Yup. Title says it all. I went out and ran with a friend and we did an easy 6 mile run today. Not doing 5/1s or anything... A couple of breaks so we could water up. But nice and easy and completed it feeling great.
I remember towards the beginning of the year I was having problems running. I was able to do 3 miles for a while, and my goal was at least 3 miles 5 times a week. Yeah, that fell through, I'm still not running 5 times a week, that is way too agressive with all the other stuff I'm doing lately. But, it was so bad I just stopped running for several months and would go do it, and then flake, and run and flake. No real motivation to run since it was starting over, and that's always hard.
Now I'm being consistant, getting out there 3-4 times a week following my plan to get my 25k done this year on Dec 31st. And I am now at a point where I can say I went out and ran an easy 6 miles and it is! It's amazing to be able to say something like that after so many struggles through out the year that kept me out of it. But, I'm not going to let it get fully to my head. I know something can come along and derail my path here and I will have to start over, but knowing I can, and doing it so successfully now makes me think if I had to, I could.
And I'm still off the sugars since Oct 31st as well as caffeine, which was totally accidental. But, when I cut out the energy drinks, I just never replaced it with tea like I was planning on. I got too lazy to make a cup. Not sure why it was so easy this time around, no real withdrawal issues or anything, just cold turkey and it worked... So far...
Always a struggle and always staying vigilant!
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Ten Mile Break Through
I'm not a runner. I can apparently run, but I don't think I have the mindset of a runner. Yet. I've been trying to be consistent on my running the past couple of months and with only a couple of minor set backs I've been able to maintain my consistency.
I believe that this is starting to show. Not only in my running times and distances, but in my mental game as well. 10 miles was always my "That is a long ass way to run" distance and as such, I always had a mental block there. This past Saturday, started off with a similar mental block. Especially since I didn't make my 8 mile run the weekend before, nor did I actually run at all leading up to the ten miles. Just a super busy week of parties, get togethers and the like which caused me to miss out on my runs. So there it is, me thinking about all the missed runs leading up to 10 miles. My Wall. The point I struggle at. I've run past it before, but it's been well over a year since the last time or two I've done it.
Because of those set backs last week, I went out with the goal of 10 miles. But with the option to cut it short if need be. I decided that the best way to accomplish this would be to head to Memorial Park and just run the loop there, so I could quit after 3 or 6 miles if need be and figured if I hit 9 miles, I will just walk if I have to, to get that 10 miles.
I set my Garmin up for my 5/1s and set off. And off I went! I had no problems at all until around 7.75 miles when my legs started to tighten a little bit. but I ran through it and finished my run with 10.35 miles in 1:43:01. Even with my 5/1 run/walk pacing I managed a 9:57 minute mile. Without the walks, my run average was 9:11. I was rather happy with that. Of course I didn't recover properly afterwards since I went to the car show here and walked around for another 3 or so hours afterwards, but still. Things are looking good! And I'm kind of looking forward to the 11 mile run scheduled for this coming Saturday.
Also, last night I ran 4 miles, nice and easy and didn't feel like I had too much residual issues from the run on Saturday. 4.13 miles in 35:56, means a 8:43 min/mile average 1) 8:52, 2) 8:35, 3) 9:01, 4) 8:21, 5) 8:53 (for the .13) So it was mostly negative splits except for mile 3, which I don't know what happened there, but still not bad!
Let I said before, I'm mentally, not a runner... Yet. But that may change soon....
I believe that this is starting to show. Not only in my running times and distances, but in my mental game as well. 10 miles was always my "That is a long ass way to run" distance and as such, I always had a mental block there. This past Saturday, started off with a similar mental block. Especially since I didn't make my 8 mile run the weekend before, nor did I actually run at all leading up to the ten miles. Just a super busy week of parties, get togethers and the like which caused me to miss out on my runs. So there it is, me thinking about all the missed runs leading up to 10 miles. My Wall. The point I struggle at. I've run past it before, but it's been well over a year since the last time or two I've done it.
Because of those set backs last week, I went out with the goal of 10 miles. But with the option to cut it short if need be. I decided that the best way to accomplish this would be to head to Memorial Park and just run the loop there, so I could quit after 3 or 6 miles if need be and figured if I hit 9 miles, I will just walk if I have to, to get that 10 miles.
I set my Garmin up for my 5/1s and set off. And off I went! I had no problems at all until around 7.75 miles when my legs started to tighten a little bit. but I ran through it and finished my run with 10.35 miles in 1:43:01. Even with my 5/1 run/walk pacing I managed a 9:57 minute mile. Without the walks, my run average was 9:11. I was rather happy with that. Of course I didn't recover properly afterwards since I went to the car show here and walked around for another 3 or so hours afterwards, but still. Things are looking good! And I'm kind of looking forward to the 11 mile run scheduled for this coming Saturday.
