Day 41 of Training: Five Minutes

I RAN FIVE MINUTES TODAY!! I know that sounds lame. Many of you might be thinking... 5 minutes of running... um... ok... cool? It's a big deal for me! I've been trying to run for five minutes straight for over a month now!! The good news is that I didn't just do it once but three times today! Walked five, ran five & repeated three times. I'll admit that on my last five of running I was looking at my watch more than at the road. I had to really concentrate on my breathing. I knew that I could run half of it but the length of time I could run was 3-4 minutes last week so I was pretty excited today!! I just couldn't help the huge smile on my face (while trying to catch my breathe) as I finished with the first five minutes today. I'm sticking with this for a week and then I'll be working on running for ten minutes then walking for five minutes.

I was in my first 5K on Saturday. When I signed up for it I was hoping to be able to run the whole thing but... as everyone knows from my above comments... that just didn't happen. It didn't matter to me though. This was the first race I've ever been in. I manipulated my Mom into doing it with me and we walked the whole thing together. It was so fun and I was glad to kind of see how the whole race thing works. The race was for women only and was all about loving your body. I felt like it was the perfect race to start out with considering that's exactly what I'm trying to do. After... I heard that it was terribly unorganized & not as great as others that people had been in. I didn't know any different but it's kind of fun to know that they just get better than that. I loved the whole theme of it though & I was pretty proud of us for doing as well as we did.

I know that I still have a long ways to go to be able to run my marathon in May but I feel like I'm chugging right along. It's been really hard so far but it's also been very exhilarating to know that I can do something that I couldn't do 6 weeks ago and that I did something this weekend that I've never done before. It's all pretty cool!

Good Thinking.

As I've been training I've had a lot of people give advice, tips & ideas. Most people are encouraging, they know I can do it. They get excited with me and want to help. I've had a couple of people think I'm pushing it too hard & trying to do too much, too fast. I listen to everyone. There's something to learn from every piece of advice, positive or negative. I would like to say a few words today about the few who have said... "Your body can't handle training to run 26 miles by May." "This is something that takes years to build up to. There's no way you can do this." "Are you crazy? You're going to get hurt." Don't try for the full marathon, you're just building up your hopes. How are you going to feel when you just can't do it? Try for something easier first."

I know that I think differently than most people... at least... I think I do. To be honest... the thought that I couldn't do this never actually entered my mind. I know that I'm overly optimistic about things but that has always helped not hurt in my life. I have many examples in my life of how this has worked to my advantage. I can't think of a time where it hasn't. I'm always the first to jump, I take high risks, I like the thrill of the unknown possibility of how things could be. I know that the only thing standing between what I want and having it is just a little hard work. I'm realistic, that is... I do think of the bad things that could happen but the good things usually by far outweigh any negative things that could happen and I concentrate on the positive things and I guess you could say I make those things happen.

On my personal blog I wrote about this subject...
http://juliespilledthebeans.blogspot.com/2009/07/close-your-eyes-and-jump.html

Well... I don't see the difference in running. I know that I'm not athletic, never have been. I know that I have a lot of hard work ahead of me if I'm going to be able to finish the marathon. I know that I have to be careful and listen to my body. I also know that thousands of people have done this having less time to train than I have. Once I can jog for 30 minutes I can start my training schedule. The schedule is 16 weeks and then the marathon. I have about 35 weeks left. That gives me around 19 weeks to get up to running 30 minutes. I'm not close yet but I've only been working on this for just over 4 weeks. I know that a lot of people that have done this exact program were older than me or weighed more than me, had health problems of some sort or combination of these things. If they can do it than surely I can.

I don't start things to do it halfway. I've always had high goals that some might think... unattainable. I think if you set your goals high enough you might be surprised at what you can accomplish. You just need to go forward thinking about your goal, believing you can do it and continuing to work toward it. It will happen, I will run a marathon in May. I will be ready and for those of you that think there's no way I can... you wanna make a bet? : )

Day 29 of Training

I'm on a good schedule that works for me right now. Monday, Wednesday, Thursday & Saturday I "run". Tuesday & Friday I walk and Sundays I don't do anything. That's working out well for me. Everytime I run I try to push it a little more.

The timer thing wasn't working out so I switched to distance. "I'm just going to make it to this tree" or "to the end of the field" or "to this mailbox". I think that's motivating me a little more than trying to run for a certain amount of time. Maybe it's because I'm a visual person, not sure. I can see where I have to be and I see me getting closer to my goal. I feel like I have a reason to run or a place to run to, rather than just running to try & make it to a time. Going with this... I've done really well!! I'm pretty excited.

I don't know how long I'm running but I can say that I am running MOST of the the 3 miles now. When I say "most" I mean... more than half of the 3 miles I'm running. The stretches that I run are longer & longer each time. Pretty good for being me & all!

I have a friend that I went to Junior High with that's been emailing me. She's helped me a lot to create a good diet that can accomodate all of my needs. (I found out I wasn't getting enough carbs & protein. I'm eating more "whole foods" like oats, cooked wheat kernels, nuts, veggies, etc....) I'm also trying to tone everything up & build up my strength a bit and she's been super helpful. I don't have all of the right equipment yet but for the level I'm at right now, I think I'm OK. I've added weight training to my schedule and I'm enjoying that. I don't want to be superwoman but in the future I would like to be toned. I don't want to be flabby anywhere. After 4 kids... I'm done with the "I'm still trying to lose my baby weight from the last 3 kids" look that I've got goin' on.

