C25K Week 7 & Running Belt Update

NOTE: I’m writing this entire blog from a comfy armchair at my local Panera Bread where I’m enjoying a delicious mango iced tea and a FREE chocolate pastry. Mmm. Okay, yes, eating a chocolate pastry isn’t very measured, but it was free. FREE I TELL YOU. 

What can I say about Week 7? Yeaaaah. Week 7 of the C25K app is 3 days of solid 25 minute runs. No intervals. A little intimidating, no? Yes and no.

W7D1 – 7 am run. I had planned a route around the nearby neighborhood that would minimize the hills. I did a little mapping and managed to find a route with only a 50 foot gain. I live on the top of a hill (the neighborhood next door is actually named Hilltop) so no matter which direction I run there’s going to be some hills, so I planned around the really steep climbs. This was a success. The first half was definitely the harder half, but once the “You are halfway!” prompt sounded in my ears I relaxed and smiled and kept going. At the one minute remaining mark I worked on lengthening my stride to finish up. I finished feeling good and proud!

W7D2 – 2 PM run. 90 degrees and sunny. PMS. Stomach felt oddly full. Still, I’d promised Josh I’d run, and I’d stopped at Dick’s Sporting Goods the night before to use my gift card to purchase a Frogg Toggs Chilly Pad to stave off the heat stroke, plus a nifty (you heard me, NIFTY) headband to keep my hair from looking like I stuck my finger in an electric socket. So at this point, despite having a bad feeling about it, off we went to run. I planned a route around town to again avoid the hills, and I made it about 14 minutes into the run before my stomach started to rebel. Now I’m stubborn. I will push myself if I want to. But nothing, NOTHING, is worth vomiting over. So I stopped and walked a bit. Josh continued. I jogged off and on until the end of the timer before heading back to work, and I don’t think I’ve ever sweat that much in my entire life. It was like I’d just gotten out of the pool. For serious! After much discussion Josh and I decided to move our joint run to Friday nights at 5 instead of the hottest part of the day.

W7D3 – 7 am again. Ridiculously humid, but pleasant. Same route as D1, but this time, I used the Map My Run app so I could pace myself and see how fast I was actually going. I averaged 11:30 per mile, which I was pleased with! It puts me right in line to finish a 5k in 35 minutes. I’ve been e-mailing my friend Christina (remember her?) because I wasn’t sure what I was going to do with myself once this training program was over, and she gave me a few suggestions, and I’ve decided I’m going to work on speed! Maybe by the time my official real 5K comes along in the fall I could do it in 30 minutes!

Running Belt Update: I took the belt in about 2 more inches, and MAN does it work better now! I still need to slide my phone around to rest on a hip to minimize the bounce, but it’s working great.

Lastly, I forgot to mention in my post about social anxiety and the Adventure Run that I won a prize that night: free registration to a 5K Mud Run! How perfect but also terrifying! (Do you know how EXPENSIVE those things are? I mean, I am totally aware of the strange irony that you’re paying a ridiculously high fee to basically torture yourself for an hour and get so dirty you need to burn your clothes.) So I got an awesome friend to join me and hopefully I will have tons of pics of me looking like Swamp Thing’s mistress to share with you!

Next week is the final week of the C25K App. D1 and D2 are 28 minutes, and D3 is 30 minutes solid. I’m not terribly worried about any of them except for the evening run, because I always seem to run worse in the afternoons/evenings. I genuinely prefer running on a mostly empty stomach.

Anyhoo, I’m wrapping it up here as my butt is going numb (note to self: more Donkey Kicks). Tchau!