Also, last night I ran 4 miles, nice and easy and didn't feel like I had too much residual issues from the run on Saturday. 4.13 miles in 35:56, means a 8:43 min/mile average 1) 8:52, 2) 8:35, 3) 9:01, 4) 8:21, 5) 8:53 (for the .13) So it was mostly negative splits except for mile 3, which I don't know what happened there, but still not bad!
Let I said before, I'm mentally, not a runner... Yet. But that may change soon....
Sunday, November 20, 2011
Bad Nutrition = Bad Run
Yesterday, went to the Texas Renaissance Festival, which is always a lot of fun. Great shows, interesting people to watch and yummy yummy bad foods. This year, I was trying to be good and not eat too much crap food. And I was quite successful at it. I had one spiced almond (free sample), some fried alligator on a stick, a gyro, and a sausage on a stick. Based on years past, this is a VAST improvement on how I would normally gorge myself stupid there. For drinking, I had one beer and some mead, so again, not bad.
While that was not all that bad, that is ALL I had to eat and drink through out the day. Obviously, firstly, not enough hydration, since I didn't have anything to drink aside the beer and mead. Definitely should have had some water throughout the day. And I knew I should have, but I didn't. And I also didn't really eat much more than that food either throughout the day. Definitely, not enough to fuel my body correctly.
This all showed up today during my run today. Went out to run 8 miles in the trails doing 5/1s. I got 2.5 miles in and my legs were feeling pretty dead already. Not looking good at all! It's not from lack of rest, I slept almost 12 hours last night (was very tired and apparently needed that sleep!) I had a little bit to eat and drink before I went out for the run, but apparently my glycogen levels were very depleted. I managed to run 4.5 miles and then had to stop, legs were not able to give me any more, so I walked the last quarter mile back to the truck.
This definitely shows me how important nutrition really is. The run wasn't horrible, wasn't even bad. Just had legs that didn't want to work because they were depleted. Will definitely have to keep this in mind when I'm out there doing fun things again. I know I can enjoy some of the bad foods out there, but also need to combine it with the good foods and be sure to drink plenty of hydrating liquids to make sure the body is fueled and ready to be used to it's fullest capabilities at all time. This way I don't have problems with having fun and then running the next day like this again.
This week will be a challenge with Thanksgiving on Thursday. Lots of yummy foods, both good and bad and so it will be a challenge to not gorge myself on either kinds and stay healthy and ready to run on Saturday!
While that was not all that bad, that is ALL I had to eat and drink through out the day. Obviously, firstly, not enough hydration, since I didn't have anything to drink aside the beer and mead. Definitely should have had some water throughout the day. And I knew I should have, but I didn't. And I also didn't really eat much more than that food either throughout the day. Definitely, not enough to fuel my body correctly.
This all showed up today during my run today. Went out to run 8 miles in the trails doing 5/1s. I got 2.5 miles in and my legs were feeling pretty dead already. Not looking good at all! It's not from lack of rest, I slept almost 12 hours last night (was very tired and apparently needed that sleep!) I had a little bit to eat and drink before I went out for the run, but apparently my glycogen levels were very depleted. I managed to run 4.5 miles and then had to stop, legs were not able to give me any more, so I walked the last quarter mile back to the truck.
This definitely shows me how important nutrition really is. The run wasn't horrible, wasn't even bad. Just had legs that didn't want to work because they were depleted. Will definitely have to keep this in mind when I'm out there doing fun things again. I know I can enjoy some of the bad foods out there, but also need to combine it with the good foods and be sure to drink plenty of hydrating liquids to make sure the body is fueled and ready to be used to it's fullest capabilities at all time. This way I don't have problems with having fun and then running the next day like this again.
This week will be a challenge with Thanksgiving on Thursday. Lots of yummy foods, both good and bad and so it will be a challenge to not gorge myself on either kinds and stay healthy and ready to run on Saturday!
Friday, November 18, 2011
A Week of Confusion.
What an interesting week this has been. Started off on Monday with my 5k TT so I could take a measure of where I am so I can see some progress.
I also had a one pound weight gain, and 3% body fat loss. Which for me meant I gained 7 pounds of muscle. That seemed odd to me, so I just stuck with what I was doing and waited for today to see what the scale would say. I'm taking these measurements on the same scale, and so it should be a bit more consistent.
As you can see, Monday was a strange day there.
My 5K TT was just as strange. I had an average pace of 8:18 min/mile. Which I was a little bit disappointed with as I was hoping for closer to 8:00-8:05 or something. But I did have some struggles with my stomach on it, as such, I took it in stride (pun intended!)
