Monday – 3 easy becomes 4 easy (@ 10:12)
Josh, Amy and I planned our schedule 3 miler for lunch on Monday. Everybody wanted something flat, so I suggested an out & back on the waterfront. The path is used mostly by snowmobiles in the winter, so I was hoping that it’d be hard packed enough to easily run on. It got a little rough in the section between the Super 8 & the Dee Stadium, but for the most part it was pretty decent. We were only supposed to run 3 but Amy and I lost track of time gabbing away didn’t turn around until the 2 mile mark, so we ended up with 4 miles for the day.
Tuesday – 8 x 400 Intervals
We usually do these up at the SDC track, but work trumped runch so I ended up doing them on my treadmill after work. I do find doing intervals on the treadmill easier than the track. I set up a work out on my FR620 to alert every quarter-mile, I hit a button to speed the treadmill up, and hit another button to slow down. Pretty brainless.
I will say that having the watch right in front of my face was both a blessing and a curse because each time I looked a that the distance, it was way less then I thought I’d gone. I’d be sprinting along, convinced that I was half-way done, and I’d glance that watch only to see that it said I went .06 miles. Demoralizing, I tell you.
I don't know why my 2nd & 3rd intervals are slower than the rest, I had the treadmill speed set the same for everything. Strange, but oh well.
I get a giggle out of the peaks and valleys on the interval graphs. You can see my warm-up, which I think was 10 minutes(?), and then each interval. My between-interval recovery was 12:00, but toward the end, I slowed down to 12:15 because I need a little bit longer for my heart rate to come back down from the atmosphere.
I cranked up the speed after the 4th interval, as you can tell by the peaks in this graph. I was pushing over 180 bpm on those last ones, but I never felt like puking. Bonus.
I don’t know why I have that outlier on the cadence graph.
I ended the last interval right around 4.5 miles, so I cooled down until I hit 5 miles and called it quits. This was a tough work out but I felt surprisingly good in the end. Tired, but a good tired.
Wednesday – 3 miles easy turns into 5 (@ 10:17)
Another extended easy run for this week. It was nice out and I decided to run down to my mom & dad’s house with Zoe instead of noodling around the neighborhood. I also decided to use this run as an wear both my FR305 & FR620 devices to see how they matched up.
The good news is that the distances were pretty much right on. The FR620 would always alert first, but the FR305 was never more than a second behind.
Unfortunately the instantaneous paces were off the entire way, by a lot. For the most part, the FR620 always said that I was going faster than the FR305, but I think the FR305 was the accurate one just based on how I was feeling & what my heart rate was saying.
I figured the two were going to be far apart, but I was pleasantly surprised to see that they were pretty darn spot on.
One thing that I was also pleased about was the cadence. I’ve been using a footpod attached to my right shoe with the FR305 and it seems to frequently lose contact with the device. The FR620 has an accelerometer in the watch and the heart rate monitor strap.
Here’s the chart for the FR620:
And for the FR305:
Zoe and I did stop briefly to talk to Josh who was biking his way home, but that’s the only drop-off that we had with the FR620. The FR305 was all over the map, which was pretty typical. I was never impressed with that thing. I haven’t done any more comparisons since, maybe I’ll take both of them on next weekend’s long run.
Thursday – 40 minute tempo
I think I’ve read every article that the internet has to offer on doing tempos and I’m still feel like I’m just winging it. This time, instead of running by pace, I thought I’d run by heart rate. According to a lot of the articles I read, I should be running a tempo “comfortably hard” or between 80%-90% of my maximum heart rate. My resting heart rate is 61 and my maximum heart rate is 190, so 80-90% translates to between 164-177bpm for me.
There’s this cool feature on the Garmin Connect website which allows you to set up workouts, and you can set limits like pace, cadence or heart rate zones to your intervals. So, I created this workout with a heart rate zone and zapped it over to my watch.
