to fret about that, since my knee isn't bitching at all.
On the upside, I feel like I have actually made a difference in the fitness level of a couple of friends of mine.
The experience has made me wonder if I missed my calling, somehow, and I should have been a personal trainer. G. and I are lifting weights together. He's so funny about it. He's always trying to get away with lifting too little, and I'm always chiding him about being a Chatty Cathy instead of actually picking up a weight and lifting it.
I'm such a nerd that I've done tons of research about strength training. He proudly proclaims his complete ignorance of the topic, but I'm filling his head with factoids and tips from my reading anyhow. He really only trains when he's with me, so I feel like my persistence is especially helpful.
Another friend of mine, T., is doing the Couch to 5K program (which I suggested.) She said something about getting a jump on it before we got together the first time, so when we finally got together, I asked her which day she was on.
"Oh, I haven't started it."
"Do you want me to print it out for you?"
"Oh, are we running today? I thought we might just do a brisk walk."
"I'll print it out."
Unlike G., T. has gotten on board with the whole thing. She ran on Sunday without me, just like she had planned.
I just wish I could figure out my own fitness program.
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