An early morning tempo run

I got up extra early today to get to my work's gym well before my start time of 9 am. And I pounded out 1 mile warm-up, 4 miles at 9:05, and then another mile cool down followed by a quarter mile of walking.

Took me exactly an hour to do all that. I even had time to get under one of the shower heads and rinse off (didn't wash my hair, no real time for that, maybe if I had short hair). Their showers are lovely here! I was impressed and the water warmed up very quickly.

I did have a problem about 2 miles into the run when a lady got next to me & had on perfume and the smell started to choke me. I also didn't have the treadmill set to any incline, save for the last 3/4 of a mile of the tempo part and that was at 1%. My legs became heavy by the end of that though.

Luke was nice enough to give me a bit of a boost in confidence yesterday when I told him about my run. He said that I should have no problem doing that. So while I was running, I was thinking about that. And actually, that's how I got through the past 2 weekends of running. I kept thinking how disappointed he'd be (sometime I even tell myself he'll break up with me!) if I'd walk or stop and that helped me to keep on going.

Last night we didn't end up going swimming as I mentioned. However we did make homemade pizzas. Well, in that we bought the crust and everything else. It was his first time making homemade pizzas and after we checked out (he bought his stuff & I bought my ingredients), he said that we could have bought 3 pizzas for how much it cost us (the $10 pizza deal at Pizza Hut). I apologised and said that we didn't need to do this, it was just a suggestion. Walmart does not carry my fake pepperoni anymore (nor the ham or turkey slices :( ) so mine was "meat" free but had a little bit of garlic, tomato, yellow onion, red & yellow pepper, broccoli and spinach. His had "beef", 2 Tomato & Basil Pizza Morningstar burgers, orange & yellow roasted peppers, cooked spinach and a bit of onion and tomato. He also bought "bacon" to put on there but he decided against that last minute. But after we cut everything up and put our toppings on there, baked it to our own perfection, he loved his pizza. Plus, I think he had a good time putting it all together. I put my peppers into strips and laid them out in a design!

His was insane. I went up to get a piece for him and I licked my fingers after putting his piece on his plate and it didn't taste good. He seemed to enjoy it though. But I do like my veggies! The reason his is half covered in cheese in the above picture is we kinda forgot to put the peppers on until after I already covered mine totally in cheese and he got half of his done. Whoops. So mine was extra cheesey.

If I get all packed in time tonight, I will be going over to Luke's place again so we can hit up the weights together and then also swim as well. Wow, guess this'll be a triple Wednesday workout day!

Categories: food, Luke, tempo run, treadmill runs

Group exercise

I found out tonight, why I don't like running with non-runners. They talk when you don't want to.

So this co-worker and I have been going down to the gym at work every day this week. Tonight was a tempo run. 1 mile warm-up, 3 miles at 9:05 pace and 1 mile cool down. Sure I can do that easily but I wanted a good workout, nothing too strenous. So this co-worker got on the treadmill next to me. She & I were talking a little bit during my warm-up. It was at my conversation pace of 6mph or 10 min/mi so that was OK. Then I bumped it up to 6.6mph or 9:05 min/mi. First mile was OK. Then second mile I started to get a bit winded. I would have to pause every 3rd word. Finally I told her no more talking for me, you can talk but I'm not answering. So then she would talk but she would say things like "you know?" or point out a picture in a magazine. Then expect me to answer or look over. And if I didn't then she would just stare at me until I gave some sort of response like a nod of the head or something. Then she asked me how many miles am I doing today. I told her 5. And then she asked how many calories is that? I finally said, why are you asking me questions when I said I can't talk anymore? Luckily, she got the point and I was able to finish my 3rd mile in silence.

When I ran the last time with a runner person (not Luke), we were quiet. Not totally the entire time, beginning we were talkative but not so much so but then we fell into a comfortable silence and then it was just us running side by side concentrating on our own steps & breathing.

But we're still pushing each other. Or at least, I'm pushing her more than me. :-) It's nice to have that feeling again! To be helping someone, giving them advice.

