Unconventional Training Entries

I keep track of my workouts in my trusty rusty notebook.  I was flipping through it to see how the month was shaping up and noticed that I had some unusual entries.  Theses that will show up in my monthly summary.  They are activities that I thought were worth tracking, but it's not necessarily obvious how they link to training:

• Dog intervals - That's what I call it when I end up taking the dogs for a run/walk.  I consider this to be a form of speed work because it's essentially a fartlek run. We sprint when we run, with periods of walking in between.  The distances end up determined mostly by the dogs.  BTW, this is actually a good exercise for the dogs too (The inserted image is about dog intervals on a treadmill.  We run outside, but the benefit to the dogs remains).

• Painting - I spent several hours painting a section of the interior of the house. I consider this to be a form of upper body exercise.The part I was painting required using brushes, not a roller, and took a long time given the actual dimensions of the walls.  I definitely feel it in my arms afterwards.

• Yard Work/Gardening - Right now I'm working out the kinks in the irrigation system. In a few weeks I will be planing my veggie garden.  Then there will be weeding. I consider this to be a form of lower body exercise because it requires a lot of squatting.  

Do you log any unconventional training activities as workouts?

Saturday Stuff

Looking over this past week, my running plus fitness walking mileage isn't bad.

• Sun:  1.0 walk
• Mon: 1.5 walk + chiro appt with focus on IT band/knee issues
• Tue: 4.8 run, 0.5 walk
• Wed: 1.5 walk
• Thu: 3.4 run, 1.0 walk
• Fri: 3.5 run, 2.8 walk 
• Sat: 7.7 run, 0.5 walk

That adds up to 19.4 miles running plus 8.8 miles fitness walking for a grand total of 28.2 miles by feet. Woohoo!!  Not a bad week.  And of course, the best part is that my knee is behaving.  I think walking, stretching, and having the chiro work on my IT band is helping.  Plus running only on dirt and avoiding hills.  It isn't a recipe for fast racing, but it does seem to be a combination that is keeping me running without pain.

Side note, sometimes I find running to be, at best, calorie neutral. Why?  Well, here's an example. This morning my running partner and I ended up on the topic of baking while we were running.  I ended up stopping at the store for some blueberries and the next thing I know I'm making over-sized blueberry muffins with a cinnamon crumb topping.  I wouldn't doubt it if I undid the caloric benefit from running by consuming a few muffins. Oh well.  What can I say? I like baking!

How was the past week for you?  And are you baking anything yummy?

Mid week miscellany

Mostly non-running related.

• Son is finishing his junior year at Cal in Berkeley. He landed a software engineering internship in Seattle over the summer. At this point, we are hoping he comes home to visit for a week before he starts his job. Planning to visit him there one weekend this summer as well. I'm happy that he's doing well, but I really miss him. 

•  Daughter is finishing her freshman year at UNM in Albuquerque. She'll be back home this summer.  She's focusing in on what she wants to do for a career and needs to change her major. We had a very good talk last Friday, and now she's got an appointment for academic advisement this afternoon to explore a new option. I'm really proud of her for working through this.  It's tough (and can be discouraging) when you start college a bit unsure of what you want to do with your life.

• This weekend I need to check our irrigation system.  Every year we start the growing season with lots of irrigation issues that need to be fixed, so this is not a fun chore.  But it will be time to plant our veggie garden in a few weeks when the threat of frost has past.  For now, I have Green Chile Bobblehead watching over my little tomato plants on the window sill while they wait to be transplanted to the garden.  

• My running partner and I had a really slow run after work yesterday.  No I mean REALLY slow.  It took us almost as long as it did for the entire 10K, but we only covered 4.8 miles.  Granted, it was really windy last night (30+mph).  But still...   

• Have I mentioned that I despise spring?  Allergies are kicking my butt, and I am so over the stupid wind.  

• I'm a huge fan of our AAA baseball team, the Isotopes. I spent all winter counting down to opening day. We've been to three games so far.  Going again next Thursday.  Woot!

