Wednesday, August 03, 2016

I hate hills

I went out for a 3 miler today - easy peasy lemon squeezy right?  Except I turned left instead of right leaving the house to force myself to do some hills.

Yeah... not as bad as doing 3 miles at noon time during a heat wave but still not pleasant.

Fortunately the hills are only the first half of the run.  Once I hit the main drag they become manageable. But it's a big spike to start a run and it really pushes me.

To be honest, that first mile of hills I did at an "easy" pace and then upped it when I hit the main drag to a "race" pace.  I am hoping it won't be long before the "race" pace becomes my easy pace and I can pick it up just that much more.  I'll give it another few weeks before I try upping things.

Right now I'm a sweaty quivering mess about to hit the showers but damn, I feel good!


And hills suck.

Sunday, July 24, 2016

I'm a Winner

Today was supposed to be a 5 mile run day.  We're in the midst of a heatwave and yesterday's 2 miles nearly killed me but hey, a training schedule is a training schedule so I laced up the shoes and left the house.

I ran a familiar route today, one that I know well enough to know all the landmarks and I got to the 2 mile point and thought about turning around.  I was hot and thirsty and done when the Aquabats song "Look at Me (I'm a Winner)" came up in my mix.  There's something about someone singing, "Someone told me you can't lose em' all... but when I nail gunned my hand to the wall, I started to wonder if that could be true...."

Yeah, running in the heat is sort of like nail gunning your hand to a wall: stupid and painful but survivable.

With a sigh I kept on to the next landmark instead of turning around.  So here I am, 5 hot, sweaty, slow miles are now in the books and I'm still on track with my training.

Look at me, I'm a winner.

Friday, July 22, 2016

Day two (sort of)

Yesterday was a scheduled 2-3 mile run.  I was going to run in the morning but said, "Hey, it's a Marsh Post night!" and thought I'd wait.

Yeah... not a good idea when it gets hot out.  So I blew it off but that meant having to get that run in this morning before it got hot out.  Which is all well and good but I had an appointment with my trainer at 8:30 and it was leg day.

The nice thing about my gym is it's near the running path where I started all this, so I figured I'd go for a couple of miles on the old path along the "back" loop.  It was lovely running in the shade along the river.  Because I choose the "recommended for you" option on Spotify, which started with the Dead and "Scarlet Begonias."  it then went to Phish, NRBQ and a lot of other jam and old school bands.

I ended up with 2.25 not bad for having blown off a run.

Tuesday, July 19, 2016

Let the Training Begin

This story started a number of months ago when I signed up for the BAA distance medley.  The email came through and I thought, "Hey, this link will never work on my iPad...."  
It worked.
It asked for my information and I typed it in and pressed "submit."
Then it asked about my estimated times and I pressed "submit."
Then it asked for my credit card and I pressed "submit."

Then it hit me - I never saw how much it was going to cost me.

Um....

OK now I'm in for $225 to run a 5k, 10k and half marathon.

The 5k was fabulous, the 10k ... well, not so much.  Last week I received the training plan for the half on October 9th.  This week calls for three 2-3 mile runs and 5 mile long run.  Today was the first 2-3 mile run.  I did 2.3 miles and it felt OK.  It wasn't a great run, it wasn't a bad run, it was an OK run and a good start.  I did a .25 run/.25 walk and felt strong.

My next run is on Thursday (2-3 miles), we'll see how it goes.