After the mile warm-up, it beeped five times and told me to GET GOING. It beeped at me in the most annoying manner until my heart rate was in the configured zone. Once I got in the zone, it gave a happy little chirp. When I fell out of the zone, I got an angry little chirp. Once I hit the 40 minute time limit, it played a little song (I'm not sure if I was supposed to dance or not) to let me know that the workout was over and I could do whatever I wanted for the rest of the time.
The tempo went pretty well, I felt like I was running at a pace which was a challenge, but I could sustain throughout the interval. I had to push to keep my heart rate in the zone on the downhills but I didn’t have to slow down at all when I hit the uphills.
I ended up going just over 4.5 miles at and 8:44 pace for the 40 minutes, just under a 10k overall. Bonus, I didn’t feel like death when it was all over. I guess this means progress?
Friday – REST
TGIF and my running shoes can stay in the closet on this day.
Saturday – 3 miles easy (@ 11:27)
Josh and I were heading out of town on a quick trip to Menominee, MI first thing in the morning and I didn’t want to miss this run so I got up at 5:45AM and hit the treadmill. I forgot to plug in the footpod calibration factor into my FR620, so it only registered 2.87 miles when the treadmill hit 3 miles. Oops.
Anyway, this was only three miles, but they felt really hard. My legs were heavy and stiff and I felt pretty uninspired to push any faster.
After a shower, I dropped off Zoe at my mom & dad’s and we took off to Menominee (in a snowstorm, no less) to pick up this beauty. Take that, snow.
Sunday – 90 minute long run
This was just okay. It was cold, really windy and I developed a blister at mile 3 which caused me major discomfort for the rest of the run. Couple that with being over-tired from the long drive from the previous day and you have a meh run.
Summary
I ended up with 32.25 miles for the week, which I believe is the most weekly miles I've ever logged for any of my previous half marathons. I'm sort of surprised, but I'm feeling pretty good after all this running. Aside from Sunday's blister and some tight calves, my body's holding up pretty well (leaving now, to knock on some wood). I like the variety of the runs - even though I'm growing to loathe tempos - it makes the week go by faster and it makes me feel like I'm actually training with focus rather than just plodding along aimlessly.
This week, we revisit hills (oh joy) and try not to die during a 45 minute tempo.
Monday - 3 miles easy (@ 10:18)
It was balmy 40-something outside when Josh and I headed out for this (r)unch. My legs were feeling pretty trashed after the previous weekend and somebody (not me) decided to route us up some hills of death in East Houghton which resulted in me taking a walk break or two. Couple that with a nasty headwind, and you have the makings of a not-so-easy run. The pace would indicate otherwise, but this was a struggle.
Tuesday – Hills of Death
I missed the first hill session a few weeks ago due to a bum knee, but I was ready for this one. Or, as ready as I’d ever be. We chose the hill from the Super 8 to Collect Avenue, which is right around 200 meters long. It’s a steady incline for two-thirds of the hill, turns a corner and then hits a very sharp incline for the last third.
The jog over from campus was quite nice, but all I could really think of was how much this was going to hurt and it sure did. I was trying to keep my heart rate to a reasonable level for the first part so I wouldn’t give myself a heart attack during the much steeper climb on the second, but I mostly failed on that one.
Each time I rounded the corner, I was already in the Oh God I’m going to die zone and I had all I could do just to hang on and grind it out and keep from puking at the end. I came really close during the second interval.
Here’s some pretty table and graphs that show my misery.
After our repeats were done, we jogged back to campus and I think we ended up with just over 3 miles for the day.
Wednesday - 3 miles easy (@ 10:24)
I was feeling pretty beat up from the prior day’s hills, so Zoe and I just jogged a little out & back on Covered Drive Road.
Thursday – 30 minute tempo (5 miles @ 8:55)
We had a shorter tempo run this week, only 30 minutes, so that was nice. I did a short warm-up then ran 15 minutes out & 15 minutes back, followed by a cool-down jog back home.
