Sunday, August 14, 2011

Progress

Well I have not written since Monday and there is actually a lot to talk about today with only having 4 run/walks between then and now. My first accomplishment of the week, which I thought was going to be the big one, was that I ran for a whole mile without stopping on Wednesday....small potatoes I know when your goal is to run 13.1 miles but to me it was an accomplishment.

Wednesday was also the family tradition dinner as I call it....so I had a blast with my family and friends after cooking spareribs most of the day and who can resist MaMa's BBQ sauce.....carb loaded for sure but oh so good. But some pictures were taken....yeah I still had my running clothes on....I did not realize how much this running/walking was really changing my life...cause the scale is not showing it....so I checked my measurements and had drop five inches in just a week and a half.  I also compared this to fourth of July pictures, yep something is working.  So this is what I am looking at now...my body does not want to drop weight right now....its all about conversion.  Which mean when its decides to stop dropping weight....watch out!!

Tuesday of this week....I reached one of the first goals which was to run 50 miles cumulatively....well after today's 7.5 mile run (talk more about this later) I am at 64 miles since July 16....time re-evaluate the goals.  So putting that in some terms I ran the same distance it takes to from my house to Cincinnati, well the GE plant in Cincinnati.

Saturday of this week I completed my first 5k since I truly decided myself to this goal.  I completed two 5k earlier this year and would do fun runs, turkey trots etc in Saudi.  But this one....this one means something because this is truly my starting point to gage improvement.  Now I did one back in June which I believe my time was around 55 minutes.  Saturday race took me around 47:30....I am waiting for the official time to be posted.  Now I know I made some mistakes in this one which could have effected my overall performance.  When the race started I pushed myself really hard, not intentionally but it just happened to stay up with the other runners, which left me a little winded at about a half of mile.  As a result I had to walk for quit a bit. So I will just have remember I am not one of those people....well at least not yet.

Today was a great day.  Today I accomplished 7.5 miles in eight more minutes than I did 6.5 miles last week....so there is progress...I thought I had completed at least 8, but my Nike plus was off...luckily I ran in a park in which I was able to find the distance online....that being Duke Park....boy do I love Duke Park....which that brings me to one of favorite things associated with running....the beautiful trails and parks around this area. The taxes we pay are really well worth it. While I am still a little partial to running in the neighborhood because I figured if it is absolutely too much I am not to far from home...more importantly my couch.  But this morning I went out to Duke Park and it was so peaceful, well as peaceful as it could be with Usher, Lady Gaga and Britney blaring in my ears.  But today after the first half mile I continue with a nice steady slow jog only slowing down after maybe every half of mile for 30 seconds to a minute. It actually hurt to walk and felt good to run. Today I was looking more to increase my distance I wasn't so concerned about the time. It took me just over two hours so I was about at a 17 mile pace, yesterday I ran right around a 15:30 mile pace.  Over time I know both will improve because they have in the last week. My three mile runs now is where I strive to better my time and one day a week I challenge myself to a greater distance than the week before. Oh I am sure my endurance was all due to my carb loading of skyline...since I got hungry at the beginning of lap four...I think I may go with a bigger one next week especially if I am going to increase distance.  Well so it is my excuse to enjoy skyline...really I should make a health choice of pasta but I don't worry about eating my Skyline knowing I am going to run my butt off the next morning.

So today I hope I am not too sore to go out and mow my lawn....and clean up my house a bit...but we shall see...I have already put on my most value thing to running which is flexall and icy hot...cause I know today really challenged the muscles.

Oh I almost forgot.... this week I also joined a running club. This I believe will be the extra push I need to be able to run a half marathon instead of just finish a half marathon.  I have not met anyone from the group yet...but will hopefully during the week some time.

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