We did weights on Tuesday and we're doing weight machines again tomorrow. This is awesome. I'm actually a bit sore. We're 8 inches apart in height but yet she can do double the weight I can on the machines. Though she does have 100 lbs on me too, I think. But I do 40 lbs for the hamstring curl, she does 80. Although I do 100 & 85 lbs for a leg press and she does 115.

I also downloaded an app today for my iPod Touch to help me lose some weight. This month, I kinda gained weight it seemed. Not too much, just 5 lbs but I want to lose a total of 10 now. And I would like to start keeping a record of how much I eat and the calories that I put in my mouth. It'll be interesting to watch.

Categories: tempo run, weight, weight training

An early morning workout during the week!

I stayed late at work on Tuesday night for an extra hour. So I decided that I might try to run in the morning before work and go in late to make up for that hour. Believe it or not, I did it!

My alarm went off at 6:00am.
I finally got out of bed around 6:40am. (I was seriously tempted to just skip it)
I got to the YMCA at 7:05am. (barely anyone there! Awesome!)
Did a 4 mile tempo, with a half mile warm up and half mile cool down in 46 minutes! 10:00 min/mi warm up/cool down and 8:57 min/mi tempo speed. (Schedule says 5miles but eh, 4 was good enough for me, I don't have any down weeks in my training)
Done running at 7:50am.
Got home around 8:05am.
Showered at 8:10am.
Left for work around 8:35am.

I don't think I'll be doing that again on a normal workday, unless I go in late. I am just not an early morning person. I did notice that today, my legs felt really heavy all day. On top of all that, I didn't eat breakfast before hand (no time since I got out of bed 40 minutes after my alarm went off) and by the time I got home, my stomach was growling and making noises. I also didn't have any Gatorade on hand to drink immediately afterwards. Another not so smart move. But I must admit that it feels good & different to be done with my run early and not have to worry about it when I came home from work. :-)

Tonight was a NITRO meeting & seminar. Our first seminar of the new year. It was on weight training and core workout. *sigh* I know that as a runner I _need_ to do that but I just don't have the discipline to keep it up all the time. I remember to do it once or twice and then I get lazy. My core especially will help me be a better runner but do I really need to be a "better" runner? I'm pretty happy at where I'm at speed wise and distance wise. My core is not really gonna help my toe tendon problem.

The NITRO shirts came in as well. I saw 2 prototypes. The squirrel logo printed out well with what I did to it. Unfortunately, it was not the logo that I created. My squirrel had running shoes, a water bottle and was running on a trail. I also had it coloured brown instead of the red and the 5 o'clock shadow that it had. On one version I had (that no one saw) I also gave it a visor & earbuds for it's ears. It really looked like a runner then! Very cute. But only a few liked the brown version. And apparently, no one really cared for the shoes or the water bottle. One person actually said they looked creepy. Oh well. This is why I'm not an illustrator for a living.
I went to Wal-Mart before the meeting and bought a big bag of chocolate; Whoppers, Kit-Kat, Reese's Peanut Butter Cups & Hersey's Milk Chocolate bars. I walked into the new FitWorkz gym with one of each in my hands. I felt bad but hey, it's not like I run to lose weight. When I wasn't running, I was pretty much this weight --OK, maybe like 5-10 lbs heavier but I could have lost that with not drinking as much beer & Taco Bell after the bar!-- so I'm not really doing it for the health benefits. I still watch what I eat just cause I'm a vegetarian but my candy I will still have and overindulge in, if I want to. :-)

Categories: mid-week run, NITRO, tempo run

Tempo Run

So I think I did my first tempo run free running, as in without having to get on a treadmill!

Last night Brent & I went running. He only wanted to do 2 miles. I said that I'll do it with him. So because it was only 2 miles, I wanted to try something different. I changed up my running style.

I shuffled. Well, not old man shuffle but I kept my upper body as still as possible and really focused on moving my ankles around each other. I ended up running faster! Brent was feeling a little under the weather so I ended up leaving him behind before the first mile mark.

Then I hit the turn around a little after 1 mile. Kept up the same pace and style. It was pretty fun. When I could tell my legs were failing, I would just say go faster and my legs went faster!

