Hello friends. I know it's been a while since I've updated. I am in my third week of school and it has taken some adjustment to get used to having schoolwork again. I also just got home from Florida, where I attempted to keep up with my training while enjoying time with my family.
The runs have definitely been getting longer and harder. On my last run, I felt like I had hit a wall. It was a 5 minute warm up, 5 minute run, 2 minute walk, 8 minute run, 2 minute walk, and 3 minute run. I felt miserable the whole run. This might have been because I was running in Florida and it was 85 degrees but felt like over 90 degrees with heat and humidity. I felt like my face was on fire and I was constantly looking at the time to see how much time was left on the run. I did finish each run completely but I really hated every step I took. After that run, I had this mental block to going out and running again in Florida. Plus we were crazy busy the rest of the weekend and I never made it out again.
I was understandably very nervous to go out tonight and run. Today was Week 5 Day 3 and consisted of a 5 minute warm up, 8 minute run, 2 minute walk, and 10 minute run. I didn't work today and went out this evening after working on schoolwork and running errands. It was about 7:15 this evening and it was already getting dark. The temp was about 68 or so and I was actually a little chilly until I had gotten into the first run. I contemplated wearing a long sleeve shirt next run but I was warm enough by the time I was finished. I say this because when I ran in Florida, it was about 25 degrees warmer and around noon, so the sun was very hot.
I feel like I made a breakthrough tonight guys!! I ran the first 8 minutes and when it was time to walk again, I felt like I could have kept on running. I recovered well during the 2 minute walk and I was ready to go again for the 10 minute run. I tried not to think in terms of time and, instead, I knew how many laps around the track I would make in 10 minutes and how many songs I would listen to during that 10 minutes. When 10 minutes was up, I was ready to stop running but I was not out of breath and my mind was not thinking this is one of the most miserable things I've ever done. I wanted to do a victory walk around the track just because I was so pleased with the run. My first mile was 16:27 and I did a total of 2 miles so I improved both my first mile time and the distance I ran.
I'm hoping that my next runs will continue on in this way. I am a little concerned about the fact that it is getting darker earlier and earlier every time I go out. I am able to go out to run a little earlier after work, I get home about 6:15 and usually I like to relax and go out to run at 7. However, I can probably try to go out at 6:30 to take advantage of the light. There will come a time when it is dark when I leave work at 5:30 and I will have to come up with a solution at that time. There were actually quite a few people using the track despite the dark and there were a couple lights on the track but not quite enough to light the whole track. I have thought about trying to find out if there is an indoor track that I can use in Alexandria but I hate the thought of running inside when the weather is still nice enough that I can run outside.
Tomorrow is Wednesday and I am planning on starting week 6.
My schedule for the last 2 weeks of training look like this:
Week 6 Day 1 -- 5 minute warmup, 6 minute run, 1 minute walk, 12 minute run
Week 6 Day 2 -- 5 minute warmup, 10 minute run, 1 minute walk, 8 minute run
Week 6 Day 3 -- 5 minute warmup, 20 minute run with no walking
Week 7 Day 1 -- 5 minute warmup, 15 minute run, 2 minute walk, 5 minute run
Week 7 Day 2 -- 5 minute warmup, 20 minute run, 2 minute walk, 1 minute run
Week 7 Day 3 -- 5 minute warmup, 22 minute run, 1 minute walk, 1 minute run
Week 8 Day 1 -- 5 minute warmup, 25 minute run with no walking
Week 8 Day 2 -- 5 minute warmup, 28 minute run with no walking
Week 8 Day 3 -- 5 minute warmup, 30 minute run with no walking FINISHED!!!
If I finish the training on time, I will still have about 3 weeks until the 5K. I am going to continue to add time onto the 30 minute run so that I can add distance and also work on speeding up a little bit. My goal is to run all or most of the 5K.
Running in Florida
This is what miserable looks like when training for a 5K in Florida