I’m kind of meh about this tempo because I ended up making several mid-run stops for Zoe to do her business. I must not have told her how you need to take care of that before you head out for a run.
Also, this was the first run I took with my new watch. I’ve been running with the Garmin Forerunner 305 since 2006 and it’s been a very reliable device. About a year ago, it started to not want to turn on and I’d have to do a hard reset on it to get it going. Those times were few and far between, so I never really considered getting a new one. Unfortunately, in the last three months, it’s been doing it more frequently and this last month it was doing it all the time. Then the battery started to act flaky – it’d tell me it was fully charged one minute, then five minutes later it’d be telling me the battery way low. So, I finally took the plunge and upgraded to the Garmin Forerunner 620.
It’s got a ton of bells and whistles that I’m still trying to work my way through, but so far I really like it. There’s a lot of complaining in the Garmin support forums about inaccurate GPS data and the watch being generally buggy, but so far I haven’t experienced any of those issues.
Friday & Saturday – Rest
Rest days, drank some beer, did some not running stuff.
Sunday – 5k race
The training plan called for a 5k race, but it’s not like anybody’s putting on a 5k in the middle of March up here, so I decided I was just going to run my own 5k.
Josh was doing the same, so he, Zoe and I took off at the same time. Josh was doing a longer warm-up than me, so I started my “race” before him. Zoe and I were cruising along well until she realized that Josh wasn’t with us, then she got all worried about where he was.
She spent the majority of her time looking behind her, and each time she’d do that, she’d end up veering right in front of me. Or, she’d just stop completely and I’d have to yell at her to keep going. After a completely frustrating .75 miles, I finally decided to stop and wait for Josh to catch up. I handed Zoe off to him and took off again, but I could never get my mojo back and I knew the 5k was already in the toilet, so I just said eff this and called it quits. Zoe and I headed back home. I was pretty ticked off about it at first, but I’d made my peace with it by the time I got home. Sometimes shit happens. What can you do.
If Josh wasn’t being a slacker in the blog department, he’d probably write a post talking about how he ended up doing his 5k in 24:56! Very impressive!
Summary – another week done
I ended the week with just under 17 miles @ 10:22. This week, we have a full schedule - intervals, tempos, a weekend long run and a few things in-between, like the annual St. Patrick’s Day storm! Go home Winter, you’re drunk.
]]>Monday – 3 miles easy (@10:56)
It was still pretty cold outside, so I plugged away on the treadmill for this one. I was having one of those days where running on the treadmill seems harder than outside.
Tuesday – 7x400 Intervals (overall 4.63 miles @ 9:41)
Josh and I did these at the SDC over lunch. The track is usually pretty empty around lunchtime, but it was a bit crowded and we ended up doing a lot of swerving around people and dodging errant basketballs.
I was keeping track of the laps manually on my watch at the line on the floor, so I don’t know why my distance is saying .27 miles when it should be .25. Maybe my footpod needs calibrating again?
Overall, I ended up with a smidge over 4.5 miles for the session, including warm-up & cool-down. Overall pace was 9:41.
Here’s our splits for the seven laps. I probably ran that first one too fast.
And here’s the pretty heart rate graph for those laps.
Wednesday – 3 miles easy (@ 11:00)
Treadmill run, unspectacular.
Thursday – 45 minute tempo (overall 4.51 miles @ 9:17)
I’ve done two tempo runs so far, and I’m still just as confused as ever with how to do them. I read a lot of articles on them, but it seems like every one contradicts the other.
I’m following the Hal Hidgon advance HM plan, and Hal’s recommended tempo is sort of a right-shifted bell-curve where you gradually work toward your 10k pace and then when you reach it, which should be in the final 2/3 of your tempo, you just hold it for a few minutes before slowing down. He includes the warm-up & cool-down in the total tempo time.
