Ride to see my baby.

date: 10 July @ 7:00 PM
destination: the cinema!
time: 36 minutes
distance: 7.75 miles
average speed: 12.7 MPH
maximum speed: 33.6 MPH

july total: 39.89 miles
year-to-date: 46.65 miles

After a quick, tiny rainstorm, I headed downtown to meet my sweetheart. It seemed cool and breezy early on, but it turned out to be a 90% humidity day (thus the sudden dumping of condensation) with a headwind. C'est la vie. It was still lovely to be tooling around in the sun on my shiny new-ish bike.

Work again.

date: 10 July @ 12:20 PM
destination: café
time:27 minutes
distance: 5.49 miles
average speed: 12.1 MPH
maximum speed: 25 MPH

july total: 32.14 miles
year-to-date: 38.9 miles

Work.

date: 8 July @ 12:30 AM
destination: work!
time: 25 minutes
distance: 5.65 miles
average speed: 12.8 MPH
maximum speed: 26 MPH

july total: 26.65 miles
year-to-date: 33.20 miles

Cold ride. Cold, cold, cold, cold, cold!

(Actually, it was lovely out, but I left the house like a fool without a jacket. New battery in my bike computer, though.)

Downhill.

date: July 6 @ 7:00 P.M.
destination: home from school
time: 13 minutes
distance: 2.5 miles
average speed: 11.4 MPH
maximum speed: 28.3 MPH

july total: 21.0 miles
year-to-date: 27.75 miles

The ride home from school is significantly quicker than the ride there.

Sad, pathetic run.

I was supposed to run 12-minute increments, but was entirely out of gas. The pain in my calf has gotten worse, and I was hobbling around on three hours' sleep. It was all I could do to run one ten minute interval, and after suffering through the second, I was glad to quietly give up when my running partner had to take off early.

I think this may well be another repeated week as, even though I managed to keep up the pace for all my runs last week, each one felt closer to killing me. Luckily, the lower leg pain doesn't last long while actually running, so I hope that taking it easy this week will help. Unfortunately, once I stop running, the ache comes back in full force, and I'm left wobbling around sadly.

Ride to school.

date: July 6 @ 12:45 P.M.
destination: PCC Sylvania
time: 25 minutes
distance: 2.6 miles
average speed: 6.2 MPH
maximum speed: n/a

july total: 18.50
year-to-date: 25.25

Hard ride uphill. The low average speed is attributable to stopping three times to catch my breath and bearings; this was my first uphill ride this year!

Late night ride to work.

date: 6 July @ 10:50 P.M.
destination: the café
time: 24 minutes
distance: 5.4 miles
average speed: 13.5 MPH
maximum speed: 28.5 MPH

july total: 15.90 miles
year-to-date: 22.65 miles

Nice ride, pleasantly cold.

Run, run, run. Run.

In the name of all that's holy, I did not want to run today. I finally got a whole eight hours of sleep last night, hung out with family, watched t.v., saw a movie, and ate my weight in American food. After coming home, I sat down with hubby and we watched the recorded prologue of Le Tour de France. When it finished, I knew my number was up.

Today's mission: run 11 minutes, walk one minute, run 11 again, walk one again, then run six minutes. Okay, yeah, fine, whatever, let's get this over with. I did it. It was no big showing, and I didn't break any records, but I did it against all lazy odds, and I know that counts for something.

Sunday evening is a no-run day, and I'll be delighted about that. Running returns on Monday, but the temperature should be at least 20 degrees lower than the past few days, so I'm delighted about that as well. My left calf still hurts, though, which does not make me happy, so I think it would like a day off, too. Happy Birthday, U.S. of Americans!

If you leave tonight, keep running.

Ate terrible things today. Terribly delicious things, which mandated this: no hosing out on tonight's run. When hubby left for work, I suited up and headed down to the track for today's assigned workout: run ten minutes, walk one minute, repeat for 30 minutes.

Clearly, that doesn't add up evenly to 30 minutes, so instead of running two sets, then only running 8 minutes, I usually round up and run a bit more. It drives my average time down a bit, but I'm okay with that, as my biggest concern at this point in time is learning how to be out of breath for 30 plus minutes.

