From Couch to 5k to...who knows? About This Page:

[Amy L]

Good for you getting out there!!

I ran on Monday with a plan to do 5 miles. Well, at mile 1.3 I hit the wall big time. It was hot, I almost stepped on a snake, and I was definitely NOT properly hydrated. I gave in and walked and then after a minute I began to run again, then at mile 2 I had to walk again for about 30 seconds. I was so frustrated! Then all of a sudden things got easier and I ended up running another 2 miles straight. I didn't make my goal of 5, but I did over 4 miles and I ended that run a happy girl. I am sharing this just to let you know that not all runs are easy or go as planned (far from it), but many times we end up surprising ourselves if we don't give up.

[Tinkerboo]

Originally Posted by Amy L

...I almost stepped on a snake...

At least I don't have to worry about stuff like that - the worst that might happen is I go too near a baby seagull and the parents divebomb me!

Thank you all - I definitely need other people to remind me of this kind of thing, as telling myself just doesn't seem to make it sink in.

[kadterp]

Yeah it was hot here in New England Monday and Tuesday. I was supposed to do 3 miles and I ended up stopping at 2. The heat was just way too much for me! I was getting nauseous and I knew that was my body saying stop. Didn't run last night, had to help a friend move some stuff so Im hoping to get outside later! Much cooler now than it was the other day!

[Tim Sullivan]

A lot of people find that they don't get warmed up for the first 10-15 minutes or so in a run, so not surprising at all that it took you the first bit of your run to warm up. I'm the same way, it usually takes me about a KM or so to get me warmed up, then I pick up the pace.

It's great that you forced yourself to get out, I'm the same way looking for any excuse not to get out...which usually passes about 30 seconds into the run

Tim

[OhToodles!]

Great job!!

[Tinkerboo]

Week 5 Run 2
When: Thursday 29th May, 7.00pm
Where: Private road by 'our' beach, with Andy (doing Wk2R1)
Weather: Grey and cloudy with impending rain on the horizon
How long: 36 minutes
How far: 2.34 miles
What's the plan?: 5m (mins) warm-up walk - run 8m - walk 5m - run 8m - 5m cooldown.
How'd I feel?: I was dead set on going tonight after work, so much so that I'd warned Andy in advance that I would be going with or without him, whether it was raining or not. I had to do R2 today so that I could be ready to do R3 on Saturday. Fortunately the rain clouds were keeping a distance and he decided to come too...my commitment is obviously inspiring him!

We did our quick march warm up together and set off when Stacy trilled "begin running". Andy is now onto doing 90s runs while I began my epic EIGHT MINUTES. He shot off as normal while I started at a more conservative pace. The super amazing thing is that...brace yourselves...I actually felt strong! Like I was running properly! With normal strides! Pardon all the exclamation marks!! It was fantastic - my legs didn't feel heavy, my chest wasn't bursting, it was like how I imagine it's meant to feel: proper running. I must have had a massive smile on my face...

I did start to get a bit of a stitch towards the end, I'm not sure why as I wasn't going all out over-exerting myself and I thought I was breathing at the same sort of rate as usual. It faded while I was doing the 5m walk thankfully. Then came the second 8m run and again I started out feeling pretty good about it, but this time it did get tougher as it went on and my brain started trying to calculate how long was left. Also, for about the last 4m the stitch started creeping back and the wind was in my face, neither of which helped! But I thought of you all, and I thought of Lorie, and I kept going. And I did it! And I was so pleased that when Stacy told me there was 1m of my cooldown left, I ran it. Seventeen whole minutes of running - decent running as well - I can hardly believe it.

I think one of the things that helped was that I was listening to different music - usually I have my playlist of different upbeat pop songs, but this time I'd remembered that aaaages ago I bought a CD called 'Running Trax', which is continuous mixes of dance music. I tried it tonight thinking that if I wasn't trying to gauge "I've done x songs, there must be x left to the next break" then time might pass without me noticing, and that does seem to have worked well. And I'd spent so much time crafting the perfect playlist as well!

Another thing is that it was evening - I have never ever been a morning person (we've never come remotely close to seeing a WDW rope drop, put it that way ) and don't think I ever will. Mentally I peak between 8-12, but physically it just takes me ages to get going. I would love to be a person who can bounce out of bed full of energy! So I'm not surprised that I might turn out to be someone who runs better when the clock gets to PM. There are PM Disney races right? Somewhere?

[Amy L]

Great job!!! I knew you could do it!! And, yes, there are night races at Disney - really, really fun night races!! How did your husband do today?

[disney_duke]

The more exclamations the better!!!!!!
What a great day of running. I love it when good running days coincide with hard running lengths/distances. It's like double coupon day.

And why yes, yes there are night time races...... 2 big ones and a "fun" one.
- Expedition Everest 5K + scavenger hunt (so it's almost like a 10K, but only first 5K is spent "running, while the next 2+ miles are spent scavenging through AK)
- Tower of Terror 10 miler
- Wine and Dine Half marathon

All have 10 pm start times. Which is my bedtime.

