Progress, Sweet Progress

I ran two full 1/4 mile laps today for the first time, with only a short 1/8 mile walk in between!

Hoo and Ray!

This brings my total running vs. walking to 3/4 of a mile running (includes two half laps) and1/4 mile of walking.

The sense of accomplishment I felt when I finished the second of the two full laps was incomparable...

Last night OA, OA's daughters and I carbo-loaded on spaghetti with fresh grape tomatoes, bococinni cheese, basil and TONS of raw garlic. Yum.

Then we splurged on top of that by going for ice cream at Dutch Dreams - a quirky, local creamery that really knocked my socks off. We walked the 2k there and back which kind of made up for the calories. Kinda :)

DAY 6 REPORT

wake-up time 5:45 (better than Wednesday!)
1 mile total (plus walking to and from track)

2 half circuits walking (1/4 mile), 2 half circuits running (1/4 mile), 2 full circuits running (1/2 mile)

Total Walked: 1/4 mile
Total Ran: 3/4 mile

Legs - tight in my thighs... nothing major
Lungs - not too bad considering it was hot and humid
Stomach - very stitchy at the end!
Sweat level - more than Wednesday's for sure... it was already above 20 degrees celcius when we left the house... and humid as all get out

Overall impression - managed to achieve my goal of running two full 1/4 mile laps in one training session which makes me very happy. Next stop will be to add in a third:

• 1 full lap running - 1/4 mile
  
• 1/2 lap walking - 1/8 mile
• 1 full lap running - 1/4 mile
• 1/2 lap walking - 1/8 mile
• 1 full lap running - 1/4 mile

For now I think I will simply try to repeat my two-out-of-four accomplishment on Sunday (or possibly Monday)

Am I Doing This Right???

After reading various online articles about proper running techniques and programs for beginners, I am becoming concerned that I am not on the right course.

In particular, the seemingly universal "if you can't hold a conversation because you are too out of breath slow down rule" is a major worry.

I can walk forever without any problems other than slightly sore feet. In fact, I often walk more than 20km at one go and hardly break a sweat.

On the other hand, very slow jogging of even a quarter mile leaves me huffing and puffing like the wolf in Little Red Riding Hood - nowhere near being able to talk about the weather to my jogging buddy.

The general message of the "easy conversation" rule seems to be to stick to walking if you are breathing with too much labour when you jog.

But I don't WANT to just walk - it would be like going backwards and would have much less of an effect on my overall positive feeling of this running routine.

Plus, it isn't like I am feeling - other than the huffing and puffing - like the running is all too hard. My body is not particularly sore post-routine... in fact I generally feel great after finishing a morning's training session.

Should I be concerned about being a Ms. Huffalot?

"Oh are we done already?"

Those were the words from my not-so-lovely-at-that-particular-moment housemate, OA, today after, huffing and puffing, I finished my 4th lap and she completed her 5th.

Whatever.

Good news is that I ran another full lap, this time without suffering nearly as much as I did on Monday. Bad news is that I didn't repeat this full lap in my workout and stayed at the same distance as Monday.

OA managed to run for two, two-lap circuits plus a lap of walking in between which made me incredibly jealous. We may be coming to a point where she will be lapping me (boo!)

When we woke up this morning, the air temperature was 8 degrees celcius with a clear blue sky overhead. Lovely running conditions - if only every morning could be like this!

I am not looking forward to days of heat and humidity. Even under only slightly stuffy conditions on Saturday I completely wilted... temps can only start getting hotter as the summer progresses.

DAY 5 REPORT

wake-up time 6 am (bad bad bad... we left the house at the outrageous time of 6:15 and must get up earlier next time)
1 mile total (plus walking to and from track)

3 half circuits walking (3/8 mile), 3 half circuits running (3/8 mile), 1 full circuit running (1/4 mile)

Total Walked: 3/8 mile
Total Ran: 5/8 mile

Legs - sorer than on Monday
Lungs - a little puffy
Stomach - stitchy at the end, the thumb trick I read about somewhere on the web did not work!
Sweat level - miniscule

Overall impression - didn't achieve my goal of running two full laps today, will try again on Friday or Saturday (still depends on when we decide to run...)

