I Probably Should Make My Blog Public again

I hate when pace is in between fast and slow, so I'm logging all of this as fast, although it was really moderate.

 Ran on the treadmill at 8:34 pace.  The last mile was 8:57.

Lately I've been worrying about my running (ie, not doing enough) and now I'm trying to change my attitude.

I ran more this winter than I have since before I was pregnant with my second son.  I have to be happy about that.  And I think it's been harder since I'm not really training for anything in particular.  I've got to get on the ball as far as setting up races for the near future.  That's my goal for now.

I've also given up snacking for lent.  It's only been 5 days so far, so we'll see how that goes.  In addition, I'm saying the rosary on the way to school every day.  I probably should expand that to just every day, but I forgot to say it yesterday--left my rosary in the car. 

Just guessing on how much of this was fast.  I varied my pace--2 minutes easy, 1 minute hard.  I had limited time tonight because during my "me" time I had to run to the store to get toilet paper, and as is I missed bedtime.

Easy 5 miles at 8:57 pace.

I tried Carolyn's hill sprints, although I only did 5 because I felt like a doofus.

They were hard to do on a treadmill, and here's why:  I had to accelerate into the sprints and I wasn't quite sure when I reached full speed, so I probably sprinted more than the 8-10 seconds I was supposed to.  And then I jumped off the treadmill so that the belt could wind down, and every time I did it I got weird looks.  Then I had to walk/lightly jog a cooldown and begin again.

I will try them again next easy run I do--in the meantime I'll try to think of an easier way to do them.

Unmotivated and in a hurry...just did 2.

Not exactly sure that this was exactly 6 miles, but I know that my pace was pretty steady at 9:15 pace for the first 4 miles and then the last 2 miles I actually had the wind at my back, so I was probably slightly faster.  I ran for 55:15 just to be pretty sure that I completed 6.

I had planned on 10 miles yesterday and ran out of time (family was in town and I had lots of schoolwork to do). 

So I settled for this run at a moderate pace.  I finished in 63:37.  I do want to check on the actual mileage on this because I mapped it using the computer--I might drive it tomorrow just to check.  The only thing I know for sure is that my first mile was 8:51 and my last mile was 8:05, so I suppose that it's possible that my average pace was 8:36.  Now that I've been running on the treadmill so much, I'm finding it hard to gauge my pace when running outside.

I will check and repost if necessary.

  I was tired on this run.  I went to the gym later than I usually do.  I wasn't into it.

I think the reasons for this were:

everyone in my house is sick

my 2 year old jumped out of his crib in the middle of the night (something he's never done--not the jumping out, but the waking in the middle of the night) and wandered into our room to "take a nap" as he said.  Then when I put him back in his crib, there he was, a few hours later, trying to crawl back into bed with us.  I gave up and had his feet in my back the rest of the night

the cardio room was exceedingly hot, like they still had the heat on or something

the weather is changing back to cold, yucky

Much better run than yesterday, but still treadmill.  It got cold again.

I'm going to have to drive this to see exactly how long it is.  MapMyRun doesn't have street names of one of Rantoul's neighborhoods correct and I don't think even their position is right.  Oh well.

I warmed up 1 mile, did roughly 1 mile fast, but a little too fast, it felt.  I cramped up a bit.  I ran another slow mile, then did another fast mile, but not as fast as the first.  I was still sorta crampy.  Then when I was nearing the time to do another fast mile, I just wasn't feeling it yet.  My stomach was still cramping.  So instead I did the last 2 miles fast.  I know that the last mile was faster than the one before it.  

I forgot to wear my watch, so the only split I have is for my last mile, where I used my ipod (how many songs went by) to time it.  My last mile was 7:47.  I kinda wish I had my watch so I knew even just my average pace. 

I noticed before my run that the right earphone on my headphones was not working.  Then the other side conked out with about 2.5 miles to go.  I left the headphones in because they were saving my inner ear from the wind, but it was annoying. 

On a slightly interesting note, our senior class has a Facebook stalker.  I know that it is one of the kids (and I have a pretty good idea who it is).  I showed the kids how to "defriend" someone and how to change their privacy settings the day one of the kids said this person was sending him weird messages, but I think I created a monster.  Before "she" was creeping out a handful of people (including me and the Spanish teacher).  Since I brought it up in class, she's trying to creep out everyon in the entire class.  And she just sent me a message that contained my address.  I'm impressed that "she" can use a phonebook.  Ah, the joys of teaching.