I got to the end around 2.1 mark and decided to end it and walk back to Brent. I couldn't find him though. Got a little worried, walk and run back to the bike path. Still no sign of him. I was thinking of the worst possibilities. Decided to run back to my house again as I had walked for a mile and cool down. I started a new run on Nike+ and picked up the pace again. Things were good. Then I spotted him near the end. And that's when I really picked up the pace. I was going a 7 min mile at one point! Insane!

All in all, I think it's cause I ran the 5 miles the day before I knew that I could run 2 miles easy and fast. Get it done and over with was my thinking.

Categories: Brent, tempo run

New shoes and pain at the Y

I got my new running shoes yesterday, as I mentioned. I was so excited, I started running over the to YMCA and felt such a difference already! I felt like I was floating on air! I have to break them in a bit, determine how tight they should be, etc. It felt like there wasn't much padding on the balls of my feet at all but the heels were nicely cushioned, I could tell that. No blisters!

However, I got onto my treadmill, setting up the controls and I hear my name. I turn around and see someone I work with. I say hi, go back to my treadmill but he starts to talk shop. asking me all sorts of questions that I guess I'm supposed to know off the top of my head. When I'm at the Y, I don't want to talk about work, at most I want to talk about exercising. This is not the first time it's happened, the first time I saw him (this being the second time) it happened then too. So I guess I have to tell him to cut out the work talk and save it for 8-5.

My schedule was to run 5 miles a tempo run but I only made it 3.11. I'm thinking it's cause I haven't done that in a while. In all actuality, I haven't done much running at all. I'm outta shape. I also think I need to do some core exercises like crunches on the ball or something to help me out. I read somewhere that this guy does 150 in the morning and 150 at night! That's what I'm talking about!

But my schedule is changing as of tomorrow. They now have me running 4 days a week. Thursdays are now run days for 2 miles (which I'll do three at an easy pace). So I'm doing it at lunchtime at work. I posted a question about that to a community and they suggest fragrance free baby wipes to clean up after a run. I hope I don't stink too bad as I have a meeting with my editor at 1pm!

This one was all over the place tonight. I think I have my Shoe Pouch on backwards so it wasn't reading it right. Gotta go look that up.

Tonight's run: YMCA, treadmill but felt warm **new shoes**

Categories: running at work, tempo run

Tempo Run

Tempo run today was pretty good. My Nike+ was off by nearly an entire tenth of a mile though from the treadmill distance. That wasn't good. I think that was because for the first two miles I was running really strong and my strides were long, that even continued into the third mile. Since it's an accelerator and not a pedometer, it has to be calibrated on your stride length. But sometimes you just run really well and your strides are longer. Oh well.

And my pace was at 8:41 min/mi. In my post yesterday, I said that I think my pace calculations are off on my Runner's World. They said that I should do a normal easy pace at 10:11 min/mi, tempo runs at 8:41 min/mi and speed work at 8:02 min/mi. This was using the 25 minute 5k race. If I use a 27:30 5k race, then it's 11:04 at easy pace, tempo runs at 9:28 min/mi and speed work at 8:50 min/mi. That's a BIG difference in speed! But now that I've been doing longer and longer runs, the tempo runs at the 8:41 pace seems to be fine. A couple weeks ago I was dying at 3 miles doing that pace; today, I was tired and feeling the effects at 3 miles but I wasn't dying, I managed to do all 4 miles of it! :-)

But I got to the Y and of course I see someone I work with. Had to get on the row of treadmills in front of her. Then a few minutes later I start running and someone else I work with comes up and says hi. He actually gets on the treadmill beside me. That could be why I was running so great. Showing off for them. I knew that I couldn't look bad. Especially after being mentioned in the company monthly newsletter about my running. Plus, it was great to know that I was running at 6.9mph while the guy beside me was running at 6.0 and 6.2mph. I wanted to say "Don't compare yourself to me!" but I didn't, I kept my mouth shut. But still felt good!

Then I realised that almost 2 weeks ago, I decided that I was going to stop shaving until I get a date. So things are quite hairy on me. Great, of course I see co-workers AFTER I stop shaving. As long as I keep my arms down, things should be kept hidden, I'm thinking. ;-) And my legs well, there's a lot of leg but I don't care, shouldn't be too obvious.

Categories: tempo run