Did it.

With a bit of heavy lifting at the end of the month, I made it. 11 runs, 23.5 miles. 

The last few days have been really hot for around here (88 – 90+). I’ve been actually running early in the day to get in the runs. 

What did I learn? Well, goals are good. There are more than a few days I would have blown off a run except I’d publicly said I was going to match what I did in January. And I did.

July goals? 28 miles. Roughly 7 miles a week. That’s a little less than my biggest week in June, but that was a tough week. If I figure 13 runs, then that’s a little over 2 miles a run. It’s also just under what I did last July while I was in training. (That was 18 runs, 34 miles)

I kinda feel like I should replicate last July, rather than setting lower goals. But, I’ll be honest, right now that looks terribly daunting. I guess, though, goals you know you can meet are not real goals, right? 2 goals? Easy goal: 13 runs; 28 miles. Hard goal: 18 runs, 34 miles. I’ve added goal tracking to my spreadsheet, so I don’t have to do it here or on FB. 

The other thing is I need to foam roll more often. Much more often. Maybe even today. 

June Running goals: update

It seemed so simple, 2 weeks ago to set goals for the month. “Easy peasy!”

And then I managed to get stupid busy at work and did something to my leg and now I’m nearing the end of the month and wondering if I’m going to make what seemed like a simple, minor goal. Then last week I realized that I had only done half my runs, and barely half my goal mileage. That spurred me on a bit.

I have 3 runs and 5.5 miles left. I’ve done 2 5K runs and a 3K run in the past 5 days. I’m giving myself 2 days off because while my cardio is good on recent runs, my leg muscles are crying. Wednesday, Friday and next Sunday, minimum 1.8 mile runs each and I’ve met goal. Should be doable.

Just for record keeping:

23 mile goal. 17.44 completed. 5.46 remaining.
11 runs. 8 completed. 3 remaining.

Well…. *^$&

Thursday night I woke up in the middle of the night to some cramps in my lower back. I took some ibuprofen, did some stretching and rolling with the foam roller and finally fell back to sleep. Yesterday, I started having pain in my hip flexors that are making stairs a bit of a challenge.

This makes me cranky. I was going to go for a run today, but everything I read says I shouldn’t. Instead I should rest and maybe roll with the foam roller. That makes me even more cranky, because rolling HURTS. And I feel terrifically ungraceful and like a whale when I do it. But, lifting my leg and rotating my knee out causes my hip, spine and neck to pop, so I’m guessing something is out of alignment and I just need to stretch and loosen before running again.

Why can’t this just be simple?

Running

June Goals: 11 runs, 23 miles

Today’s run: 2.43 miles

Current status:
3 runs completed, 8 remaining
5.15 miles, 17.85 remaining

Short and sweet

The last 2 days I’ve made it out for short (20 minute) runs. I’m feeling a bit sore in the quads today, so I’m going to take today off then go out this weekend.

The short runs seem less intimidating than longer runs. For one thing I don’t have to commit to 90 – 120 minutes (between prep, running, and cleaning up afterwards…) each run. It’s half that, which doesn’t feel so oppressive in terms of time.

The short runs are also not leaving me feeling totally wiped and DONE afterwards. In fact, they’re kinda fun and I almost wish I wasn’t feeling a little sore today ’cause I could go out.

Baby Steps. I did 23 miles in 11 trips in January, but haven’t managed to get near that for mileage or trips in the months afterwards. I’m pushing that as my goal for this month. 23 miles, at least 11 days running. Seems like a tiny goal on one level. Seems unreachable on another. But, if I post it here then it will be public and I’ll at least have to make excuses to readers, right?

# Runs: 2 (Goal 11, 9 remaining)
Mileage: 2.74 (Goal 23, 20.26 remaining)

(Edited to fix my math. Let’s go shopping!)

Running: starting over (again)

I did actually schlep my running gear to the UK, and did intend to run. I didn’t, but I’m such a wimp about running in the cold and running in the wet that out of the 2 weeks we were there I had about 4 days of actual “yeah, this may fall in my running comfort zone” weather.

Since we’ve been back, we’ve both been fighting colds and running is just not happening. I wanted to go out yesterday, but decided that it wasn’t a good idea ’cause I couldn’t stop coughing.

What that means is I basically need to start over AGAIN with low level conditioning. I … don’t want to do this. I like it when I’m conditioned and running is fun not a chore. I had just gotten to a good couple of runs before we left, and I know I’m going to have to go through a few weeks of struggling on runs before I get to that point again. This makes me sad and knowing that it will be OK at some future point doesn’t quite inspire me to put shoes on and go out now.

Then I feel guilty and lazy and all sorts of things because I don’t have the self discipline to get my butt off the couch.

My partial solution is to drag out the training schedule from last summer and follow it. That starts me off with some very short (1 – 1.75 mile) runs for the next month. If I get stronger faster, I can jump ahead. I was doing the ZombiesRun! C25K but the runs got long and were taking more time than I wanted. This gets me into 20 minutes or less 3 times a week (plus a long walk on Sundays) for a month. By then I’ll be less cranky about the time commitment and can stomach the 45 – 50 minute workouts.

It’s a plan, right?