The first 1/2 of my run was at 9:12 pace.  The second was slightly slower, at 9:24 pace.  The hardest part of it was from mile 7 to mile 8.5.  

Other than that, the run was okay and uneventful.  

Since I didn't have my headphones to distract me, I thought about a lot of things on this run:

1)  I felt slow and unmotivated, and looking back at my own blogs, I sense the pattern that I always feel slow and unmotivated the week before my period.  That's one nice thing about this blog--I have a record of how my workouts went. I think that my pace here was probably slightly under 10 min pace, but only slightly.  I'm glad I didn't bring my watch because I didn't stress about how slow I was going.

2)  I need to do a better job of recording how I feel during a run.  Sometimes on the blog I just write down my distance and pace, and that's not enough for me to analyze a pattern

3)  I like this blog.  Even though my running over the winter was inconsistent because of my early January forced respite, I know I ran more this winter than I have in 3 years (or maybe ever, I'm not sure.  I know that year I was running more miles during January, but I think I lost a little fitness in Feb, then had to rebuild in March).  And I know that part of the fact that I stuck with it, even though I didn't always feel like it was because I knew that Carolyn was going to be commenting on my blog :)

4)  I think I am going to concentrate on keeping fit for 1/2 marathons for the time being.  I don't have the time to be serious about a marathon right now.  While I still feel uncompetetive (and I don't really care that much to BE competetive) I would like to someday actually be able to RACE a 1/2 marathon instead of just being able to run.  I know that this one in April will be one that I just run for the heck of it.

5)  I enjoy running not because I am fast or ever want to be fast, but I am always so thankful that I CAN run.

6)  I'd like to move somewhere it is 70 degrees all year round.  Yesterday was beautiful and sunny (except it was windier than I thought it was going to be).

Four easy miles.  No problems.

I started off slower today, which ended up being an okay thing.  My first 5 miles averaged 9:51 pace. I was feeling a little slow starting out and then I decided that I would keep myself in check for the first 5 and then try to push the pace for the second 5.

I pushed myself for the next 4 and then kinda lost the edge.  At the end of 4 I decided to cool down the last 2 miles instead of the last mile.  Those miles averaged 9 minutes per.  Then the last two averaged 9:30, as a cool down.

If things had gone as planned this week, I would have run 10 more miles during the week.  I took Monday off, as I usually do, forgetting that we had an appointment on Wednesday.  Then on Friday 2 weeks of sleeping with a pair of feet kicking me from 2-5:30 caught up with me.  I crashed on the couch after getting home from school and couldn't motivate myself to get up.  But it's probably just as well.  It would have increased my weekly mileage by a significant amount, which always makes me nervous.

This week, though, I hope to (and know I most likely will) run 6 days this week.  We're on spring break (yay!) so I have a lot more time to get those miles in.  I don't think that it's a good idea to increase my mileage by 25%, although I'd like to run 40 miles this week.  So I might do a couple of runs that are 3 miles instead of the 5 I'd normally do.

I'm guessing on the fast miles here.

This workout excited me for some reason.  I warmed up for 2 miles (about 9:15 pace) and then didn't want to start my workout on :34 secs, so I waited until I had warmed up 19 minutes before beginning.

Then I did a ladder:  1 min. fast, 1 min. rec, 2 min. fast, 2 min. rec, and so on until I went up to 5 minutes fast.  Then after 5 min. rec, I went back down.  I did stop after my 5 min. fast because it was too warm for what I was wearing.  I exchanged my jacket for a long sleeve t.

I was pretty excited because I the workout portion of my run was 6 miles and it took me 50 minutes (8:20 average).  Since I don't have a garmin (although I do want one, but can't bring myself to spend the $) I don't know what my pace on the fast portion was, so I'm just guessing on how many miles I did fast.  I'm guessing my recovery pace was around 9:30, so I know the fast portion was pretty fast, if I do say so myself.

Then I cooled down a mile at 9:30 pace.

I'm thinking that my goal for the 1/2 marathon is anything under 2 hours.  1:58 would be nice.  I'm sorta thinking that if I treated it like a workout and did surges, I'd probably do better than I would if I looked at it as a race.  I have a tendency to have mental difficulties and I always find that I do better on runs that are broken into portions.  Eh.  Whatever.  I don't understand how I can coach my kids when I can't really coach myself.  I am a mental midget.

