Running, Traveling and Everything Else

And again, there's been a lapse in writing on the blog. But, I swear, I've been super busy and I HAVE been running!

I've run in two more 5K races since I last wrote - Ele's Race on July 22 and the Chemical Bank 5K on July 28. I was supposed to run in another race today, but it was cancelled, but I have one on the calendar for Saturday in Escanaba!

I've also run my two longest runs since then (thanks Shawn and Dave for getting me past the 4 mile mark - IN THE DARK!).

This past week, I was in Kansas City for a work conference, which took up most of my time there. However, I did manage to get two runs in during my time there, and holy cow, that city has hills! The hotel I stayed at had running maps, and both times, I tried to do the 3 mile run, but had to modify it (first time because I went the wrong way, second time because the hills were CRAZY). My feet were sore by Thursday though, with all the walking in dress shoes I was doing.

I'm going to try to do a 5 mile run on Tuesday this week...my goal is to do one by September 2. I also have about 28 miles left to hit 100 miles by September 1. I'm not sure I'll make it, but I'm gonna try!

Maybe one of these days, I'll end up doing a 10K...

Whoops - it's been awhile...

I realized a few days ago that I hadn't written on the blog for a bit. Life has been CRAZY since I last wrote and I've been trying to adjust to some new things.

1) I switched jobs. I was offered a great opportunity that I didn't feel I could pass up. Since the first 5K, I had to wrap up things at my previous position, start my new position, and I'm now in week 3, trying to get acclimated to the new job.

2) I've been traveling a lot - for work and for Jaycees. It's been fun, but I'm not so sure my car would agree. ;-)

3) I've been trying to readjust my schedule to get up in the morning (gasp!) and run. It's been so hot during the days that the best time to run is in the early morning. For those of you who know me, I have NEVER been a morning person and I love my sleep. So this has taken a little adjustment.

I did run another 5K on July 7 (temperature reported right after I finished was 85 degrees with a heat index of 90). I finished slower than my first 5K, but with the heat, that was to be expected. I also hadn't done much running up to that. I took a little time off after the first 5K, so had to get back into the habit.

In the next couple of weeks, I'm signed up for Ele's Race in Okemos on Sunday this week and the Chemical Bank 5K in Byron Center on July 28. I'm hoping the weather isn't too horribly hot for either of these! I have a couple more scheduled in August and September...

My next goals are to run a 4 mile run by the end of July and a 5 mile run by the end of August. In doing so, I'm hoping to increase my intervals (this morning I did 4 minutes running, 1 minute walking).

New reports on my running schedule coming soon (now that I'm getting back in the habit)!

There are awards?

An interesting thought came up in a conversation today.

In my 5K race on Saturday, I placed 662 out of 779 people. I was 51 out of 63 in my age division.

This got me to thinking...why do runners race?

I can't speak for all runners, but I can speak for myself (and we'll use the term 'runner' loosely here). I entered this race not to win the overall race or to win one of the three awards given in my age division. I entered this race to REACH A GOAL. I entered to cross it off my bucket list. I entered it as part of the overall goal to lose weight.

But most of all, I entered it to know that I could race a 5K.

So often, we hear that people only enter a competition to win. And when they don't win, they're disappointed.

Of course you're disappointed - you had no other reason to enter the race than to win. And when you come in 662 out of 779, you're going to be extremely disappointed. When you come in 4 out of 779, you'll be disappointed because you didn't receive a little trophy.

But if you enter the race to finish; if you enter it to reach a personal goal; if you enter it to take a step towards a bigger goal, then there is NO WAY you can be disappointed if you finish. And the best part? Even if you didn't finish, you still tried and made the effort. And I bet you learned something from it.

For all of you who don't think you can do something, or think that since you're not going to win, you're not going to play, I urge you to consider to think again. I told myself for years that I wasn't a runner and I finished my first 5K this past weekend.

Show the world what you're made of, and go out there and do it. Learn from it. And do it better the next time.