• I'm fairly certain that this recent round of knee issues has been IT band related rather than my normal knee arthritis. That's a good thing.  I've been doing a lot of rolling and am back in my old running shoes (Kinvara 2s).  I'm going to try the Kinvara 4s when they come out.   

Reflections from an under-trained 10K

This morning I ran the 10K race at Albuquerque Half Marathon's.  I went in horribly under-trained as my knee has been bothering me, and I didn't expect it to go very well.

Actually, I started with a goal of not having it be a personal worst, but that wasn't much of a goal. My running partner and I and decided to make this a training run in which we would try to hit a 10:30 pace, which gave us 1:05:00 as a target. I've been running most of my training runs at about an 11:15 pace lately, so that seemed a bit aggressive under the circumstances.

Look!  They put our names on the bibs.  Cool.

But, of course, sometimes things go better than expected.  Thanks to a cooperating knee, the excitement of the other runners, a nice flat course, and a beautiful calm morning, we ended up running much closer to a 10:00 pace.  My finish time ended up being 1:02:17, about a 10:02 average pace.  She was about 9 seconds in front of me.  Husband finished in 53-something.  I know that I was 5th in my AG (F45-49), but I don't know how many people there were.  All-in-all, I am quite pleased.

The photo from her phone!

I got to briefly meet a fellow blogger. (Just) Trying is for Little Girls was running the half-marathon in her quest for the 50 states.  I really hoped to have time to chat before the race, but wasn't able to locate her until a few minutes before her race started, so our meet-up ended up being only about 30 seconds long. She has photo evidence of the meet-up on her phone.  Hopefully she'll post it on her race report.  For now, you'll just have to take my word for it.  

Updated:  Added the photo from her phone.  Hope she doesn't mind!  My number is on my leg because I wanted to take off the long sleeves before my race started.  The car was too far away to stash it there, so I ended up running with it tied around my waist. 

Also, the results are posted and I now know that I was 5 of 8 women in my age group.  99 of 184 overall runners for the 10K

One more update:  I saw a friend/colleague who ran in Boston last week at the finish line cheering us and others on like he often does.  For some reason though, he had decided to go back to his hotel and clean up right after his race ended on Monday and wasn't hanging around the finish line  when the explosions happened. Anyway, he said that he plans on running Boston again next year if he can get in because he won't let terror win.  I'm not sure I would be so brave.   

Next up for me is Run for the Zoo 10K in two weeks.

TTT - Feelings, Failures, & Fears

FEELINGS:  I still have so many feelings about what happened on Monday, but find that I'm not able to state them eloquently. So I won't even try. But believe me, it's been heavy on my mind all week.

FAILURES:  My plan to get up early and run on Mon & Wed before work was only a partial success. Monday went well. But things fell apart on Wednesday. It wasn't my fault though! Husband was having trouble sleeping and decided to turn off the alarm in the bedroom and sleep on the couch with an alarm set on his mobile device. He intended to come in and set the alarm for me in the morning, but forgot. Most of the time I end up waking up before the alarm anyway, but not yesterday. I ended up oversleeping. Oh well.

FEARS:  I am so not prepared for the 10K on Saturday! At this point, I'm afraid it will end up being a personal worst. Why? Well, In addition to not being in 10K racing shape, I have a concern that my knee will act up and I'll end up needing to walk a sizable portion since this course is entirely road running. Sigh.  In the grand scheme of things, I realize that how fast or slow I cover the 10K distance on Saturday isn't important.  But right now that doesn't seem to stop me from fretting over it.

light shines in the darkness

I'm still having a hard time wrapping my head around what happened yesterday in Boston. 

One thing that struck me, though, was the heroism shown even in those first moments after the explosions. I'm fairly sure my first instict would be to run away, but yet there were so many brave men and women who headed immediately into the chaos, thinking only of getting to those in need.  Many more offered their help over the next several hours and continue today.  Incredible stories of heroism and kindness rising out of such a senseless act of tragedy. 

I offer a heart felt THANK YOU to the heros of the day (police, national guard, bystanders, volunteers, medical personnel, etc.) for their acts of kindness and bravery. 