Did a threshold run.  Finished my 4 miles in 31:30.  I started off with a 8:04 mile and I guess got progressively faster because my average pace was 7:53.  It didn't feel like it, but it might have been that I had the favor of the wind for pretty much the last 2 miles.

I felt good on this run.

I was off to a late start this morning, partly waiting on hubby to come home and partly dragging my feet.

I don't know why I opted to do this one on a treadmill, but I changed my mind on my way to the gym and then changed it back when I realized I didn't have my watch AND the high school kids might be out on the track so I'd have to weave around them.  I saw them on yesterday when I ran past and I'm sure they're out again today because it's nice today (low 50s, but no wind).

So another glorious treadmill day (getting my money's worth, I guess...I haven't been there in a few weeks).

I planned on doing 5 800s and 2 400s at interval pace with a jogging recovery in between.  Somehow I lost count and accidentally missed one of the 800s.  I blame it on the fact that the first treadmill I was on shut down on me.  Twice.  So I switched treadmills part way through.  Next time I do some speed work I will bring paper so I don't miscount again.

My interval pace was 7:30 (so 3:45 for 800 and 1:53 for 400).  The last 800 was hard (and it wasn't even supposed to be the last one!) but the 400s were easy.

I hate this fast/slow mile thing and I can't remember how to change the settings so I can get more options.  

 I ran on the treadmill at my sister's house while she did the elliptical (isn't she lucky?--she has a good home gym).  It was really nice to talk to someone while I ran.  We also watched some basketball!

 I ran at 8:34 pace.  It would have been more challenging if I hadn't been talking--I wasn't watching the clock like I normally do.

My hip has been bothering me a little bit.  It does this on and off and has pretty much for the past few years.  My sister thinks it may be bursitis or tendonitis, neither of which would surprise me.  She is going to show me some strengthening excersises for my hip.  I'm going to look up some information about both possibilities.

I intended to go for 4 miles, but I don't know any routes around my parents' house except for a 7 mile route and a 3 mile route.  I just guessed at what I thought might be around 4 and it turns out it was 4.5.

I didn't bring a watch, but I ran at a brisk pace.  Not easy, but moderate.

Going out for this run, I wasn't sure exactly what my goal was:  should I do two 6.5 loops for 13 miles?  1 6.5 and one 4.5 loop for 11 miles?  When I hit about 4 miles, I realized 2 things: if I did run 11 or 13 miles, that would mean that I ran 20% more miles this week than last week, which I didn't think was a great idea; and if I had to run past my parents' house, I probably wouldn't go out for more miles.  So I stopped to stretch and really think what I should do, and then decided to turn around and go back the way I came, even though I didn't have any water with me.  This way I'm only increasing by a little more than 15%, which is probably still too much.

I also don't know my pace since I didn't even bring my watch home with me.  I did do a little tempo running within this run, but not at any regular intervals.  I let my ipod dictate--whenever it played a song that got me pumped, I would increase the pace for the duration of that song.

A slow and easy 5 miles.  My hip is hurting when I'm walking, but not when I'm running.  I forgot to get the strengthening exercises from my sister, but I'm going to Chicago this weekend and I need to remember.

A treadmill run.  

This one was hard, mentally.  First off, it is sweltering in the cardio room.  It actually makes me a little sick.  Second, I'm having food issues--my lunch is too early and by the time I get home my blood sugar is so low that it makes me sick.  Any other idiot would just pack something extra for an afternoon snack, but I am not that smart.  It's just a timing thing.  When I would have time to eat a snack I'm not hungry, and then when I have time again, I'm almost ready to go home.

I did an easy mile (9:13 pace) and then  I did 1/4 mile at 8:00 pace/1/4 mile at easy pace.  Towards the end I snuck in a little rest before getting on the treadmill.

Running now makes me mourn the days when my husband and I got home at the same time.  It was so easy back then.  I'd run pretty much as soon as we got home (when I wasn't famished) and be done running before it was time to start dinner.  Now it's harder to get into a routine.

My husband got punched today by a student while he was trying to break up a fight.  She (yes, she) was then arrested.  He's okay.