Tweaked is better

I got to try the tweaked run today and man did it feel good to run again after a couple of days off. I am officially only running every other day for now to ease my body into it better. I also warmed up on my exercise bike and hit the neighborhood running. I liked it much better and was able to keep a steady run for a while. A new baseline for measurement. It was pretty windy and that made it cold and almost unpleasant but still better than the treadmill indoors. Can't wait for Sunday!!
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The proof is in the pants

A favorite pair of pants made their re-debute from the depths of the closet this morning and they look damn good! Haven't worn 'em in over a year-and not for lack of trying every few months. The scale says I haven't lost anything but that just means my new muscles weight more than the flab I have shed. The pants don't lie and these pants rock again! I love running on so many levels...
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Life happened

Today was supposed to be a training day where I got to run and try out the newly tweaked workout... What actually happened was an entire afternoon devoted to a Disaster Recovery test - aka productive chaos - and no time at work to slip away to the treadmill. Tonight was my monthly bookclub meeting - a hallowed tradition I am immoveable about missing - which meant no time for an outdoor run at home either. While I am bummed about missing my run today, I will just do it tomorrow. Bookclub, the friend time afterwards which yielded some fabulous story development for my novel, and the neighbor time after that was well worth the sacrifice. And let's be honest, my poor calves are just starting to give up their protests about all the work they have been doing lately so one more day of resting isn't going to be unappreciated on some level...
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Kind of annoying

First, it is again snowing in my neck of the woods and it is pretty damn annoying. One day it is 70 and the next you need the winter coat - in April. Equally annoying is having to take a day off of training because you are pushing your poor body too hard. Today that wasn't a big issue since I was slammed at work and my designated workout time came and went before I even noticed. Funny, though, how quickly you can become addicted to an activity and miss it if you aren't doing it everyday. I couldn't (or rather wouldn't!) go running in the snow either so instead settled for some yoga to relieve some stress - from the damn IRS considering it is tax day - and still felt pretty good. Can't wait for tomorrow when I get to see if my "switching it up" methods get me better results.
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Day 10

Today was dreary and rainy and I ran indoors on the treadmill. I have decided that for many reasons I like running outdoors better - not the least of which is not having to fiddle with the damn treadmill to get the right speed settings. In the outdoors, I just decide I want to run and I run at the pace that feels good. On the treadmill I have to fiddle with numbers and buttons and it just isn't cool to be reaching and running and trying not to stumble and fall face-first into the display while hoping to catch yourself without bouncing down onto the whirring belt below your feet to be spit humiliatingly out the back. Not that it has happened like that... yet... but it is exactly what goes through my mind every couple of minutes of walk/run intervals when it is time to adjust the speed - AGAIN. I started out strong today and felt good but by the time the 10-minutes of initial walking was over and I was ready to run, my legs were sore and I could barely get comfortably through two or three intervals before my calves cramped up on me so hard that I had to slow down and resort to walking. I only ended up logging 22 minutes. I was pretty ... well... pissed, dejected, worried, exhilarated (I got almost a full 120 seconds in on my first running interval) and everything in between. I broke down and admitted I might need more info than what I had found on the Internet and turned to a friend who is a fairly new runner - less than two years - to get some sanity check and pointers. It doesn't suck that she trained with a "real" trainer for a year and could give me real information that worked for her. I found that 1) I am training way too much if I'm running every day. Cardio everyday, OK but running everyday, not OK. 2) It may not feel like it but I'm going too fast in trying to increase the time I am running at each interval. The fact that in just over a week I have doubled the length of my running intervals is apparently not OK. 3) I'm wasting my best running energy on my initial 10 minutes of walking time. Oh, and I could probably use a masseuse to work out the poor calf muscles but tell me something I didn't already know on that regard.... So, I am officially on the running only every other day plan and am going to switch it up a bit with warming up on a recumbent bike (I happen to even have an exercise bike at home for the running outdoors days) so I can save my legs for running up front when I get on the treadmill. I have to say, it still feels good to be achy at the end of the day because I had a good run earlier. I just have to stop comparing myself to the marathoner's and lifetime runners that seem to surround me and realize that I AM doing good runs - for me! - which is the only one it really counts for...

Day 9

I had to listen to my body today and take a day off of running due to a very nasty headache. I wasn't able to get my run in during work hours at the fitness center and by the time I got home my head was pounding and I could barely see to drive. I did, however, take a minute on the way home to drive my outdoor route and determine the distance of my 30-minute outdoor runs. 1.6 miles isn't too shabby for this beginner. Which means when I get to the point where I can run the 15-minutes straight prescribed in the training program I will be running a mile (or something close to that). I refuse to think of today as a defeat but instead am reveling in the fact that I am already showing significant improvement after only a week. Tomorrow is another day and one in which I get to run!
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Day 8

Today was a personal best even though there isn't too much to compare with as yet. First day running outdoors with my running shoes and still can't say enough about them! I am back to my lungs giving out before my legs do. There's one stretch of road I could easily mark progress on and I was able to go twice the distance as the last outdoor run. I had more running intervals on this run and I wasn't sucking wind as much after any of them. I'm going to have to plot out a new route because now I am done with the route before my 30 minutes are gone. Progress is such sweet victory! And, now that word is out, I have been recruited for my first "race" which luckily I have more than a year to train for. It is a 9-person relay between two cities where each team member runs three 3-mile legs. I am still amazed it is only a week in and I am seeing the kinds of results I am with increased lung capacity as well as endurance. I balked at the thought it would only take 30 days before a non-running-never-run-before beginner could be running 3-mile stints but it sure looks now like it is possible!