Wednesday, March 2, 2011

First day out

"To climb steep hills requires a slow pace at first." – Shakespeare

I need to keep reminding myself of this quote. That it’s not my speed but it’s my endurance, strength, and mental focus that I am trying to train. Speed, well that will come eventually most likely during training for a race after the boilermaker.

I brought all my stuff into work so I could change in the bathroom and drive over to the Saratoga State Park to run through the trails there. I started to change and I reached in my bag thinking that I had my compression tights to wear under my shorts. Nope, I had grabbed my shirt instead so I was just rocking some shorts. Shorts in winter weather when you aren’t going to be working up a huge sweat make one particularly cold. Yet, I wasn’t going to let anything stop me.

I got to the park, started up my C210K app and my Nike+GPS app and picked the appropriately named “F*ck you, I’m prettier than you” playlist and set out on my little run. I forgot that the first week is a lot more walking than running. Each path that I set out on would eventually fall prey to being closed off due to winter snow. Ended up running from the theater parking lot, past the theater, up to the clubhouse, and back to the parking lot like three times. It equaled out to 2.3 miles and that for the first time out made me feel really good, since 1.6 miles was my first time out during C25K.


What I noticed this time around was when it told me to run, I actually ran. During C25K I “old man jogged” each time I had to run. I focused a lot on my form and breathing when I did C25K. So when I started running my 30 second intervals I remembered slight lean forward, head up straight, loose arms bent at the elbow, with each step bring heels towards the butt as much as I could.

I found myself going a farther distance when I ran, actually ran. Yes, I was winded when I was running harder than my old man jog but I knew that is how I would build in the weeks to come. That if I pushed myself harder than my 5k training but not to the point of hyperventilating, well I’d be in better shape and run a little farther and faster.

Tonight I get my paycheck for one day. (Yep, I started one day before the pay cycle ended) So with that one day pay I’m buying some wind pants. I figure I will need them as Thursday looks to be colder than yesterday and I’m now in the mind set of every other day and trying to keep to the schedule. Now, if those park roads would just get a little cleaner, I’d be a happy camper.

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