Last night, I went for a 3 mile run, which is only .1 mile shorter than 5k. I went out to do a nice easy run to loosen up a bit and see how things felt after the core workout in the morning, and the 4 mile run I did on Wednesday. I also went in yesterday morning to the Asthma and Allergy specialist and they poked me 64 times with various things to see if I have any allergies I should be made aware of and the only ones that came up were cat and dog (knew about the cat one, but not the dog one.) Anyways, I went out nice and easy, not breathing too hard or anything, and the first mile ticked off, I didn't look at the watch as I didn't really want to know, it was an easy run. I didn't want to start getting competitive with myself.
I finished the run, and saw the time: 23:35.88
Wait. What?! How was that possible? It was an easy run, I wasn't breathing hard at all! So I got home and dumped the data. Yeah. First two miles I averaged 7:55 minute miles. The third mile was 7:41 minute mile. So the average for the three miles was 7:51. My average pace over all was 25 seconds a mile FASTER on this easy run. My average heart rate was 173.
How can one go out, with the mind set to run as fast as they can, and be so much slower than going out for an easy run? This I don't know.
But I do know, if this is the case, I am getting slower closer to my speeds I was at back in 2007/2008, and I like it.
I also had a one pound weight gain, and 3% body fat loss. Which for me meant I gained 7 pounds of muscle. That seemed odd to me, so I just stuck with what I was doing and waited for today to see what the scale would say. I'm taking these measurements on the same scale, and so it should be a bit more consistent.
- Tue 11/08 - 224.8 Pounds 23.4% Body Fat
- Fri 11/11 - 224.6 Pounds 23.8% Body Fat
- Mon 11/14 - 225.2 Pounds 20.9% Body Fat
- Fri 11/18 - 222.2 Pounds 23.1% Body Fat
As you can see, Monday was a strange day there.
My 5K TT was just as strange. I had an average pace of 8:18 min/mile. Which I was a little bit disappointed with as I was hoping for closer to 8:00-8:05 or something. But I did have some struggles with my stomach on it, as such, I took it in stride (pun intended!)
Last night, I went for a 3 mile run, which is only .1 mile shorter than 5k. I went out to do a nice easy run to loosen up a bit and see how things felt after the core workout in the morning, and the 4 mile run I did on Wednesday. I also went in yesterday morning to the Asthma and Allergy specialist and they poked me 64 times with various things to see if I have any allergies I should be made aware of and the only ones that came up were cat and dog (knew about the cat one, but not the dog one.) Anyways, I went out nice and easy, not breathing too hard or anything, and the first mile ticked off, I didn't look at the watch as I didn't really want to know, it was an easy run. I didn't want to start getting competitive with myself.
I finished the run, and saw the time: 23:35.88
Wait. What?! How was that possible? It was an easy run, I wasn't breathing hard at all! So I got home and dumped the data. Yeah. First two miles I averaged 7:55 minute miles. The third mile was 7:41 minute mile. So the average for the three miles was 7:51. My average pace over all was 25 seconds a mile FASTER on this easy run. My average heart rate was 173.
How can one go out, with the mind set to run as fast as they can, and be so much slower than going out for an easy run? This I don't know.
But I do know, if this is the case, I am getting slower closer to my speeds I was at back in 2007/2008, and I like it.
Monday, November 14, 2011
5k TT and Disappointments
Today I had planned to do a 5k time trial run. This is so I can figure out where I am currently, and watch my progress over the next month when I have another one scheduled on my training program.
Over the 5k (3.1 miles) I averaged 8:18 min/mile pace. I was really hoping for something closer to 8:00. I did have some stomach issues while I was out there, basically it felt like my stomach was punching itself which I think was due to various pills (vitamins, Advil, etc) I popped too close to the run time. Next time, I will take the vitamins, etc after the run so that they won't interfere. I haven't run a 5k TT in years, and last time I don't remember my time, just that it was between 21-22 minutes.
I was looking back at my various runs over the last several months. Most of them were easy when I run the jogging path at Memorial Park, and then I stumbled across one I did in early October, where I ran 3 miles with a 8:24 min/mile pace. That kind of stung. How was I able to run that fast with out really trying? And yet when I was trying I barely did better? One of the things was the stomach issue that's for sure. I had to stop to a walk for about 15 seconds twice to try to set aside the pain. I'm thinking the another thing, was I had a super busy weekend. I ran 5.5 miles on Saturday morning, where I didn't use 5/1s. Simply because I forgot until after the first mile and decided to go with it. That was a surprisingly quick run from and I was quite happy with it.
