Training Day #9

Let's just say tonight didn't go as plan. After a long day on my feet, my shins were killing me before I even started. My scheduled work out was a 4 mile run, but 2 miles in I knew it wasn't happening. So I pounded out 3 (which is on the schedule for Wednesday) and spent a solid 30 minutes stretching, massaging, and attempting to work out the pain. Hopefully come Wednesday I can eek out 4 miles.

So tonight, I'm really frustrated. I would like to say I'm irritated about my pace, but honestly, I'm so ticked off that I don't even care. And I'm really starting to feeling anxious about how this whole race is going to go down. I'll save you the ranting and just call it a night.  Here's my stats.

Training Day #5

Tonight...it's hard to even gather my thoughts. Yesterday's run was tough, and as the night moved on I realized my shins were starting to take on that faint pain that comes with the dreaded shin splints. Having already been side-lined for a couple of weeks back in December, I stubbornly thought that I needed to keep on my training schedule, even if it was super slow. So I did, despite my husband's warning and encouraging me not to, I tackled my scheduled 2 mile run. And for a while I thought it'd be ok.

I made it a 1/2 mile in before I even needed to stop (which seems like nothing to seasoned runners, but for me, it's a HUGE thing to run more than 2 minutes at a time). I caught my breath and took off again, a little quicker but still slow. Unfortunately by around 1.3 miles the pain really started to crank up. Now, at this point, any good runner would have likely walked a couple cool down minutes and called it quits. But NOOOO, not me. I kept going.

I got my measly 2 miles in, and honestly not much else to show for it. After a solid 30 minutes of stretching down and attempting to roll it all out, the pain and my tears were simply too much. For those who have escaped the horrors of shin splints, count your blessing and give thanks. Those unlucky enough to have experienced them know it's not laughing matter. Frankly, it hurts like hell. And I've given birth to 2 kids.

I'm almost too embarrassed to even post tonights stats. Almost. This blog is about accountability and to help others on this running journey not get down because they don't run fast enough or far enough compared to the mass of runners on Instagram or Facebook (speaking from personal experience here). So here's my stats, promise you won't laugh.

Right now, that pace, oh it hurts. But not as bad as my stupid shins. So for now, I'm going to continue to keep my feet propped up and iced. Tomorrow is a cross train day, so I'm hoping I can at least walk. I have to keep going. I don't want to hurt myself, but I also don't want to quit. 34 days to go.

Training Day #4

I know...I had promised to talked about gear on Thursday (a rest day), but after a long week, I was so exhausted I simply went to bed. Friday, a cross-train day was derailed when one of my little guys came home screaming with an ear ache. We spent the evening at urgent treatment and thankfully were able to get some medicine to ease his pain and deal with the infection. But after several hours of caring for a little one, and not getting to settle down until well after 10 PM cross training was out of the question.

Saturday, my scheduled long run day turned out to be a bitterly cold day. I drug my feet getting out of bed, and eventually the day passed by me before I knew it. I desperately wanted to get outside and do my long run, so we choose to attend church Saturday evening, allowing me this morning to run.

The good news: It was warmer that Saturday and my new Garmin watch worked perfectly!

The bad news: No, you didn't miss anything in the good news. Today's run was hard. While the temperature was not as bitterly cold as Saturday, it was still a balmy 32. I was dress correctly, but the cold really hit me hard and as a result I struggled with my breathing. My other challenge, I started out fast. Much faster than I normally run. I even covered the first mile in 11:54. I also failed to plan to bring some water. Being that I usually drink something every mile, I was struggling. Thankfully, my husband came out looking for me and brought me water. It was just what I needed to push through the last mile.

So the details of my run.

My pace wasn't horrible when I consider that I'm only 4 actual training sessions back and how much I actually walked. I purposefully picked a course that had lots of hills to help get me used to race conditions.

One of the neat features my watch gave me was a graph of the elevation along with my pace. My goal as time progresses is for there to be less peaks and more consistent pacing. But I'm reminding myself, one day at a time. One day at a time.

And finally, for those interested in my splits. It's obvious that my overly energetic start caught up with me. I struggle with pacing myself because it always feels like I'm going too slow, but I'm learning that most likely, I need to be going slower to help build up my stamina.

The Hot Chocolate Run is just 35 days away. I'm struggling with the feelings that I'm never going to be able to get there. That I'm never going to make the progress I need to. But I'm also determined to finish, so I'm working on setting realistic expectations.

Until tomorrow!

  

Day 22 - July 24

I've been bad about updating. But I have been trying to keep motivated and keep up my running. Don't believe me {honestly, why would you?} below is my calendar of runs as evidence.

So while not  entirely consistent, I have been trying. And there for a while I thought I might be improving. But if you follow me on Twitter (@agirlandherrun) then you probably saw that yesterday's run was a particularly bad one. Not just bad, as in I didn't accomplish what I wanted, but truly bad, as in I came home, promptly sat on the couch and contemplated just quitting altogether. I told myself lots of lies in those post-run moments - "I'm never going to get past this hurdle" "My body just wasn't made to run" "I simply can't do it". And one point, I really started to believe them.  It doesn't help one's psych either when the scale seems to be moving in the wrong direction {another topic for another day} giving me further reason to just throw in the towel. Then, after a long hot shower to soothe my achy muscles, I did what all logical people do -  found something to distract myself in the laziest way possible - I grabbed a book and curled up in bed.

<< Side note: I'm currently reading "Unbroken" by Laura Hillenbrand. As a dedicated fiction reader, this one is a little out of my normal scope of books, but Ms. Hillenbrand is a phenomenal writer and has crafted this story in such a way, that I literally can't put it down. If you're a reader, or just like history, I would highly recommend this book. >>

So as I'm reading about this amazing story of survival, by no less than a Olympic RUNNER, I realized I'm selling myself short. So I'm taking one step forward and two steps back some days. It happens. Ok - so I managed to only run about 4-5 minutes total over the course of 30 mins, but I covered almost 2 miles. That more that I did last month, heck it's more than I did the day before. That's got to count for something, right? I wrapped up the evening feeling a little less discouraged and resolved I wasn't going to give up just yet.

Then this morning, as we were getting ready for work and chatting, my husband said the smartest, yet simplest thing. In the midst of my lamenting about not being able to do the training, he pointed out that maybe I should just start over. Huh? Start over? Why would I do that?! But as the thought sunk in, I realized that's probably what I should do (or better yet, should have done to begin with).

When I started running on July 3, I wasn't following a programing. I was just running. And that was fine, but I started realizing my results weren't consistent and I felt like I couldn't get past a certain point in my run. At that point, I decided to give the Couch to 5K method a shot.  However, in my cockiness, I opted to start on Week 3 because I could totally do 3 minutes of running no problem {not entirely true, but I wanted to think I could}. However, when the game stepped up and I find myself where I am now, flaming out (somewhat literally, my legs were on fire) at week 4, I realized, it's because I haven't been training for 4 weeks to get my muscles in shape to do the week 4 workouts. Week 3 I did, but just barely. My lung may be working fine, my legs haven't seen this much activity in years. {So maybe I'm not horrible at this running thing after all?!} Just as there's no crying in baseball, there's no cheating in running. You can't jump ahead just because you think you should - believe when I say this, my legs are reminding me of this with every step I take today.

Which means today, I'm starting over. I'm starting with Week 1 Day 1 of C25K. I'm going to forgive myself for whatever "failures" I've convinced myself I've committed, and move forward.  It's humbling really. But I'm hoping starting over will help build up my muscles, but also my confidence. After all, I've got nothing to lose at this point!