Real Pain

Saturday. 

Saturday, saturday, saturday. 

Saturday mornings are long run mornings! 

Yesterday was the first time I did a long run by myself.  I slept in a little bit, woke up at 7 and was out the door around 7:30 with the goal of 6 miles. I detoured through Atlanta and by mile 3 I said I'd do an extra half mile just for kicks. 

Well between my detours and just feeling pretty damn good, I hit 6 miles and was not very close to my apartment.  The longest I've ever run is a 10k, so 6.2 miles.  

Saturday, this past Saturday, I ran 7.14 miles. SEVEN POINT ONE FOUR. Holy balls I almost cried. I almost quit a few times too but I refused. I was in so much pain, I had a side stitch so bad on my left side I was clutching it with my hand, my iPod had died and It was getting steadily warmer outside than when I started, but I finished it. I ran all the way to where I started running. 

I have officially felt new pain. Real pain. Real running pain. Nothing has compared to that pain I felt Saturday morning. But it hurt so good. I have now officially run over 50% of the distance I'm training for, and I'm a week ahead of schedule in my little training schedule for mileage. 

I also averaged 10:24 mins/mile. Faster than I really wanted but it just happened. 

Real pain has never felt so good. Even the next day it still feels good.

Catchup

I'm not sure if it's the sudden real training plan or my body just hates me but I HURT. Everywhere. The weirdest muscles in my legs hurt. And my feet. And my arms. 

Whatever, it's all part of the big plan right!?

Saturday was a 5 mile long run with the BF. It was really good, I know I can run without problems at an 11 minute pace.  I had a few speedbumps on the way...

Me:"Hey, slow down"

BF:"What, I'm not speeding up..."

Me:"liar yes you are!"

BF:"damn my tricks don't work on you anymore."

Etc. Etc. I wanted a slow recoup run. Somehow I don't feel too recouped. 

My 3 miles this morning felt awful. I don't know what it was but damn was I feeling rough. Like I hadn't slept or eaten in days. Just drained. 

Tomorrow is weights. By Friday last week I couldn't move my arms much over my head. I was sore EVERYWHERE. I'm looking forward to feeling like that again actually.

Till then,

Happy running!

Day 4: Running Crashers

Today was a 3-4 mile run as marked out by my lovely little planning calender. 

The BF decided last night he wanted to stay over and crash my run in the morning. More affectionately he just wanted to run with me. Which is always entertaining. 

I've finally stolen for extended use one of my friend's Garmin watch's so now I can actually track my pace on my own! I told the BF we were going to the park and back, which is right over 4 miles. 4.2 to be exact. 

Well it's all hills, and I have never ran it without stopping on purpose. There's stopping for stop lights in the middle of Atlanta and then there's me just giving up on some of those hills.  Well this morning the BF didn't give me that option. We finished with a 10:24 min/mile pace and with the sun coming up in Atlanta. It was a gorgeous morning and a very good run. I can't wait for my 5 mile run on Saturday morning. 

Today all I did was study heat transfer. Besides the feeling of impending doom of exams I've been a sore mess.  I lifted last night for the first time in a very long time and I am feeling it in every muscle above my abs. It makes me want a beer.

Mmmm Beer.

Day 2/3

Ok sorry I didn't post yesterday. School may or may not be killing me right now. 

Yesterday was day 2 of training and involved a light 3-4 mile run. I got up at 6 was out on the turf fields by 6:30 running laps. 

Who ever thought running laps was fun? Goodness gracious it's 3 laps to a mile. By lap 5 I was getting dizzy. Mind you these are big laps but still. Ridiculously boring. 

Anyway I'm not sure what pace I was at since my BF has lost his garmin watch charger....failure...but I think I was a little under 11 min/mile. Which is exactly where I'm ok sitting. I know now that to get up into those double digits I'm not going to be able to just run my little heart out at whatever pace I want. The 3 miles felt like nothing! The good news is the weather has gotten considerably better here in Atlanta. Especially in the morning. I actually had to pull out my running pseudo leggings and a sweater. It's amazing how little you sweat in the cold versus the heat. Until I stopped running, then I started pouring sweat out from every pore. 