Tonight (or, you know, this morning for those of you who aren't nocturnal) I was feeling especially like torturing myself, so I ran my three intervals, then ran five more minutes. I wanted to run another ten minute set, but I really didn't have it in me, and I was wet and grumpy from being hosed down by the sprinklers which turned on around the eight minute mark. Oh, they were lovely at first, but it really can throw your running form out the window when you're squeegie-ing water from your ears and wringing out your shirt while running laps.

The walk home was lovely, and the sun was just beginning to brighten the sky, and the early morning drivers looked at me squeaking down the sidewalk like I was a dripping lunatic. Beautiful.







Injury: Oh! Following Wednesday's run, I got a cramp in my left calf, which appeared to be exacerbated today. It was fine during the run, and the subsequent walk, but all angry like when I got home and sat down to drink some water. Eff that noise. I'm going to take a shower, rub some smelly goop on it, and hope it works itself out before or during tomorrow's run.

Oh, comely.

time: 2:45 AM
destination: the other side of town
time: 30 minutes
distance: 5.1 miles
average speed: 10.2 MPH

july total: 10.5 miles
year-to-date: 17.25 miles

Another lovely ride, this time after my shortest work shift ever, to the other side of town to meet my honey. Even darker and quieter, but not for a moment anything but warm and lovely, with a cool breeze and only the sound of road tires on pavement, echoing off the still river.

Best part of the ride: a damp, freshly street-cleaned bike lane, which smelled like wet summer, lightly spraying my ankles as I rode along in the dark.

I'll follow you into the dark.

time: 12:40 AM
destination: work!
time: 24 minutes
distance: 5.4 miles
average speed: 13.5 MPH

july total: 5.4 miles
year-to-date: 12.15 miles

Nice, quiet ride into work with barely a soul on the roads. Cool, quiet, and new headphones to listen to Death Cab For Cutie. At some point, I rode through a scent of indistinguishable, crushed berries, and was flooded with nostalgia. Couldn't put my finger on the why or the when, but the moment was lovely, and I wished I could close my eyes and ride down the middle of the road. However, if I've learned anything from crappy re-makes of much better films, that is a very bad idea.

Keep on running.

As much as I like companionship on my runs, I gleefully missed my running appointment this afternoon, when my partner called to cancel. I was in no way relishing a 90° run, which I knew would have to be done on the monotonous track rather than the overheated hills. I lollygagged my way to school, swung by the bookstore, took a leisurely walk through the locker rooms, and chilled in my air conditioned math class.

At home, I knew the running was imminent, but so was my desire for taco salads an McFlurries. When hubby mounted his bike to ride to work at 2:00 in the morning, I saddled up with my Air Pegasus-es and hit the pavement.

Monday's run was supposed to be 8-minute segments, but I couldn't keep it up in the heat. Today's work-out—provided I was on target—was to run for nine minutes, walk for one, and repeat that three times. I didn't want to fall back onto last week's schedule again, so I told myself as I was leaving the house that at the very least I had to match what I did on my last assigned work-out: run seven minutes, walk one, repeat times four. By the time I was half-way to the school, I had convinced myself to achieve Monday's run. When I began running, for some odd reason, I knew I could run today's nine minute intervals. I began slowly (and continued thusly), and before I knew it, I was so distracted that five minutes had elapsed. When my nine minutes rolled around, I decided to make it ten.

My biggest problem when running is my wandering mind. It makes me an excellent multi-tasker, but constantly gets me into trouble any time I'm forced to pay attention to anything. When I get some moeny, I hope to rectify that with expensive pharmacautials, but in the mean time, I'm left far too easily distracted when I should be concentrating on running. For some reason, it clicked today, and managed to stay in gear for the first two segments of my run. The third segment was more push than I care to admit, but I prospered, and threw in an extra 30 seconds for good measure.

Yay, Scouts!

Running With Friend(s)

Today, I met my partner from last term's running class with the hopes that we would both run better if we had someone to run with. Sadly, it was 80° and humid, and neither of us were very motivated.

I was supposed to run in 8 minute bursts, but never kept it up for more than a few minutes at a time. We even tried running some of the tree-lined trails, but I just didn't have it in me, and felt like I was slowing him down. We made another appointment for Wednesday, and I'm thinking maybe we should stick to the track, and maybe jump back a week in my schedule; that would have me running in five-minutes bursts.