Other articles advise to exclude the warm-up & cool-down from the total temp time, and also have you stay at your 10k pace for longer. Others just recommend doing tempo intervals. Ugh, so confusing.
Since I really don’t know what my 10k pace is, I just try to pick something that’s hardish and hold it for my fast section. Here’s what I ended up doing.
The first mile was my warm-up. Then I gradually worked my way toward 10k pace, dropping my speed each mile. I held my 10k pace for a mile, then started to back off until I hit 45 minutes and jogged back home. I have no idea if this is how I’m supposed to be doing tempo runs.
My overall pace for this run was 9:17 and I ended up with 5.50 miles.
Friday – Rest
I was pretty tired from the pervious runs, so I did an hour of yoga/stretching and called it good.
Saturday - 3 miles @ HM pace (overall 4.39 miles @ 9:02)
This one was a little huh? moment after I was done with this one. I’m shooting for a 2:00ish HM, so that’s a 9:09 pace. I decided I was going to run this on the upper end of hard, but try to stay out of puke territory.
Started out with a .50 mile warm-up, which wasn’t much of a warm-up thanks to Zoe, the dog that can’t go slow. Then I just started dialing in a pace that I felt like I could hold, but wasn’t all that easy. My plan was to do that for three miles, then jog back home.
I wasn’t keeping too close of an eye on my watch, just mostly distance because I was doing an out and back and wanted to not miss my turn-around. I glanced at my pace every so often just to make sure I was keeping it in the range I wanted to be in, but I was mostly going by effort. Every once in a while I’d do the talk test to see how I was doing (full sentences with no problem – too slow; a few words between breaths – just right, and where I was) and confuse Zoe. She’d throw me the strangest looks over her shoulder, as if she was saying “Who in the world are you talking to??”
I finished my miles and jogged back home. My watch said my average pace was 9:02, which was a little surprising. And it wasn’t until I pulled the data from my Garmin to see how I did that I realized I’d overshot my 3 miles and conveniently ended up with exactly 5k at race pace. That ended up being 26:45 which is a holy shit PR for me.
Sunday – 90 minute easy (overall 9.25 miles @ 10:03)
Thanks to Josh doing a downtime into the wee hours of the morning and DST (which I think is officially dumb), we didn’t get started until mid-afternoon. The weather was a balmy 38 degrees, but it was pretty windy.
I started out well enough, but about a mile into the run, my legs started to complain. They were tight, heavy and burning. Hi, lactic acid. The entire run was pretty unpleasant but the absolute worst part was the mile and a half climb up S. Superior Road back home. Hoo boy, I was in the pain arena for that entire stretch. I stopped once and strongly considered giving up entirely, but we were only a half mile from home and there way no way I was going to bail on nine miles in the last half mile. Also, I was with Josh and I wasn’t going to make him finish walking, either. So, I sucked it up, gritted my teeth (literally), and pleaded with the running gods to let me keep running. I made it, but it was pretty miserable.
Summary – I survived; feeling okay
I’m a little disappointed with how I felt on the long run, I was hoping for nice and easy and I got misery and despair, but overall I think this was a pretty good week.
I ended up with a smidge under 30 miles @ 9:53.
Next week, we have hill repeats. I missed the first session because of my bum knee, but I’m ready for these ones. Maybe I’ll do mine on S. Superior Road for a little redemption.
]]>I screwed up my knee last Saturday morning shoveling snow (I knew that was a bad idea) and hobbled around all day Saturday and Sunday. It was still bothering me on Monday & Tuesday, so no running on those days. It felt almost back to normal by Wednesday, so that’s when I started.
Monday – 3 miles easy
That was a pass for me, but I was able to ride my bike trainer for 30 minutes at an easy pace. As long as I kept my cadence below 90, my knee felt pretty good. Anything over than that caused me some discomfort, so it was kind of a snoozer of a ride.