"No, maybe I can't win. Maybe the only thing I can do is just take everything he's got. But to beat me, he's going to have to kill me. And to kill me, he's gonna have to have the heart to stand in front of me. And to do that, he's got to be willing to die himself. I don't know if he's ready to do that. I don't know." - Rocky IV

Getting Through - Week 9

Apparently, I'm now in Week 9 and just can't count. I blame it on the week that I took off at the beginning of May.

After taking the entire weekend off and losing my motivation, I endured enormous peer pressure yesterday and have decided to do my first 5K - in 3 weeks. June 16, Kalamazoo Klassic. I do not harbor ill will towards those that encouraged (making) me to do it. But I figured if it got me to see my friend Shawn herd us to the finish line, why not?

I have no delusions that I will run the entire thing. In fact, I'll probably run only about 50-60% of it. But, I'll finish. I know I can do that!

Meanwhile, in an effort to get my friend Dave (over at http://dqworthams.wordpress.com/) back on track with his Couch to 5K (and encourage him to run the Kalamazoo Klassic), we went for a run on the Lansing River Trail. This is the first time I've actually run with someone, so it was a little odd for me. But, I could still talk while doing so, so that's good!

While it was a little slower pace than what I left off with last week, it was still fairly good. It's been pretty humid and hot out over the past week and since I hadn't been out in a week, I'd say it was a success. Plus, Dave had his best pace so far!

Wednesday, May 23:

4.08 miles
56:41 minutes
458 calories
13:53 minutes/mile

I'll be out again tonight. Then taking Friday off and planning on going Saturday, Sunday and Monday. I've really got to try to keep to the 4 times a week schedule leading up to the race!

Week 3 and into Week 4...

I've been off the grid on the electronic side, but I've still been trying to keep a somewhat normal walking/jogging schedule.

The last check in on here was Sunday, April 8. Since then, here are the results:

Wednesday, April 11:

2.02 miles
28:17 minutes
189 calories
4.3 miles/hour

Thursday, April 12:

1.73 miles
22:52 minutes
162 calories
4.5 miles/hour

Sunday, April 15:

2.48 miles
36:50 minutes
232 calories
4.0 miles/hour

In that, I really just missed the Saturday walk/jog. I won't be able to make it up at this point, but it happens.

Highlights: Thursday, I ended up running 10 minutes out of the 22:52. Not too shabby and a bit unexpected. Sunday, I was absolutely exhausted and ran for a few minutes total, but mostly walked. It seems that I'm consistently walking/jogging at a 14 minute/mile pace. It was a little quicker on Thursday, but obviously, I ran more.

Though, the last few days, I've really been lacking motivation to get out and run. I know part of it is sheer exhaustion from everything else going on, but I just really need to get some motivation back.

Part of it is also that I don't feel like I've been improving, and that doesn't help with motivation. I'm still mostly walking and I'm just not feeling like I can run. So, it's been a little discouraging and I'm trying to muster up the motivation again.

Which means I have to try to go out and do today's workout.

Week 3, Day 1

Well, today is Easter. It is also Day 1 of Week 3 of my Couch to 5K adventure.

Today was a walk day, and I decided to try a new route that I was fairly certain would get me out close to 60 minutes. For those of you in Lansing, I left my apartment complex on Canal, walked south to St. Joseph, walked east to Creyts, then went north to Saginaw, making the loop back to Canal (though I ended up cutting through on Westshire back to Canal).

Stats from today:

4.11 miles

1:05:38 minutes

384 calories

3.8 miles/hour

It was WINDY today! When I was going west, it was the worst, so it slowed me down a little bit. But some good tunes on Pandora today kept me going (good as in "fast/keeping you moving" types of tunes).

And now, for a quiet, productive day to myself.

Week Two, Days 6 and 7

So, I'm back at it again.

Friday was a bit of a slow day, after having been off since Sunday due to illness. However, I think I did ok even though it was a walk. I took Dakota out because she's been kind of cooped up all week.