Also: I forgot sunblock, and left the track for a three-hour math class, feeling red and exhausted. Awesome.

My bi-cycle's back, and I'm gonna be in trouble.

date: Sunday afternoon
destination: work at the Cinema
time: 35-ish minutes
distance: 6.75 miles
average speed: slow-ish
maximum speed: fast-ish

june total: 6.75 miles
year-to-date: 6.75 miles

After getting Foxy back from the painter last week and the mechanic last night, I rode him around the neighborhood a bit, but had to save my real ride until today. Opting to take it fairly easy, as I've been off the bike for some time, I rode to work with the caveat that Husband come and pick me up later.

It was a nice ride, and not too difficult, but it was fairly warm outside, and the air was blowing directly at me the whole way. I yearned for the luxury of a red light, but there was no joy. When finally I was able to stop a bit and rest, I was downtown, sheltered from the wind, and forced to stand in the sunshine while waiting for passing cars. None of this is a complaint, mind you, as I had a fabulous time, but I arrived at work starving to death, and was forced to inhale a huge burrito.

Also: my mommy bought me a cool new computer for the bike, which I've been waiting over a month to install, and it is cute and awesome, but the amount of information I get is limited. A few minutes into the ride, I thought about putting the old computer back on, but by the end of the ride, it had occurred to me that I spent more of the ride enjoying myself, and less worrying about my average speed. Hooray for bright orange, blobby bike computers!

Early to bed, late to rise. . .

As per usual, I skipped my run yesterday, and very nearly skipped it today, too. However, the pasta lunch, two candies, several handsful of popcorn, countless sodas and dinner at Wendy's—after a long day of alternating work and sitting—weighed hard on my conscience.

My sweetheart walked with me to the track, where we both ran, and I was able to check off another box in my exercise regime. You know. . . in so much as abject laziness can be classified as a regime, and so far as one can check off imaginary boxes.

In roughly four months, I have finally advanced to the page marked "Week 4." Fingers crossed, I'll have zoomed past my "Week 5" duties before Summer ends.

Running down a dream.

After eating an absurd amount of ice cream this evening, directly following dinner and Battlestar Galactica re-runs, I remembered I had to run today. When my sweetheart left for work, I suited up and gathered my stuff. After a brief tutorial on shoelace tying (which I've been intending to investigate ever since I realized I missed an issue of Runner's World where it was prominently featured), I headed out in the windy, cool early morning to run.

Again I was scheduled to run five minutes, then walk one minute, and repeat the madness five times. The workouts are designed to be 30 minutes, with steady increases in time spent running, until I can run for 30 whole minutes without feeling like I am going to die. Today, I was feeling noticeably better than yesterday, so I ran an extra five minutes, walked another minute, then ran three minutes at a faster pace in order to get to 40 minutes.

When I was finished, I was delighted to see that I had just barely exceeded 3.5 miles. I've run farther in the past (my farthest was the 10K Human Race), but my record was cleared when I bought a new iPod last year, so I get occasional pep talks from celebrities informing me I've met a goal or gone farther or faster than before which are not true. Alas, I need all the help I can get, so it was a small triumph to end my session and hear Lance Armstrong tell me that was my farthest workout to date. I should tweet him and say thanks. It was, after all, my farthest workout in over a year. So, you know: way to go, Scout.

Also: I established a new rule: any day I am running the same schedule as a previous workout (run 5, walk 1...), I have to tack a bit more time on. Hopefully I can both remember and actually achieve that goal.

Bad Moon Rising

I did not feel at all like running today, but I hosed out on Monday's run (after also failing to run either Friday or Saturday) because it was the first day of school, and because my running partner had to cancel, and because I am the laziest person on the face of the planet.

Despite my bad behavior, I went ahead and ran the five minute bursts I was scheduled to run on Monday. I didn't want to fall behind again, so I decided to push myself. About midway through the run, it was all I could muster to run four minutes in one go, so I did that, then walked for two minutes, then finished with two six minute runs. I figure it all comes out in the wash, and the important thing is that I wasn't sitting on my oversized butt reading an issue of Runner's World while chewing on ice cream mochi.