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it - John 1:5 (NLT) 

Best laid plans

often go awry.

Without going into too much of a rant, let me just say that I'm really tired of two things right now: scheduling my runs around others & the freaking wind.

I've been planning my running schedule so that it works out better with others.  Generally, this means planning to run in the afternoon which is when the wind is at it's worst.  Too often that results in us cancelling due to excessive wind (and sand-blasting and allergies and general ickyness).  I'm so over that.

Given past performance with weather conditions such as those in the forecast for the first half of the week, I just know I need to do something different.

The new plan is that I will *really* try to run solo in the morning before work (at least on Monday & Wednesday) before work before the wind gets too bad.

Disadvantages:  No running partner, colder running temps, earlier wake-up (coldest part of the day is right after the sun comes up, so temps will be close to the lows listed in the weather forecast)

Advantages:  Less wind, Can run from home (vs. drive to meet somewhere), less rushing after work.

Wish me luck!  I'll need it when the alarm goes off...

[Updated:  Thanks for the well-wishes.  Day 1 was a success!!!]

Confidence Builder

Just a brief update.

I've been rolling.  And I decided to switch back to my old running shoes (just to eliminate another variable).  Ended up doing a run/walk with a friend Friday evening, and then a 7 mile run with my running partner Saturday morning.

Guess what?!  No Knee Pain.

Both efforts were quite slow, but getting through them without knee pain resulted in a huge boost to my confidence. Oh, and I still plan to make the cupcakes. ;-p

Freaking Knee

If you've followed my blog for awhile, you know that I have a recurring problem with my left knee.  To be more exact, I have an ongoing problem with my left knee and get periodic relief from it thanks to Euflexxa injections.  The underlying problem is never going away, so it is inevitable that the pain will return again and again.

It was bothering me in PHX.  I thought maybe it was due to spending more time on my feet than usual.  I've been in a bit of denial, but to be honest, it's bothering me again.  I have NOT been spending that much time on my feet. If anything, my training is way behind schedule.

I haven't decided what I'm going to do. 

• I could go back to the orthopedic doc now and request that she starts the injections, and that would force me into an 8-12 week break from running. 
• I could go back to the orthopedic doc now and see if she has some other suggestion besides the injections.
• I could continue to scale back my running and wait until I get past one or both of the 10Ks on my schedule and THEN go see the orthopedic doc.
• I could make a couple dozen death by oreo cupcakes and eat them all in one sitting.  I'm not sure what effect that would have on my knee, but I'd be happy for a little while until the sugar coma kicks in...

Blah.

[Update:  Husband suggests that I roll my IT Band to rule that out as the cause vs. my 'regular' knee issue.  Sounds like a good plan.  I'll try that first.]

March Recap

Numbers

Tempo Twist shorts from Nike Outlet

• 92.4 miles by feet (59.5 running, 32.9 walking)
• 22.0 miles by seat
• 1 purchase from Nike outlet
• 2 sick days
• 2 travel days
• 3 spring training baseball games
• 1 "fun run" event

Thoughts

• March was better than February in many regards, but my running is not going as well as I would like.
• Looks like it will be warm enough to run in shorts after work today.  Hoping to give those new shorts a test run.
• Went for a bike ride on Easter that ended with me walking my bike the final half mile due to a flat.  I was too lazy to fix it given that I was so close to home when I realized that the tire was flat.

Plans

• Keep training for 10Ks in April & early May.
• Get out on bike more often.
• Try to smile and enjoy life.

I hate spring

I know I'm probably going to get some flack about this, especially from those of you who are still experiencing winter weather.

This is the weather forecast for the next 5 days.  The high temp seems reasonable, it's the stupid wind every.single.day that has me frustrated.  It's not even considered windy unless the winds average over 20mph, but to me 15+mph winds most days combined with seasonal allergies =  no fun.

Since running after work hasn't been working out for me for one reason or another, I'm going to try running tomorrow morning before work.  It looks like the temp will be about ~40deg at that time which isn't too bad.

For what it's worth, my favorite season is fall.  I *love* fall.  But spring.  Blah.  Not a fan.  How about you?

