Running Chick

This was a bit of a cut-back week since the schedule called for a 5k race on the weekend instead of the usual long run.  My 5k was a fail (THANKS DOG), but the rest of the week went pretty well.

Monday -  3 miles easy (@ 10:18)

It was balmy 40-something outside when Josh and I headed out for this (r)unch. My legs were feeling pretty trashed after the previous weekend and somebody (not me) decided to route us up some hills of death in East Houghton which resulted in me taking a walk break or two. Couple that with a nasty headwind, and you have the makings of a not-so-easy run. The pace would indicate otherwise, but this was a struggle.

Tuesday – Hills of Death

I missed the first hill session a few weeks ago due to a bum knee, but I was ready for this one. Or, as ready as I’d ever be.  We chose the hill from the Super 8 to Collect Avenue, which is right around 200 meters long. It’s a steady incline for two-thirds of the hill, turns a corner and then hits a very sharp incline for the last third.

The jog over from campus was quite nice, but all I could really think of was how much this was going to hurt and it sure did.  I was trying to keep my heart rate to a reasonable level for the first part so I wouldn’t give myself a heart attack during the much steeper climb on the second, but I mostly failed on that one.

Each time I rounded the corner, I was already in the Oh God I’m going to die zone and I had all I could do just to hang on and grind it out and keep from puking at the end. I came really close during the second interval.

Here’s some pretty table and graphs that show my misery.

After our repeats were done, we jogged back to campus and I think we ended up with just over 3 miles for the day.

Wednesday -  3 miles easy (@ 10:24)

I was feeling pretty beat up from the prior day’s hills, so Zoe and I just jogged a little out & back on Covered Drive Road.

Thursday – 30 minute tempo (5 miles @ 8:55)

We had a shorter tempo run this week, only 30 minutes, so that was nice. I did a short warm-up then ran 15 minutes out & 15 minutes back, followed by a cool-down jog back home. 

I’m kind of meh about this tempo because I ended up making several mid-run stops for Zoe to do her business. I must not have told her how you need to take care of that before you head out for a run.

Also, this was the first run I took with my new watch. I’ve been running with the Garmin Forerunner 305 since 2006 and it’s been a very reliable device. About a year ago, it started to not want to turn on and I’d have to do a hard reset on it to get it going. Those times were few and far between, so I never really considered getting a new one.  Unfortunately, in the last three months, it’s been doing it more frequently and this last month it was doing it all the time. Then the battery started to act flaky – it’d tell me it was fully charged one minute, then five minutes later it’d be telling me the battery way low. So, I finally took the plunge and upgraded to the Garmin Forerunner 620.

It’s got a ton of bells and whistles that I’m still trying to work my way through, but so far I really like it. There’s a lot of complaining in the Garmin support forums about inaccurate GPS data and the watch being generally buggy, but so far I haven’t experienced any of those issues.

Friday & Saturday – Rest

Rest days, drank some beer, did some not running stuff.

Sunday – 5k race

The training plan called for a 5k race, but it’s not like anybody’s putting on a 5k in the middle of March up here, so I decided I was just going to run my own 5k.

Josh was doing the same, so he, Zoe and I took off at the same time. Josh was doing a longer warm-up than me, so I started my “race” before him. Zoe and I were cruising along well until she realized that Josh wasn’t with us, then she got all worried about where he was.

She spent the majority of her time looking behind her, and each time she’d do that, she’d end up veering right in front of me. Or, she’d just stop completely and I’d have to yell at her to keep going.  After a completely frustrating .75 miles, I finally decided to stop and wait for Josh to catch up. I handed Zoe off to him and took off again, but I could never get my mojo back and I knew the 5k was already in the toilet, so I just said eff this and called it quits. Zoe and I headed back home.  I was pretty ticked off about it at first, but I’d made my peace with it by the time I got home. Sometimes shit happens. What can you do.

If Josh wasn’t being a slacker in the blog department, he’d probably write a post talking about how he ended up doing his 5k in 24:56! Very impressive!

Summary – another week done

I ended the week with just under 17 miles @ 10:22.  This week, we have a full schedule - intervals, tempos, a weekend long run and a few things in-between, like the annual St. Patrick’s Day storm! Go home Winter, you’re drunk.