Tuesday – 6x200 hill repeats
Another pass on this one, but I did do an interval based trainer ride to compensate, albeit slightly. Josh did this workout on the treadmill while I was on the trainer and all I can say is that I’m not looking forward to doing these.
Wednesday – 3 miles easy
The training plan called for this run to be between 10:30 – 11:30 and I ended up with an average pace of 11:05. My knee felt pretty good as long as I didn’t go any faster than 10:00. I had a couple of twinges toward the end, but nothing major. Ice packs are my friend.
Thursday – 40 minute tempo
Josh and I headed up to the SDC at lunch to knock this one out. We did a 15 minute warm-up, followed by 20 minutes of slowly working up to race pace, and ending with a 5 minute cool-down.
I was pretty happy with this first tempo, but it was really hard. Those last two laps were downright brutal. They were our fastest laps, I think we did them in the high 8s, and I could feel the nausea slowly creeping up my stomach during the last half lap. Happiness is crossing the finish line and keeping the contents of your stomach off of the track. We ended up with 4 miles in 40 minutes.
Friday – Rest
Rested. Caught up on “Sherlock” and started watching the original “House of Cards”.
Saturday – 1 hour 30 minute long run (3:1)
What do you do when the forecast calls for –25 wind chill and the training plan says a 90 minute long run? Convince the rest of Team /var/run that a long run sufferfest at the SDC was in order. I’d originally suggested on doing the entire run on the treadmill (ugh), but Amy suggested doing it on the track, so we went with that plan. We got there early, got on the track, and were about to start running when some meathead football dude came over and told us (in a rather assholish manner) that we should go elsewhere. Um, what? After looking at the online schedule, which said the track was open, and calling to confirm (yep, track is open), it turns out that the football team had the track reserved for the first hour of our run. Hey, SDC – thanks for having your shit together. Hey Football Meathead – thank for being a giant asshole.
Anyway, up to the fitness center we went, grumbling the entire way. We slogged through 60 minutes on the treadmill, which was pretty brutal. I ended up stopping twice, once when I accidentally paused the belt (what can I say, it had a display with a ton of options and I like to press buttons), and once when the time limit was reached and it automatically went into cool-down mode. I had to mess around with it for a bit to get my final five minutes in.
Once that was done, we headed down to the track to do our final 30 minutes. The 3:1 long run is supposed to be done with the first 3/4 at an easy pace and the last 1/4 at or near race pace. By the time we hit the last 1/4, Amy and I were pretty beat, so we ended up settling a pace that was race pace + 30. In the end, we ended up with a smidge over 9 miles for 90 minutes, so right around a 10 minute mile.
Sunday – 3 miles easy
My legs felt pretty heavy following Saturday’s long run, and my feet were sore from spending a few hours in the basement unpacking boxes (yes, still) so I took this one pretty easy. 3 miles @ 11:21. Bonus: ALL BASEMENT BOXES ARE UNPACKED!
Summary – I survived; feeling good
Cycling: 22 miles @ 22 mph
Running: 19 miles @ 10:25
Next week we start intervals (dun, dun, DUNNNN). 7x400 @ 5k race is on the schedule for Tuesday followed by a meeting with a personal trainer. There’s a program at work called SWEAT, no idea what it stands for-too lazy to look it up, and you can either do group workout sessions or do sessions with a personal trainer. The group sessions are right after work, which won’t really work out well now that we have doggie bladders to consider, so Josh, Amy and I all signed up with a personal trainer. I’m not really quite sure what they’re going to do with the three of us, but I think it’ll be an interesting experience. And bonus – we get to use the SDC for free during the 6-week program, so I’ll gladly take that.
]]>
Except that I'm doing the half marathon and not the marathon because I'm not crazy enough to train for a marathon in the winter. This one's scheduled for May 18th and we'll have entire Team /var/run there, so it's going to be a lot of fun.