Also, it was hot and humid, and I was sharing the playground with a kid learning how to ride his bike without training wheels, so the run felt destined to blow from the get-go. I'm totally copping a squat later, though, and eating that strawberry mochi while watching Battlestar Galactica. Just try to stop me.

Feeling better.

I don't know if any other girls in the world have the same problem as I do: once a month, I begin getting frustrated, tired, cranky, and more down on myself than usual. Though that is common and fairly predictable, my problem is that I always forget it's coming, don't understand where my motivation went, and would fight you to the death, crying the whole way, for a cupcake. Chocolate, please, with vanilla bean frosting.

Luckily, when my monthly visitor does show up, I'm so shocked and perplexed, my anxiety and anger seem to dissolve, and I spend the next couple days apologizing to everyone I came into contact with for the prior few. I've considered getting back on the pill, as my system is fairly irregular to begin with, but I turn 35 this year, and the idea of sudden strokes and blood clots freaks me out far more than growling at passers-by while I devour everything in sight.

Today's run was indicative of this cycle more than any I can remember in recent history. I didn't feel like running the past few times, I had to practically push myself out the door, and when I finally mustered the courage to spend 30 minutes in the sun, I performed poorly and whined the whole time. I lowered my expectations for the past couple runs, but this time out, I found myself running just a bit longer each repetition; instead of just running in three minute bursts, after a couple of repetitions, I was running in four, then five minute increments. That's not too big of a deal, as I was running for five minutes at a time last week (and I should have been running for six minutes at a time this week), but it is always surprising to get my motivation back.

Now, if only I could release the death grip on the cookies.

lazy. . . lazy for feeling so. . . lazy!

Owing to both an inability to run at the level I was supposed to have achieved, as well as general laziness from my 10-whole-day summer break, I reset my running calender for the week. Instead of moving ahead of running days I never completed—instead, even, than simply restarting my week—I fell back on the previous week to buoy my spirits and advance my progress. . . hopefully.

Today's run was ten sets of running for two minutes, then walking for one minute. It was warm, it was freakishly humid, and I was feeling fatter and lazier than usual. Luckily, though—with the exception of nearly being mowed down by an inattentive Ford pick-up driver rolling nonchalantly through a stop sign while staring directly at me—it was uneventful. Accomplishing goals or getting verbal thumbs ups from my Nike+ are nice and all, but sometimes the best goals are simply getting off the couch and out of the house.







(I think my energy waned a bit there at the end!)

slackerdom.

Got a new tattoo on Thursday.

Supposed to run on Friday; didn't feel like doing any more damage to myself.

Supposed to run on Saturday; too lazy.

No run scheduled for Sunday: success!

Nearly forgotten run.

This was the run from my last day of jogging class. It was uneventful, but it was very warm. Humorously, it was supposed to be a very flat route in and around the Sylvania campus, but it began in an upward fashion, continued thusly, and pounded me for most of the "run".

I alternated walking with light jogging on the prodigious hills, enjoying actual running on the downhill stretches. Most of the final push back into campus, however, was downhill, but I was so broken from forcing myself up the unplanned hills, I couldn't even sustain constant downhill running.

At one point, I was separated from my partner and had no idea where I was in relation to the school. For the most part, I go to school and come directly home. Where most of my fellow students know the neighborhood and local landmarks, I don't even know street names or general directions. When my partner turned out of view, I decided that was the perfect occasion to cease running and give myself up for dead. Then I rounded the same curve, realized I was simply approaching the school from a new direction, and picked up my pace. I even took a slightly longer route back to class, knowing it to be predominantly downhill.

When it was all over, I washed off my face, loaded up on water and juice, and enjoyed a potluck with my fellow classmates before saying goodbye for the term. I hope I got an A.

Here we go again.

date: Monday, June 8
goal: run 5 minutes, walk 1, repeat x 5
temperature: cloudy, 67°

Week three of my training schedule begins with the quote, "Obstacles are those frightening things that become visible when we take our eyes off our goals." Despite the fact the words were uttered by a momma-loving, cow-hating lunatic (and despite using the word that when the word which would have been more correct-er), I decided to heed the advice and go for the run I was scheduled to take.