Speaking of sweat, just to ramble about things I've learned since running.

                                                     

These (sock-ish-things stage Left)are the most amazing things EVER if your shins hurt (lightly). Once upon a time I tried to run and ignored my shins. This ignorance resulted in stress fractures and put me out of the game for 4 months. These are compression thingys. You can buy them with socks attached so that they're literally compression socks but I bought them to wear when I sleep to help my shins not feel so battered. I scoffed at the 40$ price tag but they were so worth it, especially when my shin splints were beginning to plague me again. Now I always wear them the night before runs.  Plus they're warm. Who doesn't want warm calves in the winter?

Back to the sweat. Stage right is my new (as of when I began running) deodorant. I may or may not sweat a lot. It's a problem. And not very cute, says the BF. He gave me this. It's men's deodorant. This was a conflict at first for me but DAMN does it work well. It is now my every-day deodorant. Seriously, if you sweat or stink like I do, this is for you. It's the best investment I've ever made. Those girly little deodorants don't hold a candle to this stuff.

Ramble done. Today is a weight lifting day. After a failed meeting this morning at the god-awful time of 5:45am I will be going later today. After I study system dynamics and heat transfer until my brain explodes. No worries, that won't take too long!

Tomorrow is a 4 mile run, I think I'll run to Piedmont park and back. Now that my feet and ankle are feeling much much better I'm willing to run some (aka a shit ton) of hills to get to the park. Hopefully my legs hold up.

This is me being lame and showing off my frogtown medal. 

I ended up 23rd overall in Women and 77th overall in men and women of 331 participants. Not too shabby eh? I also averaged an 11 min/mile, which for the amount of walking involved to get up the trail hills and get across the log crossings is pretty damn good in my opinion.

Off to study. Happy Running everyone!

Day 1

Well today started it.

I have committed to this plan.

I will stick to this plan.

This plan scares the be-jeezus outta me. 

"THE PLAN"

Written in inviting and colorful pens to help me through this process.

Tonight was my first attempt at tempo runs. Since I am slow they were at 9:45 min/mile and because my school gym is packed with people when I went today I only got 2 mile reps in. BUT it was a good start. Then I swam with MF and watched House...

 I would have done more but my feet are still killing me from overexertion last week (? no idea how THAT happened) and after near-breaking my ankle a few times on the rough trails of Frogtown the outside of my left ankle/leg is a little unhappy.

My super-cool-Asian friend bought me these capsicum patches? No idea if they work. I put them on but so far...no good.

I'll just have to wait and see. Tomorrow I have an easy 3-4 mile run planned. Probably going to either run flat and run around our turf fields or inside. I want to baby my foot/leg before I jump into ridiculous hill stuff.

I'm still nervous thinking about this in the long term but I think week-by-week views will be less intimidating.

I want to do this. I want to run this half, and I want to do it well. I want to do it right. I know I can, I just needed a kick in the ass (IE my colorful schedule) to get me going.

Overall: good Day 1. 

Tomorrow is a new day, see you then!

The Uber Planner

First order of business: I won my first running medal! I placed second in my age group (for women) and 23rd over all (for women). Frogtown is definitely one of the most fun races I'll ever run. 

I got a medal, a shirt, and a lot of free swag as well as a sore ankle from nearly busting ass on the rough trails. I LOVED IT. 

Second order:

So yesterday, while I was hungover from a  night of debauchy celebrations with The BF, I made my half-marathon training plan. Randomly too. I just needed to see it on paper. So I pulled out my fancy super-awesome-super-fine-point-super-nerdy color pens and went to work.  I only have a little over 7 weeks to do this. Fingers cross I can manage it, but since I put it down on paper it feels a lot more manageable.

Long runs on Saturday morning, goal longest is 11ish. Jeez, double digit numbers scare the hell outta me! I've calculated all my long run and tempo run paces...laid out my cross training. Now It's time to get to work. Starting today with a few miles and some time in the pool.

I'm not sure if I'm giving myself enough time for this or not but I think I can do it. It may not be the fastest half ever or the most comfortable but I need to start somewhere and I need to just push myself to start training at all. 

Here's to hoping all goes well!