Saturday while I was running I thought I was doing SO good. I had just ran my longest, I started to go into my walk and an old lady breezes right past me. She's listening to her iPod, smiles huge at me... I may have glared at her, not sure. I felt awful all of a sudden. I felt pretty pathetic that an old lady can run like that & I can't. How sad. I was contemplating this and my neighbor that I'll be running with on the Wasatch Back smiles & waves at me as I walk by. I'm not sure why but it just made my morning. All of a sudden I was fine again. I just thought... that's what I'm trying to do. I'll be like that lady when I'm old.

I do get side tracked sometimes but then I look back and I see where I'm at now and it's nice to feel like everyday I do a little bit better. I get impatient sometimes and I have to remind myself that it's just going to take a while to train my body to do something that it's NEVER done before. I've never done any kind of sports, I used to skip Gym class in school, I've never WANTED to do anything like this before. It's exhilirating to know how just last week I couldn't go as far as I can this week. It relieving when I feel like my lungs are working more efficiently. I can feel them building strength and they can go longer and longer before I start to feel the burn.

I found out that one of my neighbors is also going to run the Ogden Marathon so we've made plans to go down together. She's a lot faster than me so I know she'll be running ahead of me but it's nice to feel like I'll know someone there. Makes it not so scary for my first time.

I'm doing my first 5K on August 22nd. I might be walking a lot of it but that's OK. This particular run is supposed to be all about women & loving your body. I figure... that's what I'm trying to do so it sounded like a good fit for my first race. My Mom started walking 3 miles and I've talked her into doing it with me. It's going to be a lot of fun.

Day 20 of Training

Over the last couple of weeks a few things happened. I finally got to the point where I could finally start running for little bits at a time. Then... I hurt my knee. I think that it got overdone because I was trying to increase my distance and my speed all at once. I made a visit to my chiropractor and he said that the arch in my foot had fallen and that was making me step weird. He fixed it. I also went back to Striders and got different supports for my shoes.

It's been frustrating, I don't like it when I feel like I'm not making progress. I've been trying to heal the knee so I decided to keep the distance but slow things down to a walk. The first few days were a speedy walk and then after a few days and after my knee was feeling a little better I decided to walk as fast as I could without jogging. I've done that until today.

I found out that if I drink 1 cup of V8 before I run and 1 after I run I don't get nauseated. Since I started doing that I haven't felt the nausea come on at all. I'm glad I figured that out! What a relief!

I decided to take a different route over the last few days. They've just finished the "Rail Trail" by my house and it's awesome! The trail was the old west tracks that stopped being used sometime in the 1980's. The rails had all been taken out a while ago and they have paved over it to make this really nice walking area. The trail goes from West Bountiful to Roy. (23.69 miles) It makes a great path for running because it's so level. Streets are always slanted off to the sides which makes it harder on my body to run on. From my house and back again I'm doing just over 3 miles a day.


So, today was finally the day that I was adding spurts of running again. I'm recovering from a cold but that's not stopping me and I feel confident that it's time to start moving ahead with running. My goal was to run 5 minutes then walk 5 minutes. I head slightly up hill toward the rail trail. I have my kitchen timer in my hand and it's time to start my five minutes of running. I push the button and start going. My body is working hard and I start to feel like I'm not getting enough air. There comes a point when I think that I might die so I decide to forget about the timer and walk again. I look at the timer and only 1 minute had passed. 1 minute? Yikes! Well... I tell myself that it is slightly uphill and that I am recovering from a cold so maybe... that's why I couldn't breathe? I decide to wait 5 minutes out and go again. This time I should be on the rail trail so it should all be pretty flat, easier.

There's nobody on the rail trail right now and that makes me feel better that I have no witnessing neighbors for my sorry attempts at running. My 5 minutes of walking is up and I run... no... I jog...(I decided to take it easier). My lungs start burning again, I feel like I need to gasp for air. I stop and walk. I look at the timer and only 1 minute 30 seconds had passed! Whatever!

I walk for 5 more minutes and people have come from the other direction and are walking toward me. I hit a busy road and it's my place to turn around and head back. My timer goes off... time for me to run. I start going, I'm coming up quick to the people in front of me. They're walking pretty fast. I move over to the left to pass, I pass!! OK... This might seem like a silly thing to some people but I was pretty excited about that. I passed 3 people on the trail! To me that's pretty exciting! I've never done that before, well... except in a car! Not with walking or running or anything like that. It felt great! (Although one of them was probably just doing their warm up.) The fire starts again in my lungs and I slow down to a walk. I take a peek behind me and they're pretty far back there! I look at the time and again... 1 1/2 minutes. 5 minutes just wasn't happening today.

That's my goal. I'm not thinking about the marathon in May. I have lots of time for that. I'm not thinking about how according to my "training schedule" I should be running 30 minutes at a time right now. My goal for right now is to run 5 minutes without feeling like I might need an oxygen mask after and to be able to repeat that 4 times during my morning walk. I'm not setting up a time frame that I need to finish it by... I'm just going to work hard to reach my goal. I feel pretty good about what I did today.