After last week's debacles and sad showings, I contemplated recycling Week Two's training schedule, and running in shorter bursts for the same amount of time. Perhaps, had I stuck with that decision, I wouldn't be dead now. But I am dead, because that run which I just ran, absolutely killed me.

It didn't help that the school near my house was still in session, so I had to run on the street, which can loosely be defined as "rolling hills," though is more accurately defined as "up and freaking down and up and freaking down over and over again." Sometimes it's a nice run: there are trees and patches of shade; and sometimes the cars don't try to kill me. However, I need to stick to flat land any day I'm adding time to a run. It's strenuous enough on my delicate, tissue-paper-like disposition to run while contemplating whether or not I can keep it up for one whole minute more than usual. Throw "rolling hills" into the equation, and I begin looking for passers-by to whine at. Yeah, I know, I'm complaining about Henry Ford's grammar, and I'm ending sentences in prepositions. This paragraph has also gotten strangely long, and I'm barely hiding my apathetic, sympathetic, eventually-diabetic ways, but it's okay, because I died miles ago. Feel free to use bad grammar upon my epitaph. I deserve it.

Sunday, Achy Sunday

No running, as promised. I did 30 minutes of Wii Fit yoga, though, to stretch out my terrifically tight muscles, and it felt lovely.

Also: I took some street-legal drugstore drugs, and drowned my sorrows in iced tea and pasta at The Old Spaghetti Factory. Okay. . . I also ate the husband's spumoni in addition to mine, but that's hardly a new event; when declining his dessert to the waiter, I have been known to quietly hiss, "no, honey, you want your ice cream, remember?"

We run on Saturdays, too.

date: Saturday, July 6
goal: run 4 minutes, walk 1, repeat x 6
temperature: warm, humid

O! Sweet Justice! Remember yesterday when I all but collapsed on the floor of the gym and declared, "Thank fracking Jeebus I don't have to run tomorrow"? Ha ha haha hahahahahaha. . . uh, eh, haaaahhhh. I woke up this afternoon, following eight delicious hours of sleep, actually gazed longingly at my math books, then shot a cursory glance at my training schedule.

(Insert long, whiny air-leaving-a-balloon sound here-ish.)

Following some ridiculous reviewing of chapters one and two of algebra (pretty much the same sad, sorry stuff your mind can conjure when considering 7th grade algebra), I laced up my shoes and headed to the playground down the street for today's workout. Surprisingly, I felt a bit better than yesterday, and I managed to finish each of my repetitions despite a constant ache in both shins and strange shoulder and inner-elbow pain (seriously, what is that place called?!). It hurt, but I pressed through, and I did what I set out to do. And I feel like the better person for it. Granted, I'd have felt like an even bigger, better-er person had I not then gone home and ate myself out of house and apartment, but I wouldn't be the girl I am without an unabated adoration of cheese-flavored snack foods.

Roughly one hour following the disemboweling of Vietnamese sandwiches, tubular American potato chips and butterfly-shaped French cookies, I was on top of the world. Three hours later, mind you, I was clutching a bottle of Tylenol, massaging old-lady-ointment into my legs, and whining for my mommy. She never showed.

Lesser Trail

date: Friday, June 5
goal: run 4, walk 1
temperature: overcast, warm

Today was the last real day of my jogging class, and it was fairly warm outside, so our teacher crafted us a run on some shady roads and trails. I knew yesterday that I would have to run today, but that didn't seem to keep me from running twice, playing Wii, and going for a walk. Suffice to say, I did not have it today.

My goal was to run four minutes, then walk one, and repeat for at least 30 minutes. Starting out, that was easy enough: my partner and I were first out of the gym, trucking along at a respectable pace, and making some pretty good time. It was certainly the first time we ever led the pack in class, but it wouldn't be long until that ended, as we started out on a downhill. Amazingly, with our slack plan of running the downhills and walking the uphills when we could no longer run up them, we stayed ahead for over two miles. I'll just assume everyone else got lost, and chalk that up to my superior map-reading skills.

Back at school, we were lapped just as we nearly finished, and I lied down on the floor, thrilled to be done with running for the week, and anxiously looking forward to a lazy weekend of studying for my math final Monday.