Day 15 (continued)

Okay, I have a little time now. Let me reiterate that I was pleasantly surprised that this morning was nowhere near as difficult as I expected it to be. This may be another tick mark in the column that says that the real battles of running are mental ones, not physical ones.

As I biked home for lunch, I noticed that that litte ache in the area below my right knee. Apart from that little ache, and some minor protests from my muscles as I came up the house steps, I feel surprisingly good. It's not just the lack of aches. I feel up, with plenty of energy. My blood sugar levels yesterday and today have been the best they've been in years. In fact, they were still so low after breakfast today that I needed to grab a banana. Now that's a good problem to have.

So, while I'm not quite ready to jump onto the "running is awesome" bandwagon, I am quite surprised that we've made it this far, and am pleasantly surprised that I'm feeling as good as I am today, especially after how bad I felt last week.

Because it was so dark this morning, we decided to go the other direction on the trail. The way we normally go is under a thick canopy of trees for much of the length we use, and since it was still dark this morning [Ah, the joy of living in the northern lattitudes!] and we had only a sliver of moon, we decided to try the other route. It worked out well. Lights from town reflected over the water to give us some light, and the path was much more open to one side. This is likely the route we will use going forward.

After completing our warm-up walk, we had turned around and walked back to a bench where we adjusted our shoes and did some last minute stretching.

Like Mrs. F, I did restrain myself a bit on our first set, but my pace was right on what it had been most of last week (Friday excluded). The 90 second walk was plenty of time to recoup, and the first half of the second set was no problem. I figured the set would be difficult, so I worked on pacing myself. It definately took more effort to get through the second half, but it was still managable. The three minutes of walking was just about right, too. Boy am I glad the plan called for doing 90-90 for the next set--I think doing another three minute set would have made this morning a nightmare!

Knowing that the last three minute set was coming, the 90 second walk seemed too short, but I picked up the pace and moved on. I had ridden alongside one of my sons yesterday as he ran three miles, and I was encouraged to see that his primary cadence was not much faster (or so it seemed) than what I was doing in each of our sessions. [I'm sure his stride was longer, but that's something I'll need to improve on another day.] I just kept going--footfall after footfall. I found myself checking the watch more often, announching "half way," "two-thirds," "three-fourths," and finally, "ten seconds," "five," and "done!"

While we technically only had a final three minute walk ahead of us, with the extra distance from our starting bench to the car we ended up walking almost five minutes. Unlike some days where we have been completely drained, however, the extra walking felt good today.

I must say that I am looking forward to Wednesday. If it is anything like today, I might actually enjoy it. I didn't get to bed as early as 9 PM last night, as planned, but it was still early. I think the extra rest did me good.

Day 15 (Week 3, Day 1) - Mrs. F

The anticipation of todays workout was much harder than the actual workout. Don't get me wrong, it was not easy by any means, but it was doable.

I took the first set deliberatly slow, anticipating that longer,harder set yet to come. Then set 2 came(3 minutes running, 3 minutes walking) and well it was hard. The first 90 seconds came relatively without trouble but the last ninety seconds was really tough!!!! I so relished the 3 minutes of walking.

The 3rd set was okay. It came without much fanfare. The last set was hard to do but the most encouraging. I was surprised at how fast(this is all relative, we still had a 21 minute workout) the sets went. When there is only 4 sets it feels quicker. In this last set, Mr. F announced how far we were into the set. He called out 1/3 there, or 1/2 half there. For the first half of it, Im like what, it felt longer. But hearing him call out the last parts of the set was awesome! And the cherry on top of the cake was the 3 minute walk to end our workout set. Very nice!

It was great to know that I had accomplished the workout set that haunted me to think about. I did it~

Keep on running,
Mrs. F

Day 15 (week 3, day 1)

Wow! This morning was nowhere near as bad as I expected it to be. I don't have a lot of time to post details right now (I had PC problems this morning, and resolving them ate most of the time I set aside for blogging), so I'll need to post more details later.

In short, we survived the morning's training session. It was definately hard, but knowing there were only a total of four sets really did help. The three minute jogging sets were definately tough, but other than general soreness-from-use, I have no specific aches or pains. Even the blister on my left foot (reported earlier) didn't cause me any grief, although it was sore when I first put my shoes on. It did seep a little bit, but other than that it was fine.

Here's this week's routine:

Week 2 Routine

• 5 minute brisk walk (warm-up)
  

Then, this pattern repeated twice:

• Jog 90 seconds
  
• Walk 90 seconds
  
• Jog 3 minutes
  
• Walk 3 minutes

I'll post more later.