Wind, wind, go away...

Let me begin by saying that it was windy on Saturday.  REALY windy.  Something like 25-30 mph winds with 50-60 mph gusts. Blustery.  Very blustery.

The plan for the morning was to run 3 miles, then do a 5K fun run.  What actually happened is that we begrudgingly ran 3 miles, then talked about skipping the fun run.   

But the fun run was to celebrate a new running store opened by our running coach.  A dream come true for him.  How could we skip out on that?  So we decided to do the run anyway.  But with the cold wind, it really sucked, and we ended up bailing after 2.5 miles.  Because we could.  And because it was decidedly not fun with the wind.

And a side note.  My Garmin is trying to commit Garmin suicide.  I can't get the buttons to work, and couldn't get it to turn off the other day.  So I have no idea how fast we ran on Saturday, but I'm pretty sure it was on the slow side.

Fast forward to Sunday.  The plan was to run 6 miles.  But my running partner had to cancel leaving me with a decision. I didn't want to run 6 by myself, but didn't want to totally skip an opportunity to do SOMETHING, so decided to get out on my bike. 

Smiling - before the ride

I decided to go with the bike.  I knew I hadn't been on it for awhile, but I didn't realize how long it had been. I actually had to remove the race numbers from my bike from the triathlon back in August. 

Yikes! That was like 7 months ago!  Has it really been that long?!?!

Decided on a fairly short, but somewhat hilly route.  Compared to the blustery winds on Saturday, the 10-15 mph winds this afternoon seemed mildly breezy.  But the wind, combined with my lack of cycling, resulted in it being much more difficult than it really should have been.  Don't get me wrong, I'm glad I got out there, but it wasn't fun.

Where does that leave me?

Well, for someone who does all of this for fun, a not-fun run on Saturday and a not-fun ride on Sunday made for a not-so-awesome weekend. To be honest, I'm feeling discouraged. I'm trying to stay positive, but I'm not really succeeding at that right now. Sigh.

I'm supposed to run a 10K in a month.  I'm not feeling very confident about that.  I think I'm going to sign up for another 10K that is about 3 weeks after that (Zoo Run).  I'm thinking that maybe that's the one to target, and use the first one for practice.

[Updated to add:  It's a done deal.  I've signed up for the Run for the Zoo 10K.  I will also do the Albuquerque Half Marathon 10K, but that will be in prep for the Zoo run rather than treated as a race.  I think that's a good plan. Fingers crossed that it goes well!].

Where did the week go?!?

Ran this weekend on both Saturday and Sunday and had high expectations to run on both Tuesday and Thursday after work.

On Tuesday, my running partner cancelled.  I could have run by myself, but opted to walk my dogs instead.  We went on our "regular" 2 mile hill walk.  The dogs loved it.  I haven't been walking the hill very much recently, so I really felt it in my glutes.

The next afternoon, I started coming down with some weird ailment.  Chills and body ache like I had a fever, but no actual fever.  Worked from home on Thursday and sadly cancelled my run.  While I think it was the right thing to do, it's disappointing that it's now Friday and I haven't run at all since the weekend.  First week that I could fully take advantage of  DST and nada on the running front.

At this point, I'm planning on running solo today.  Then tomorrow we're probably going to run 3 miles before a 5K fun run, then the actual fun run.  Sounds like a good plan at the moment, I'm sure I'll be questioning my sanity during the fun run portion tomorrow though.  LOL.  The bottom line is that I need to be training for a 10K and a simple 5K run tomorrow won't get me there.

In other news:  Husband & I celebrated our "almost silver" anniversary on Monday. Things change as the years pass by, but life is good. Son (who goes to school in California) will be spending the summer in Seattle due to landing an intership there; we will likely go visit sometime in late June.  Daughter (who goes to school here in NM)  is spending this weekend in the Chicago area to visit her Navy boyfriend who graduates bootcamp today and has day liberty until he starts A school next week.

Transitioning to DST

Yes, I know the rest of you did the whole Daylight Savings thing a week ago, but we spent the week in AZ so I didn't end up transitioning to DST until we got back.