I've been having a tough time figuring out how I want to deal with training for this race. I usually just find a plan with four days of running, and (...wait for it...) run. I tend bypass any plan that has speed work or tempos because I'm not really sure what they are or how to do them. This time I actually wanted to see what my body could handle, so I put out a couple of feelers to some awesome runner friends of mine and asked them what I should be doing. Using their advice, and probably sprinkled with a little bit of over-confidence, I found a plan that will probably kill me, but hopefully I'll get a PR crossing the finish line before that happens.
I decided to go with Hal Higdon's advanced half marathon plan. Here's a little snippet, click on it for the full calendar.
When I found this plan a few of weeks ago, I knew it was going to be hard, but I tried not to get too freaked out about it. But now that training starts on Monday, and I'm looking at the plan and OMG all the running, and the race is ONLY 12 weeks out - I'm starting to feel a little overwhelmed and anxious. I never really worried about that sort of stuff with my other plans because, ultimately, they were pretty easy. This plan, though, it could be too much running. It could be too hard. I could get injured.
Or it could be none of those things. I try to stay optimistic about most things but sometimes when I'm presented with something new, my pessimistic side bubbles to the surface. I think it'll be important for me to stay positive during these next 12 weeks. To do my best not get get overwhelmed, take it one run at a time, and try to stay focused on the prize. My goal is to finish as close to 2:00 as I can. We'll see what happens.
Day 29 - Christmas Swag/Zoe's Birthday/Nighttime Run
This little monkey turned the Big O-N-E, so we had to celebrate by going for a run.
I was also testing out the new swag Josh Santa brought me for Christmas - Brooks Cascadia 7 shoes and a headlamp.
I wasn't really keeping an eye on my watch (hard to do with headlamp & holding a dog leash), so I mostly was just going by feel. I was kind of surprised when I saw the results, I usually drag on the uphill sections of this route. That last mile - I have no idea. That's the most uphill section of the route and it's usually a struggle. Tailwind?
Day 30 - Come Get Me Run
Josh was putting in a half day at work, so I took that opportunity to run down to my mom & dad's house and have him pick me up on the way home. I'm only sort of excited about my pace. Aside from a small uphill in the first .5 mile, it's downhill the rest of the way. Factor in Zoe pulling me and we have an impressive time. Eh.
It was also fairly warm outside, so I was able to run in lighter gear. The Oiselle Lux top that I got from Amy and Oiselle Lesley tights were just right for the temp. Josh picked up lunch on the way home. Rodeo, of course, in honor of our Team /var/run Friday lunch tradition.
Day 31 - One and Done
After spending half of the day shoveling off the roof, then the other half shoveling the snow that was on the roof, by body didn't want to be be doing anything other than sitting by the fire, downing Ibuprofen and drinking wine. But, gotta keep the streak alive, so one slow one on the treadmill was all I could muster. I was running easy for this one, my entire body was hurting.
Side note: I've been using the Brooks PureFlow 2s for my treadmill runs. For years I've been running in the most cushiony shoes I could find, and I really wanted to see if I could make the switch to a more minimalist shoe. I've been keeping my runs in them pretty short (under 4 miles) and I did have some complains from my shins & quads when I first starting using them, but now they're my go-to treadmill. I've also been using them when we run on the track at the SDC, but I've found that my shins do quite a bit of complaining afterwards so I don't know how these shoes are going to pan out for non-treadmill running.
Day 32 - Frigid Five (point five)
This run was cold as hell.
But, what the hell is going on with my time?
My last three outside runs have been in under 10:00. What?
I figured Day 29's run was a fluke. Maybe I accidentally told my watch to use the foodpod instead of the GPS. Maybe I was just having a good day. I dunno. Day 30 was all downhill with some help from gravity & Zoe, so I pretty much wrote that one off.