[Tinkerboo]

Oh pants - I totally forgot to mention him! Andy!

He did okay - he said he did feel more 'worked out' than with the previous sessions, as you would expect given that it's the second week and he's moved from 60s to 90s at a time. That said, when we finished he asked me what run times he'd been doing...clearly not as obsessed with the numbers and calculating while out there as I am! I think he is glad that he came out, and he says he plans to do the next session tomorrow while I'm at work (I think he wants to catch up with me a little instead of sticking at the same gap between us). I've made sure he knows the importance of rest days, but while he's on the early weeks and coping pretty easily I'm not going to insist on them and discourage him from going. But I will have to write down instructions for juggling the apps he needs to use!

Oh, and I forgot to mention that he weighed himself on the day he started (17 stone 1lb - don't tell him I told you!), after one week he'd lost one pound - it's not much but it's a start. "Every journey begins with a single step" and all that.

[Big Baloo]

WooHoo! You had a big day! Congrats! And you did much better than me today, btw. I only got to 1.5 miles and had to walk the rest of the way b/c where my stitches had been (they were taken out last week) began throbbing.
One thought about the pain in your side--are you hydrating enough an hour or so before you run? And one more thought--my DH gets a pain in his side when he's had too much caffeine (more than 1 cup) and then tries to run. Just something to think about....
And yes, the ToT 10miler is a night run and is a BLAST!
Congrats again!

[Milichal]

Yay!!!!

[Tinkerboo]

Week 5 Run 3
When: Sunday 1st June, 10.30am
Where: Private road by 'our' beach, with Andy (doing Wk2)
Weather: Bright and sunny, though luckily not too hot
How long: 38 minutes
How far: 2.22 miles
What's the plan?: 5m (mins) warm-up walk - run 20m - 5m cooldown. Pretty straightforward right?!
How'd I feel?: We hit a bit of a snag in that Andy's app kept malfunctioning - it starts him off on the warm up but then seems to just forget what it's doing and go back to its home screen. Of course if you've put it away instead of holding it in your hand then you don't know this until the point where you think "surely five minutes has gone by, why hasn't it told me to start running?" and take it out to look at. So it did this while we were walking and DID notice it - had to pause mine, stop walking, get him set up again, then re-start - and then apparently it did it again later but he DIDN'T notice and went through that whole "hmm?" thought process before realising what had happened. In the end he had to pace himself by doing roughly 'run half a song, walk half a song' - not super accurate but he was careful not to push TOO hard. He's been having trouble with his achilles tendon because of a certain pair of boots he wears to walk the dog so I told him to be really careful of that, but he has avoided those boots for a couple of days and said it was fine while running today so that's good. This afternoon's task will be to uninstall and reinstall the app in the hope that it fixes the problem...

So onto me - I know you're all dying to know how it went, right? Well, spoiler alert...
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
I DID IT!!!




Sorry for picture overload, but that's how I felt at the end!

I was using my Running Trax dance music again and was planning to just try and get into a 'zen' state where I didn't think about time passing, but I forgot to turn off the voice notifications on Runkeeper so it announced how I was doing every five minutes and I knew exactly how much time had passed. It wasn't too bad though, I might keep it on as it did help me psychologically, knowing when 10m had gone by. As usual I was in Turtle Mode, trotting along with my little shuffle pace, expecting that at some point later on I might feel stronger and able to go faster/take bigger paces...but this didn't really happen this time. I'm not disappointed though, nor too surprised - my body was probably too busy wondering why on earth we hadn't had a walk break yet to deliver me any 'Super Mario' energy boosts! I would say that I felt consistent all the way through - it didn't get easier, nor harder...my slightly heavy breathing was the same throughout for sure! When Stacy told me the 20m was up (which I already knew because Runkeeper had just told me, thus ruining the element of surprise) I was so SO pleased with myself for doing the whole 20m. This is how surprised I was:



I was curious to know how far I would travel solely during just the 20m run (assuming that I made it the whole way) so - gadgetnerd that I am - I had MapMyRun tracking the whole thing as usual (i.e. including the warm up/cool down walks and the walk back to the car from wherever I ended up) and Runkeeper which I activated at the start and end of the 20m to capture just that part. And the answer was: 1.5miles, making it a 13.47 m/m pace. I was pretty surprised at that - I had expected it to be slower (it felt slower!).

It was just on the right side of being too challenging...any less time and it probably wouldn't have pushed me hard enough, any longer and I'd have maybe not made it. I LOVE THIS PROGRAMME!!



(I'm jumping, not sitting on the rail!)

[disney_duke]

Wooo Hoooo!!!!
That's how you spell P R O G R E S S!!!!! Awesome job, simply awesome.
And look at the air you caught on that jump. Sweet!!

[Tinkerboo]

Oddly, it didn't feel that high...it was meant to be a test jump to see if the 'burst' function on the camera phone would work, but it came out okay so I kept it.

And thanks!!

[kadterp]

AWESOME!!!!! Wonderful news!!! You should be proud of yourself! Remember that feeling!