Week Five, Day Three

I did it. I did it!

I ran twenty uninterrupted, consecutive minutes last night. I did it and afterwards I felt great. In fact, at one point I glanced down at my trusty kitchen timer at a point where I thought I was a little better than halfway through and was surprised to see that I only had three minutes left.

Going into this running program it was always week five, day three that intimidated me the most. I feared that run and figured that if I could do that and not want to die, I could easily make it through to week nine, day three, which is run thirty minutes with no walking.

Honestly, I think I could have run thirty minutes last night.

My goals though, are still the same. Number one is to finish the Cool Running's Couch to 5K walk/run program as prescribed. I don't want to skip ahead or push myself beyond it at this point because I still am very much a beginner and, mostly, because I'm enjoying myself and I credit that to this program for not pushing me too far too fast.

My second goal is to work on my pace and get my mile under ten minutes (Superdad laughingly called that a "girly goal"). I'm almost there now and will start setting faster goals once I reach the ten minutes mark (want to race, Superdad?).

I don't know if you all know this about me or not, but last April when I said my competitive nature was usually repressed I was totally lying. (Sarcasm is a good friend of mine.) So the last goal I've set for myself (for right now, anyway) is to run a 5K sometime in early 2008. For now that's it, but once I attain my goals on running faster miles, I may set a time I want to hit.

Week Five, Days One (again) and Two

After a week of not feeling that well, I just decided I may as well start my lackluster week five once again. I'm glad I did too, because even at full strength these have been tough runs for me. At the end I've felt tired but, more importantly, an overwhelming sense of accomplishment. Not only did I do it, but I could have done more.

Each run in week five prescribes a different amount of running. Like the first time around, my first run had me run five minutes, walk three minutes, run five, walk three and then, finally, run another five. And, like the first time around, the five minutes spurts were manageable and fun.

Last night I ran eight minutes, walked five and then ran another eight. I felt seriously, seriously proud (and seriously, seriously tired) after last night's workout. Eight minutes! Ha!, all you marathoners out there are thinking. But to me? Well, I don't think I've run that far or long in years, and certainly whenever I did it never so manageable or enjoyable.

I won't lie though. Next up? An uninterrupted twenty minute run. I'm nervous!

Week Five, Days Zero and One

I told you I'd tell about the good, the bad and the ugly, right? And this week, in regards to running, has been uuuu-gly!

Tuesday night I intended to go running. I really did. But I just couldn't. I was completely and totally exhausted and was unable to make myself go. I did run Wednesday but it became obvious to me during my run that I was coming down with a bug of some sort. Still though, I felt a sense of accomplishment because I made it through my run anyway.

I also was proud because I realized that when I started out running (a month ago!) ninety seconds was a big deal and now the least amount of running the Cool Running's program doles out are five-minute spurts-- and I can easily do it!

And that's it, folks. Here it is Friday and I need to squeeze two more runs in this week to stick to my goal. I think I need to develop some sort of alternate goal system for when I'm under the weather. Still though, I'm committed to making it out tonight. Or, if our church's social fish fry tonight goes too late, then tomorrow. And Sunday.

Good. I posted it here. Now I have to stick to it.