Oranges 2 Oranges

Looking Back at 5K and Moving Forward…

Dec 8

Wii!!! Another 5K at home…

by With a Dog by My Side

Okay, I just remembered that I hadn’t checked in yet today regarding yesterday’s run of 5K (3.1 miles)! I did it! There are a couple of you out there who came to mind when I wanted to stop early, but I kept going because I wanted to be able to say today that I did it. It has been a few weeks since I’ve had a regular running schedule, and I haven’t been doing well in terms of mileage, so it was a little harder incorporating my new-found, slightly faster pace with the longer distance.

My legs felt sluggish below the knee in the last third, and it felt like time was slowing down. But, hey, I finished the C25K, didn’t I? I’ve already gone this far before! Why couldn’t I do it again? I need to move forward, not backward!

I’m sore today, but it feels good, because I know that it’s because of the effort I made. I’ll need to recalibrate my Nike+ again, since I had a little problem with something falling onto the treadmill’s belt last calibration, which I think calibrated the Nike+ to think that it was taking me longer to get to the mile than it actually would have without my trying to pick up the thing off the belt. I may well have run longer than 3.1 miles, as the treadmill itself said it was 3.3 miles.

On another note, my mother won a Wii Sport and gave it to us yesterday! We played it yesterday, and I played it today for an hour so far. You kind of get a workout from it if you really put forth an effort to MOVE and not sit there just moving your arms, which some people have done. It’s fun! We’re looking into getting Tomb Raider, since it was our favorite game on the old Playstation years ago. YAY!

Thanks, Mom!

Have a good evening, everyone!  🙂

Shannan

Running

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Dec 5

Quite the End to the Week (so far)

by With a Dog by My Side

Okay, so I’m thinking I’m going to have to re-challenge myself next week. I had some family things come up yesterday during the time I was going to run, and since I had waited so long to run, the opportunity had passed. Today, I had to take my brother-in-law to the hospital (after going in to work early) for knee surgery that was supposed to get us out of there by 3pm (surgery scheduled for 1pm). I find out at 4pm (after 4.5 hours of waiting in the waiting room) that he had just gone into surgery. Hubby had to come take my place in order to let me go home, which was at 5pm. I think they must be on their way home as I’m writing this. I hope. The day is gone for me. I will try again on Sunday. I think I will start again next week, but maybe just make it a weekly mileage goal instead of every day, since it seems that is not realistic to life right now.

Sigh. Thanks, Thomas, for your comment. I will do well on Sunday. I really want to try to get more miles, so I’m going to plan on a longer running time and take whatever mileage I can get in that time. It’s been a rough eating week, too, and I need to recommit to doing both the running and the eating the right way. I guess it’ll happen when I make both of them a higher priority.

Have a good weekend, everyone!  🙂

Shannan

Running

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Dec 3

Day 3 of My One-a-Day Challenge

by With a Dog by My Side

Okay, so it’s the third day of my challenge to myself to run a mile each day until Sunday, when I’ll run 2 miles, bringing my weekly total to 7 miles. I’m up to 2.5 miles, since I didn’t run yesterday. I have legitimate reasons for not running yesterday, but the point is, I made up some of it today, running 1.5 miles. I even did it with an 11:53 pace, which is fast for me. I’ve been challenging myself to run a little during my runs at a faster speed, to try to get my average pace up (fewer minutes per mile). I hope to be able to at least do the tomorrow’s mile between doing a project for work and other things around the house.

As for the reasons I didn’t run yesterday, I’m first an earlier-in-the-day runner (more like late morning), and I got home around 4pm, making it much later than I’m used to. It was not a priority for me at the time. Secondly, and probably the more legitimate reason, is that a few days earlier I had been doing strength training and did a favorite of mine that I learned on the Biggest Loser DVDs, which is the wood chopping movement, where you hold a weight in your hands and slowly pretend you’re chopping wood from one shoulder down to the opposite foot. I did fine that day, but the next two days my hamstrings were hurting — more so on Monday night and Tuesday morning — and my right leg had also been twitching on Monday night. I was afraid I’d damage something if I ran, and I knew I needed the rest time.

It’s been difficult getting back into a routine the way it was when I was on a strict C25K schedule. There’s no chart to tell me where I am, and I’m not really answering to anyone but myself. The fun part of it, though, is that I’m starting to really try to better my times and to get used to the faster speeds. It’s been interesting finding my limits and trying to go past them each time.

So…my aim is to run the next 3 days and then on Sunday do a full 2 miles. Maybe I’ll even pull off something better.

I hope you’re all keeping warm, and for those of you in warmer climates, appreciate it!