After that run, I went mountain biking, which I was feeling the run while pedaling around. So, the legs were well worked on Saturday. Sunday, I went outrigger canoeing. Not a leg workout but definitely a back workout. And last time I had planned the 5k TT I had to stop because it was a day after an OC practice and my back gave out. Today, I did feel my back a little bit, so I had prepared for it with a super hot shower and stretching, and Advil (yeah those pills I popped too soon to running time.) I think if I ease off the weekend activities just before the TT, then I should have better times. Plus, with all the training I'm putting in between now and then to get myself back into shape, I am hoping for something better.
Am I disappointed about this run? Sure. But it was a learning experience like always and I know what not to do next time and as well, what to try. I do think I am on some correct tracks though with nutrition and the training, just need to keep at it and keep an eye on things.
Over the 5k (3.1 miles) I averaged 8:18 min/mile pace. I was really hoping for something closer to 8:00. I did have some stomach issues while I was out there, basically it felt like my stomach was punching itself which I think was due to various pills (vitamins, Advil, etc) I popped too close to the run time. Next time, I will take the vitamins, etc after the run so that they won't interfere. I haven't run a 5k TT in years, and last time I don't remember my time, just that it was between 21-22 minutes.
I was looking back at my various runs over the last several months. Most of them were easy when I run the jogging path at Memorial Park, and then I stumbled across one I did in early October, where I ran 3 miles with a 8:24 min/mile pace. That kind of stung. How was I able to run that fast with out really trying? And yet when I was trying I barely did better? One of the things was the stomach issue that's for sure. I had to stop to a walk for about 15 seconds twice to try to set aside the pain. I'm thinking the another thing, was I had a super busy weekend. I ran 5.5 miles on Saturday morning, where I didn't use 5/1s. Simply because I forgot until after the first mile and decided to go with it. That was a surprisingly quick run from and I was quite happy with it.
After that run, I went mountain biking, which I was feeling the run while pedaling around. So, the legs were well worked on Saturday. Sunday, I went outrigger canoeing. Not a leg workout but definitely a back workout. And last time I had planned the 5k TT I had to stop because it was a day after an OC practice and my back gave out. Today, I did feel my back a little bit, so I had prepared for it with a super hot shower and stretching, and Advil (yeah those pills I popped too soon to running time.) I think if I ease off the weekend activities just before the TT, then I should have better times. Plus, with all the training I'm putting in between now and then to get myself back into shape, I am hoping for something better.
Am I disappointed about this run? Sure. But it was a learning experience like always and I know what not to do next time and as well, what to try. I do think I am on some correct tracks though with nutrition and the training, just need to keep at it and keep an eye on things.
Saturday, November 5, 2011
Rough Week
I had a bunch of goals set for November, after a successful October, but this was cut short because of several things going on. First, was my fridge flaking out on me. This meant I had no means of keeping foods after cooking and had to toss a bunch out. This makes it hard to cook ahead and stay healthy. Second was/is work. I don't normally let work get too involved in my non-work time, but the last several weeks it's been hard with two weeks of training and then a major planned power outage at work today. That meant I couldn't plan on anything this weekend for getting out and doing stuff as I don't know when I go in or for how long. Yesterday I got there at 6:45am and left at 11:15pm, then didn't know if I was coming in today in the morning or evening when the power comes back. As it turns out, it will be this evening.
Because of that it's been hard to keep up with my work outs and eating. But, I have been not too bad with eating and making good choices by going to the grocery stores and getting chicken and salads and veggies for lunches while at work. I did have pizza last night, but it was ordered in for the group of us working and I didn't gorge too badly on it. And I had some gnocchi for breakfast today, as it was thawed out from the fridge and needed eating. And some mexican food as well today, grilled chicken with onions, mushrooms and cheese, with rice and beans. So not great, but I never over ate and don't feel bad about doing it. I know the coming week will also be a challenge as I need to get back to working out and eating healthy and restocking my fridge.
All in all, it wasn't a bad first week of November for my goals, not meeting them all, but still meeting some of them. Again, this goes back to my thinking that goals need to be flexible since you never know what life is going to throw your way and you just have to go with the flow and do your best.
Because of that it's been hard to keep up with my work outs and eating. But, I have been not too bad with eating and making good choices by going to the grocery stores and getting chicken and salads and veggies for lunches while at work. I did have pizza last night, but it was ordered in for the group of us working and I didn't gorge too badly on it. And I had some gnocchi for breakfast today, as it was thawed out from the fridge and needed eating. And some mexican food as well today, grilled chicken with onions, mushrooms and cheese, with rice and beans. So not great, but I never over ate and don't feel bad about doing it. I know the coming week will also be a challenge as I need to get back to working out and eating healthy and restocking my fridge.
All in all, it wasn't a bad first week of November for my goals, not meeting them all, but still meeting some of them. Again, this goes back to my thinking that goals need to be flexible since you never know what life is going to throw your way and you just have to go with the flow and do your best.
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