Saguaro - We don't have those at home

While we were gone, we ran a few times.  Husband asked if I noticed a difference running in AZ.  Did it feel easier?  It should have, we had plenty of oxygen at the lower altitude.  But I didn't have my Garmin and don't know how fast I was going.  It would be easier to tell a difference if I could say, for the same effort I was going faster or for the same speed it was so much easier.  I would probably really be able to tell a difference on hills, but we ran on a flat surface.  So, not really sure.

It was nice to run in shorts in the morning instead of tights; it was much warmer than at home in central New Mexico.  Actually it was quite pleasant during the first half of the week, but then it got freaking hot and I was ready to go home.

Back to the topic of DST.  Let me just tell you - the alarm seemed to go off REALLY early today. Generally speaking, I'm a fan of DST.  This week we'll have plenty of daylight after work to run!  But it is definitely tough in the morning.

What are your thoughts on DST?  Fan or Foe?

Hi-Visibility Clothing

A few of my running friends have recently commented that they can always see me coming "from a mile away."  Hahahah.  I don't know if it's true that they can see me from that far away, but it means that I've been successful in my quest to be seen.  Being an invisible runner can be dangerous.  In contrast, being highly visible means less likely a car won't notice you.

Depending on the weather, here are my three go-to pieces for being highly visible

For warmish weather I have what I call my 'safety cone orange' shirt.  Sometimes worn with some pretty wild arm arm warmers.  But I couldn't find it.  So this will have to do.The black shorts, the skirt, even the arm warmers don't really stand out in this blurry camera phone photo.  But the safety cone orange shirt does!

For cooler weather I like my Brooks Night-life half-zip.  I'm told that the green color really glows in the sunlight. In this photo, I was standing in the shade, and it still stands out (which is good, I want to be seen in both good and poor lighting conditions)

When temps are frigid, I wear this jacket with the florescent yellow body.  Yellow in the front and back.  Black sleeves.  Even in the photo, you can see how the yellow stands out and the black just disappears into the background.  That's why I try to avoid running in black as an outer layer.

Your turn!  What are some of your favorite hi-visibility pieces?

Running and Stress Reduction

Ever have anyone ask you why you run?  More and more, I realize that I'm a very social runner.  I almost always run with someone else.  I have a hard time motivating myself to run alone.  I guess the social aspect must be one of the main reasons that I run.

But what I find even more interesting, is how I feel when I don't run as often as I want.  I don't really feel lonely. I don't necessarily miss my friends.  Despite it being a social activity, I don't necessarily miss the social part so much. However, I definitely notice an increase in my stress level. I also become more irritable and more easily agitated.  Clearly, running must be a large part of my coping strategy, a way to deal with stress even if I don't recognize that as one of the main reasons why I run.

I'm not sure if it's the running itself or the combination of running and talking that works so well for me.  Whatever it is, it works. So going with an analogy along the lines of the saying that running is cheaper than therapy*, perhaps my running partners are my therapists and the trail is my couch, or something like that.

Where am I going with this?

As it turns out, I haven't been able to run after work during the week since November due to lack of daylight.  Eek!  Not a recipe for a happy me.

Well, we finally have just enough daylight to make a 30 min run possible.  So I met up with two of my running friends after work yesterday, so we ran.  Afterwards, I felt terrific!  Not in the "this was a great run the way that people who normally measure runs" kind of way, but in a "wow, I forgot how effective running is at melting away my mid-week stress, especially right after work!"  I'd venture to guess that my co-workers will find me much more pleasant to be around today.

How about you?  Is running a big part of your coping strategy as well?  If so, do you find that running solo works for you?  Or are you a social running like me? 

* I'm not fully convinced that running actually *is* cheaper than therapy.  However, I am certain that it is more fun.  ;-)

Half the battle is in your mind...

"Things turn out best for the people who make the best of the way things turn out." - John Wooden

Not sure how (or if) I'm going to work that quote into my post today, but it seems like a good thought, especially for a Monday.