Shannan

C25K Running

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Dec 1

Let’s Try This Again

by With a Dog by My Side

So today is the first day of our restart of Weight Watchers. We kind of stopped counting points a few weeks back, and now we’re getting back on it. It’s not hard once we actually decide to do it. I’m hoping to be at my goal by Valentine’s Day. From then, I may try to lose more.

This week I’ve decided to see if I can run each day, but only a mile a day. It doesn’t sound like much, but I wanted to see what doing half my usual distance each day without breaks would be like. I don’t think I’ll need the rest days between, just because I’ll be running so little and easy (about 13-15 minutes depending on pace) that it won’t be too hard on my muscles. I’m eager to test this. If I do M-F at one mile, and then 2 miles on Sunday, that will give me 7 miles for the week.

I also went out in the wee hours this morning and shoveled the 1.5 to 2 inches of snow we got overnight. It’s the wet, heavy kind, but it wasn’t deep, so I was able to lift it. I did get in my strength training doing it, though.

So, I just wanted to check in and let you all know that I’m trying to get back into things after the hectic Thanksgiving period we always have around here. I’m even going to start my free, downloaded MIT writing courses soon. Work’s going to get busy, and it’ll be a nice distraction. I printed out all the coursework and have my two books. I failed miserably in the NaNoWriMo, and ended up with under 3,000 words. It just wasn’t the right month for me, and I think quality work can’t be done in 30 days, fixing it up later or not. What’s the point of writing 50K words if it’s all going to be nonsensical jabbering? Just to get a certificate? No, thanks. If I get good enough to accomplish that one year, then it’s going to be quality work, not just whatever I can type up in the time allotted.

I’ll be back to let you know how the running’s going. It’s my one-a-day challenge.

Shannan

Running Writing

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Nov 20

Dumbbell…Me AND the Weights!

by With a Dog by My Side

Okay, so today was going to be a run day. Guess not, now. Yesterday I was cleaning up the office in preparing the house for Thanksgiving next week, and I had put some of my exercise stuff, like my big ball and some dumbbells, on the floor in our bedroom. I forgot about them, and was carrying a laundry basket from the bed backwards when I stepped onto a dumbell in my socks. I bruised my right heel, which is also on the same foot that my neuroma has been acting up. This leaves the front and the back of my right foot in pain. The bruise hurts more than the neuroma, and I’ve been running with the neuroma pain for weeks now, but even walking is bad now. I’m going to lay off it and try to do some leg exercises that don’t require walking/running, and I’ll get in some weights today, too. Since I’ve started running it seems that I’ve been neglecting my upper body strength training a little, so I’ll take the opportunity today to do it in place of the running.

These past two or three weeks have felt like another dimension, but I’ll bounce back eventually with the running and writing and whatever has been pushed to the wayside. We’re hopefully going to hear back on results regarding a family member’s health problems, so at least we’ll have answers there. Certain daily, monotonous things just don’t seem important right now while other things are up in the air like this.

Sorry to be so blah today. I’m trying not to freak out about it being a week from Thanksgiving. Clutter just doesn’t seem to be much of a concern this year. Not that it’s not there, but I’m beginning to see that it’s just not as important as just being with family. (Sarah, don’t you start or I will!)  :^)

Everyone, have a good day! I’ll be watching the rest of season 2 of Arrested Development on hulu while I clean and lift weights. 

Shannan

Running

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Nov 16

Early Morning Run

by With a Dog by My Side

Ran 30 minutes today, 6:15am. It was my fastest pace, too.

We’ve got one of our nephews over today, so we’re spending the day with him. Gotta run, but I hope to report a higher word count on my NaNoWriMo story soon. I made some progress this past week, but I plan on making even more. I have to! 

Later! Have a good Sunday!

Shannan  🙂

Running

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Nov 13

Back in the game…

by With a Dog by My Side

Good Morning all,

I did another 30-minute run, having only intended on going 1.5 miles, but once I’m there at that 20-minute mark I’m bound to keep pushing to the end. It’s almost becoming a game with me. If I tell myself that I’m only going to go so far, I usually end up finishing it up to the 30 minutes. I have no idea why this keeps working. lol

I just looked at my Running Ahead log, and I can see how my pace has picked up over the course of the past 10 weeks (even after considering that my C25K pace calculations included the walking portions). If I had been doing One Hour Runner, I’d have just ended my first week, except that I had done 45 minutes my first day last week. I’m happy to be able to run on my own terms, but still maintain the standards OHR upholds for progress. It’s not to say that one day I’m not going to do a 20-minute run if I’m not up to 30, or I won’t do another 45-minute run prematurely. But I get to say what I do and when I do it, and the freedom keeps me running.