Stats from Friday, Day 6:

1.73 miles

25:47 minutes

161 calories

4.0 miles/hour

Today, I had to try to get a quick walk in before I took off to work Texas Hold 'Em. It was pretty decent though because I jogged 5 1/2 minutes out of about 29 minutes.

Stats from Saturday, Day 7:

2.05 miles

29:15 minutes

191 calories

4.2 miles/hour

Tomorrow is walk day, but I'm going to see how it goes. Right now, I'm doing fairly well in how I'm feeling, just a little tired (and sunburned from the Easter Egg Hunt and walking earlier today). Not too shabby though!

Week Two – Days 2-5

You’ll notice there’s a big chunk of time missing from this blog. That would be because starting Monday, I had a sore throat. I started to wonder if I should run on Tuesday, and determined that since I was feeling fatigued, I wouldn’t.

That was probably a good decision, considering I ended up staying home on Wednesday. I slept late, napped through parts of the day and went to bed at 8:30pm. I ended up going back to work on Thursday, but came home after work to get some more rest.

So, to make up for this week, I will walk/jog today and then get back on the normal schedule Saturday and Sunday. I will probably “repeat” week two in my schedule, since I didn’t get to build up and sort of feel like I have to start over again.

One of the hardest things I’ve dealt with mentally since I’ve started this is that I’m typically an overachiever, and it’s hard for me not to be able to just do something right away. I have to keep reminding myself that I can’t just get up and run a 7 minute mile – it’s something I have to work up to. I’ll be able to do it when I’m ready. The hard part is that I won’t know I’m ready until I’m ready. I’m learning this lesson in the Couch to 5K and have realized that I can apply it to other things in my life. It’s been a valuable lesson, even in the short time I’ve been working on the program.

Day 8 - Week Two - Day 1

Today on the Couch to 5K schedule was a 30-60 minute walk. I took Dakota along today, and my goal was a 45 minute walk.

3.4 miles

52:12 minutes

318 calories

3.9 miles/hour

I'm finding myself to be more than tired...more like exhausted. But I'm trying to keep up the idea that eventually my body will get used to this. I still haven't run a whole lot, but hopefully will be able to work up to that.

I can say that Dakota is not used to walking so much, and while she had her normal fast paced walk to begin, I could tell she was getting tired toward the end. Though, she wasn't too tired to try to chase cars!

Day 7 - Shoes and end of week one

While I'm feeling like I'm a bit behind on sleep, I'm still trying to make sure that I keep with the schedule for the Couch to 5K. Today, since I had some time, I went to Playmakers to get some shoes. I was able to get some sale shoes - so that worked out well!

Today's stats:

2.5 miles

37:31 minutes

234 calories

4.0 miles/hr

So, in week one, I ended up walking/jogging 8.64 miles. I haven't had any pains other than the normal "I really am not used to any sort of exercise" effects on my body. I've been running a little bit during the week, but only in short spurts. And, somehow, I was able to stay in a decent amount of calories and not go over.

I know I'm going to have some challenges in week two, since my schedule might be a little difficult to follow. So, I just have to make sure that I make it a priority.

Day 3 - Leaving the apartment complex

So, today was Day 3 of my Couch to 5K. Yesterday was a rest day.

Days 3, 5 and 7 call for 1.5 miles running. Unfortunately, I don't think I am quite ready for running that much yet, so I mostly walked and alternated some jogging (though minimal and more like "plodding"). I actually went 2.1 miles today and LEFT THE APARTMENT COMPLEX!

Today's stats:

2.11 miles

31:45 minutes

15:03 minutes/mile

197 calories

4.0 miles/hr

I noticed on the first workout I had, I logged it wrong, and the calories should have been lower. I'm testing a few different apps on my phone to keep track of stuff and hopefully will settle on one soon.

I have a feeling Thursday is going to be tough. I'm hoping to make my comeback to yoga tomorrow night (barring any issues). But after sitting down after tonight's workout, I could feel how tired I was. But, that's two days from now...