Cool little Google Maps Application

I just discovered this cool little Google maps pedometer over at the Jog Blog.

It shows how far you have run in miles based on tracking your course on a street map.

The distance between my home and Bathurst and back (OA's former favourite course when she used to run) using a relatively straight route is 1.8 miles.

Considering I have yet to even attempt to run/walk more than 1 mile, I should be able to tackled running this full course sometime by next year :)

Scary thought though - this full 1.8 miles at an assumed constant jog rate would burn only approximately 245 calories. Yikes!

Good to know all the same!

Today was my first day of running a full quarter-mile! Huzzah! Hooray!

Unlike Saturday, which was my first day running without the slowing force of a 7 year old companion with short legs, I purposely tried to maintain a slow steady pace. My stride has also becoming more gliding and less like a dressage horse.



(the image above is a random Google Image Search of what I thought I looked like on Saturday morning with my high kicking knees!)

OA, my housemate, thinks that I should be pushing myself more which got me a little peeved given that this was the first day I ran a full lap of the track. I figure I have to go on what my own body tells me and just ignore what others say... I feel like I'm getting a good workout each morning!

The one HUGE advantage of today was the steady spritzing of rain combined with cooler temperatures... it was like running in a pleasant shower. Wednesday (the next scheduled run day) should be cloudy in the morning and cool as well. I'm looking forward to that as well!

DAY 4 REPORT

wake-up time 5:45 am
1 mile total (plus walking to and from track)

3 half circuits walking (3/8 mile), 3 half circuits running (3/8 mile), 1 full circuit running (1/4 mile)

Total Walked: 3/8 mile
Total Ran: 5/8 mile

Legs - okay
Lungs - better than Saturday, but not as good as earlier last week
Stomach - fine
Sweat level - it was hard to tell if I was sweaty or just wet from the rain

Overall impression - I'm very happy about the one full circuit but next time want to try to cut back on the walking a big by adding an extra full circuit. That way, I will have walk a quarter kilometre in total and ran 3 quarters.

Woke up at 8am and then remembered the possibility of our track area being overrun by early morning soccer players.

Luckily, we were the only ones at the track when we showed at 8:30. It was very tough going, smoggy, humid as hell and I didn't have a 7 year old running partner to use an excuse to go slowly.

I was gasping for air like an asthmatic after only half of the 4 rotations. Something told me I wouldn't be able to complete the full mile unless I added an extra half lap of walking in lieu of jogging. Good idea, because I think I was slightly hallucinatory at the end.

My cotton Vision TV t-shirt which I have been wearing at the track was soaked by the end of the morning and I think my earlier purchase of sweat wicking pants earlier this week should have been replaced by shorts or a skirt or something less hot.

DAY 3 REPORT

wake-up time 8 am
1 mile total (plus walking to and from track)


Half circuit of track walking, half circuit of jogging
3 revolutions of track like this

1 revolution walking only :(

Legs - a little tense
Lungs - the worst thus far
Stomach - stitchy towards the end - no wine the night before jogging ever again
Sweat level - it was less sweat and more like more pores opened and every glass of water I hadever drunk in my life pored out at once

Overall impression - not too bad for someone who felt like taking a hammer to her alarm clock this morning.

Overslept but happy

I woke up today at 7:50. Quite the change in quality of rest when you have slowly gotten used to 5:45 wake ups.

My body feels really good - no soreness or anything like Wednesday.

I also told my parents today that I am running. The pressure is officially on to keep up with this now!

Big test is tomorrow... will I be able to wake up early on a Saturday?!?

At least the French Open will be on tv which is a pretty good impetus to get up out of bed!