Yesterday when we took off, I figured I'd be back to my usual mid-10:00 slog for this route. It's a a bit hilly for the first three miles then there's about a mile downhill before we hit another climb back to the house. The last time I ran this with Josh on Thanksgiving day, I had a hard time keeping my pace up. I even had to stop a couple of times to get my heart rate back down from the stratosphere (aka pukeville). I'd classify that run as hard. This time around I found I was fairly comfortable with my pace and my heart rate stayed in the high 160s to low 170s the entire time. My splits were all under 10:00, which is definitely not the norm for me. What, what?
There's a couple of factors that probably contribute to this speed drop. I lost a few pounds bringing me back down to my pre-marathon eat-all-the-things weight. I've been running EVERY FREAKING DAY FOR THE LAST 32 DAYS. And I've been throwing speedwork into my routine every week or so with intervals on the treadmill or track sessions with the Team /var/run crew. Do these things for a month straight and I'm bound to see some improvement, right? I think? Anybody?
In any event, I'll just keep doing the same things and see where it gets me. Since 2013 is coming to a close, it's time to pick my spring half marathon. I've decided not to do Journeys this year. I've done it five times already and I'm getting bored with it. I've got a couple of races in mind, but I haven't settled on anything yet. Soon.
I'm averaging right around 17 miles/week. Sometimes I'll throw in a longer 5+ mile run, but typically I've been keeping them short & sweet. I've been running with the team /var/run folks during lunch at work more, and that restricts my run time to about 30-35 minutes. I didn't think I'd like running during lunchtime, but coming home and not having to get a run out of the way is pretty convenient. I'm not sure Zoe would agree, but she thinks we should be running all the time.
Here we are post run(ch). I believe this is the one where I made everybody run around campus until my mileage got to exactly 3.00. The previous run(ch) we ended on 2.99 and it made me twitchy for days. Payback, bitches.
Here's another one of our run where Amy and I are busting out our sweet moves. Note that we were under the bridge. Note that we might have been breaking the law ("No Pedestrians"). (photo by Amy)
And another one of our mid-run dance breaks. Or something. (photo by Josh)
Post-lunchtime runs also turn out to not be as bad as I thought they'd
be, logistically speaking. It required a bit of trial an error the first
few times, but now that I've been doing a few run(ch)s, I've finally
got my system down. My run(ch) kit contains a bag with spare make-up
and toiletries, the ShowerPill (which is pretty much my savior), and
my most important item - a post-run hat because there is no saving my
hair after a run. I sit behind a desk and write code all day
long, so it's okay to toss on a hat for an afternoon of tapping away on a keyboard, but if I'd probably skip run(ch) on a day where I had an afternoon meeting.
My treadmill and I are also becoming pretty good buddies, however, it doesn't matter that it's my own treadmill in my own basement, I still can't stand to log more than 30 minutes at a time on the thing. If I just need to tick off a mile or two, I'll just punch in a speed and go, but if I need a longer run or something a bit more challenging, I'll do an interval workout.
There's a 2nd page to that workout, one of these days I'll make it fit on one small piece of paper, but continually flipping it around makes life interesting. This is a pretty challenging workout for me, especially minutes 7-8 at 6.9mph (8:34 minute mile). I do not run that fast, ever, and I have all I can do to just hold that pace and keep from flailing myself onto the floor. I'm also certain that timer pauses when I'm not staring at it every second because sometimes those intervals mighty long (*I'm giving you the side-eye, treadmill timer*). But the interval workout sure does makes the time go by so much faster than when I'm just plodding along watching something silly on Hulu.
Fast forward to Christmas, where I got a swag update - new shoes and a headlamp!
The shoes are Brooks Cascadia 7s, my go-to winter running shoe. This is the third pair I've had. The first one was a Cascadia 6 and it fit like a dream. When it was time to replace them, I went with the latest version (7s) in the same size, only to find out that they were just a smidge smaller than the 6s. They didn't cause me any problems, but my feet definitely felt swished when I wore thick winter socks. So, this time, I asked for a half-size up to accommodate my socks and, eventually, insoles. Sizing up was the right thing to do, I ran 4 miles in them last night and my feet felt very unrestricted and happy.