Over the course of the past 4 days, I managed to "run" (and I use the term loosely) a total of 16.9 miles.  May not seem like much to you, but given that I only ran 29.4 miles the entire month of February, this is a step up for me.

Here's the best part.  On Sunday afternoon, I was running with my running partner and we were both feeling really sluggish.  We had decided to run "to the gate" which essentially means until the path we were on dead ends.  We were maybe half a mile from the gate when I abruptly turned around and said "I just can't do this today."  But then I decided that was crazy talk.  I could in fact do this, I simply didn't want to.  And actually, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that, I actually *did* want to.  So we turned around again, screamed "We can do this!" and in fact went all the way to the gate.  Huzzah!  Positive self-talk for the win!

I deserve a cookie or 12 for that, don't you think?  No?  Well how about something fitness-related then?  Better?  Yeah, I thought so too.  I am now the happy owner of a second pair of the new Merrell Mix Master Move Glide, this time in the greenish color scheme.  You can't really tell from the photo, but they are some BRIGHT shoes.  

Truth be told, I bought the shoes before my break-through positive self-talk moment.  But at least now I feel like I deserve them.  And as you may have guessed, this means that I have decided that I am happy with this particular style.  

Mondays are typically my rest day, but there is a part of me that is itching to get on my bike.  Looking at the weather, it probably won't happen today.  The forecast for the afternoon shows crazy wind (30mph-ish).  Ick. Okay, maybe tomorrow... 

Happy Monday!

Feb Numbers and March Plans

Numbers

• 48.9 miles by feet (20.0 miles walking, 29.8 miles running)
• 1 race (sweetheart 5K)
• 2 visits to chiropractor (grrrr....stupid back)
• 1 pair new running shoes (Merrell move glide)
• 1 pair new glasses (and hey...I like them!)
• 2 birthdays (mine and husband's)
• 2nd t-shirt quilt (love it!)
• 1 vacation planned
• 1 year long "photo a day" project completed

Thoughts

• February always seems to be a challenge for me.  And once again, not really the numbers I wanted to achieve.  But it is what it is.  No looking back.  Just looking forward.
• The time change is just around the corner.  I expect my running to increase when the opportunity to run in daylight after work presents itself again.  

Plans

• This weekend I'm planning to register for the 10K at the Albuquerque Half Marathon.  I need a goal to help me get serious about running again.

Thursday Three

1) I received my t-shirt quilt.  Yay!  Similar to the first one that I had done, I had this one made with 12 shirts, which works out to a nice size for a throw.  Here's a close up of two of the squares.  I'd like to point out that even the square from a really boring black print on white t-shirt looks interesting with a coordinating border around it. Nice way to reuse those old event shirts that are taking up space in the closet.

2) As if I'm not having enough aches and pains already, I had to do something stupid to add some more.  This morning I tripped over one of my dogs while looking for the headset for my phone.  I'm now sporting two lovely bruises: one on my knee, one on my hip.  I'm sure that will make running tomorrow fun...

3)  The recent winter storm has managed to bypass us for the most part.  They had more snow in Tuscon & Phoenix (which pretty much never get snow) than we did here in the Albuquerque area.  That is bizarre.  I'm not complaining, just amazed.  Here's hoping for good running weather this weekend!!

First Impressions

My new Merrell Mix Master Move Glide running shoes arrived!  Just in time for my birthday and Valentines Day.  Haven't had a chance to run in them yet, but here are my first impressions from trying them on around the house.

1) They are very similar in cut/style/fit/weight/feel to my beloved Kinvara 2s.  This is a good thing. One difference is the tread.  I'm guessing that the Kinvara is intended to be more of a road shoe whereas this is intended to be more of a trail shoe. In any event, I'm currently feeling confident that these will work out well for me.

2) I ordered the same size that I wear in the Pace Glove which is also the same size that I wear in the Kinvara 2.  Seems like the correct call.

3) Looks like the shoe will hold up well, but of course the only way to really know for sure is to put some miles on them.

4) The reflective stripe around the shoe is a nice add.  I appreciate the effort to improve my visibility as a runner.

5) I haven't even run in them yet and I'm already thinking about what color I want for my next pair! :-)