I truly believe that had I committed to the OHR program for 10 weeks, I’d have already quit. Don’t get me wrong, I like running, but the C25K was enough to introduce me to running, and now I’m going to run because I want to, it keeps me fit and has been improving my heart, not because a schedule tells me to. I may do times that are similar to the plan’s, but it’s going to be on my own.

Okay, enough of the soap box. I just feel passionate about having the freedom to do what I want on the days I want. So far it’s been working.  :^)

Yesterday I picked up 9 bags of leaves from our front lawn. There are sycamores planted up and down our street, and many of the trees’ leaves inevitably come to our property, along with snow, rainfall and loose recyclables that fall when the truck empties the cans. It turns out that since it had rained/sleeted the day before, the leaves were nice and wet and tended not to fly around and set allergens flying. I did it all in an hour, and it was good exercise, too. The bags were nice and heavy, and I had to carry them to the back of the house. This was a fortunate thing, because later in the day, when I was supposed to be doing my run, I spent hours on the phone with a family matter and couldn’t run.

My sister and I spent two hours doing a NaNo sprint yesterday evening. It’s 10 minutes writing, 10 minutes not writing, for the duration. I got to increase my count, which you can see on the sidebar, and my story got to move along a little further. I’m not giving up hope that I can get to 50,000 words by November 30th, no matter how naive that hope is.  :^) We’re planning another sprint tomorrow night, which is also my mom’s birthday.

♦♦♦ HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MOM! ♦♦♦

Tomorrow’s Friday, so everyone have a good weekend!

Shannan

Running Writing

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Nov 9

Another Run

by With a Dog by My Side

I ran 30 minutes today. I had planned on only getting in about 1.5 miles, which would be close to 22 minutes or so, but I got there and thought, “I can and should go to 30 minutes,” so I did.

It’s been a rough week emotionally, so I was a little distant or absent altogether in some of my usual forum groups and on here. I also only got in the one 45-minute run between Monday and today.

It’s snowing here now — very lightly, like flurries, but snowing. We’re getting the house ready for Thanksgiving in the next 2 1/2 weeks, so that’s going on, along with having more things than usual to think about at work. It’s going to be a challenge to keep eating healthy and running without letting the stress of everything that’s going on bring me down…not to mention the NaNoWriMo, which you can see I’m only 870 words into (as I write this). The goal is 50,000 by November 30! My sister and I are planning to have a through-the-night writing marathon to get our word counts up, though she’s FAR ahead of me right now.

My first “textbook” came for my two MIT online, downloadable, writing courses. It’s the American poetry 1945-1960 one, which has some interesting poems inside. I can’t wait to get started, but I think it’s going to have to be at least December before I dive into that.

I’m planning on running again on Wednesday, since tomorrow’s a rest day and Tuesday’s probably a full day at work. We’ll see. I’m aiming for 6 miles a week right now, which comes out to about three 30-minute runs.

Have a good day!

Running

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Nov 5

I Just Ran 5K!!!

by With a Dog by My Side

I ran 5K!

I figured that the run after my C25K graduation should be one that proves that I can actually run 5K (3.1 miles). I had been running based on time during the program, and today I decided to run based on distance. It took me 45:05 minutes, but I ended up with a 14:27 pace, which is about the pace I was doing during the final phases of the C25K program. That’s all based on my Nike+, which I will keep using to maintain consistent stats, even if it’s a bit off on the time. The Nike+ time is always about 10 seconds slower for every half hour, so my pace is probably a little bit faster over the 45 minutes.

I’m not going to be doing the One Hour Runner program. I’m not ruling it out for good, but I’m not really seeing it in my future. I just went from doing 30-minute runs to a 45-minute easy run (with a couple minutes at an increased speed, then keeping it a little faster than the run’s beginning/easy speed for the rest of the run), and I’d hate to have to follow the 30-30-30 schedule for 3 more weeks, and then slowly add to my time. Even if I’m risking overdoing it, I feel free now to run longer if I want to, or shorter on other days.

My plan thus far is going to be to not do more than one long run per week, and the other days of the week will depend on how I feel. If I can make 30 minutes, then I will. If I can only do a mile that day, then that’s how it’s going to be. My plan is to not have a plan, but to be smart about it so I don’t hurt myself. I’m sticking with 3x a week for now, but willing to be flexible.

I’ve posted some C25K graduation pics on the Week 9 page. For now, my posts will be on this front page, and I will keep Weeks 1-9 up for those who are contemplating their own C25K journey and just want to see what one person’s runs were like.

Have a great rest of the week!

Shannan

C25K One Hour Runner (OHR) Running

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Nov 1

I Graduated C25K!

by With a Dog by My Side

I’m just quickly posting that I finished the C25K today! I’ll post details and some photos later…  🙂

(To quickly answer a question – I’m starting OHR next week.)

C25K Running

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