I used the headlamp for the first time last night. I had to keep messing with it in order to get the light pointed the way I wanted to, and I didn't like that I have to turn all the way around to see what's going on behind me, but ultimately it's way better than running with a flashlight. I'll come in handy if we ever find enough people to put a team together for a Ragnar Relay, too.
One thing I discovered last night was how reflective Zoe's orange vest is.
I haven't noticed it before since we're typically running in daylight, but my headlamp was really making it glow. This is good because, it means cars can see us. She also wears a blinky light on her collar, so we're really hi-vis over here.
Speaking of Miz Zoe, she turned 1 yesterday! It took a while for her to settle into a routine, but now after 5 months, she's trained us pretty well.
She pesters me relentlessly when I'm doing yoga/stretching/whatever on the floor. If I'm doing situps, she'll sit on me. If I'm doing planks or pushups, she'll wiggle under me and squirm around. It's annoying, but pretty funny so I don't get too worked up over it.
She tolerates me dressing her up in little outfits. Here she is in her puffy coat and booties. She runs in the booties on super cold days. They don't have much traction so when we hit some slippery patches, she ends up looking like Bambi on the ice.
She loves riding in the car. Note the same posture of these two.
She loves running and will go wherever & whenever.
And she sometimes has to share her bed with Pippen, but she doesn't seem to mind.
We frequently get asked what kind of dog she is. We typically say that she's a German Shepherd mix, but I've always wanted to know her exact genetic makeup. Turns out you can get a DNA test for your dog - hello Wisdom Panel.
I think it'll be useful in determining whether she's predisposed to any genetic heath issues based on her breed profile. And also, I'm just really curious to know. She already takes up too much room on the bed, so fingers crossed for some really small breed so she'll stop growing!
Here's my log, to-date:
The weather has been so crappy the last several days, that a lot of my miles have been on the treadmill. Today, though, it was primo outside running weather. Granted, it was only about 7 degrees, but for the first time in probably four days, there was no wind so Zoe and I headed out. She's sporting her new high-visibility coat. Safety first!
She's not bothered by the cold or the snow. She's a machine.
When we finished, she was sporting an impressive ice goatee.
And then she crashed in front of the wood stove for the rest of the day.
I recovered by spending the day in my new festive compression socks. Keep it tight, man.
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This year, right around the time when I was falling right back into that same old black hole, along comes the 2013 Holiday Running Streak from Runner's World. The premise is simple - run at least 1 mile from Thanksgiving to New Year's Day. Somehow my Team /var/run teammates didn't think I was nuts for suggesting we do it, so here we go!
Day 1 (Thanksgiving Day) - 6.25 miles for the Team /var/run Virtual Turkey Trot 10Tkay
Day 2 - 4.25 miles with Zoe and her ice whiskers
My legs are feeling pretty sore and tight after two days of hard-ish running on the squishy roads, so I think tomorrow might need to be a short day.
Our roads were snow covered with a few icy patches but I put a fresh set of screws in my shoes, so I was all set.
We managed a 10:20 overall pace, which was pretty good despite feeling like I was going to die for the first three or four miles.
I haven't really been doing much running in the last several weeks, and Josh and Zoe are speedsters so keeping up with them was a challenge. Fortunately, I'm doing the Runner's World Holiday Running Streak for the next 33 days, so that'll get me back in shape.
Zoe does not sit still for photos. I tried to get one shot of all the ice on her whiskers, but my cameras not fast enough. Anyway, here's Josh's photos for the day:
Josh had to go to work for a giant project that his group is working on, so it was an early dinner for us. These two stared at me the entire time I ate. Can't figure out why.
This one wasn't bothered.
Time for more pie, Happy Thanksgiving!