be still my heart...

or whatever other heart reference you can come up with. For Christmas, my DH gave me a heart rate monitor to use in training. It's pretty cool actually, a strap that you wear around your chest (i kind of tuck it under the bottom band on my sports bra, and barely notice it once its on) and then a watch that reads your heart rate and tracks it during your workout. So I've been playing with that the last couple of days, first on the bike on Saturday, and then running today. Turns out that the treadmill can actually pick up the signal from the monitor as well, so it was displaying my heart rate right on the control panel.

Anyway, the idea is that you use a mathematical formula (or a test done by a doctor which is more accurate but expensive and lengthy) to determine your maximum heart rate, and then use some more formulas to work our your target heart rate for easy, moderate, and hard workouts. Once I move into my formal training schedule, I have days when I'm supposed to do an easy run, and days with a moderate run, so it helps to quantify those numbers. Good thing I have a few more weeks until we get there, because at this point, anything more than a brisk walk is getting me into my moderate to high heart rate. At least it isn't a surprise, I definitely knew I had some work to do to get ready! But I'm a numbers person, so it's great to have something quantifiable as opposed to just "I'm tired" or "this hurts" to measure by.

cross training

Managed to remember my shoes this time, thank goodness. 30 minutes on the bike. Watched Gossip Girl and the time flew! I'll be downloading the rest of the season for my future bike sessions. Sunday is a day off, so I'll be back to the gym (and the blog!) on Monday.

in case you were worried that I'd be boring

This morning I got up at 7, got into my gym clothes, put on my boots and coat, and headed for the gym. 20 minutes later, I parked in front of the gym, and reached over to the seat beside me to get my ipod, water bottle, and sneakers. ipod, check. Water bottle, check. Shoes? No. Sitting on the kitchen table. So I went back home (another 20 minutes) and climbed back into bed. Grrrrr. Better luck tomorrow I guess.

back to training... yay?

I REALLY didn't want to get out of bed this morning and go to the gym. I don't remember feeling this way about running before. I think two weeks off RIGHT as I decided to do this have been really hard on my resolve, but unfortunately it wasn't my choice. Luckily enough, many many people know about this half marathon, so that's enough social pressure to drag my butt out of bed when my personal resolve can't.

Anyway, 25 minutes of running. It wasn't fun, but I did it. I'm looking forward to going back, I know it will get better. That's what I had to keep telling myself. It wasn't my most mentally positive workout, let's just say that.

Tomorrow I'm going to ride the bike, do a little cross-training. I'm wrestling with my video ipod right now, trying to restore it so that I can load a show to watch while I cycle. I'm going to try Gossip Girl - seems just fluffy enough to fit the bill, plus I love Josh Schwartz. I'll report back! If that doesn't do it for me, I think I'll start re-watching Gilmore Girls.

Christmas miracle

I'm healed! :-) I was actually well enough on Sunday to go have a Christmas luncheon with my 97-year-old grandfather, which I'm very thankful for. I would have been very upset if I had to miss seeing him. And this time, I've STAYED well, which is great. So tomorrow, back to training and making a fool of myself in order to entertain my blog readers. ;-)

sigh...

I'm STILL SICK. I just decided not to torture you all with post after post of my complaining. So now I've got the super-powered-prescription cough syrup, and I'm finally getting some sleep, so perhaps health is just around the corner. Come back after Christmas and see if I ever get this training routine off the ground! I'm frustrated, I wanted to be in the swing of things before the holidays hit, but I suppose I'll just have to make do. So Merry Christmas all! Stay healthy!!!

I sound like a seal

as in, I'm barking. My cough is horrid! So no running again today. This isn't exactly a training log, is it?!! It's more like an illness log so far. Well, I guess I can be doubly glad that I started early enough, I don't have to be freaking out about the precious training time I'm losing.

But I did get some cross-training in yesterday - if you count shoveling 10 inches of snow off my front and side walkways as cross training. I do! Hey, I was sweating and my heart rate was up, what more can you ask for?

My mother's daughter

It seems that Friday's yucky feeling was the preamble to a weekend spent on the couch, tissue box in hand. So I'm taking it easy today, no cross training. Back to running tomorrow.

I was at a Christmas party on Friday night that my father was also at (my parents live in the next town over from us). He was telling EVERYONE that I'm running a half marathon, which I found both sweet (he's so proud!) and annoying (what if I chicken out? The whole town will know...) In order for this story to mean anything from this point, you have to know my dad - he's an uber-athlete. He is a mountain biker, telemark skier and runner, and he does them to the extreme. He was in a 50 mile bike race this fall, and he came in second for his age group - he turns 60 in three weeks. Anyway, he can kick my butt any day of the week blindfolded with his hands tied behind his back. I very specifically didn't tell him about running the half marathon until after I knew registration was closed, so he wouldn't be tempted to run it with me in about half the time. He's in the best shape of his life.

So back to Friday night - I got into a conversation with a woman who bikes with my dad, who was saying she wants to run the 50 mile race this fall (the same race my dad biked) and was trying to convince me TO JOIN HER. Um, NO. She couldn't understand why I didn't want to do it. And I quote, "Oh come on, if you can run a half marathon, you can totally run the 50!" To which I replied, "I don't even know that I can run a half marathon!" I finally realized that she thought I was my father's daughter, and I had to explain to her that I was not. I'm my mother's daughter- her hobbies are crossword puzzles, knitting, and watching the Red Sox. That's much more my style! But I'm glad my dad is so excited for me, helps me to be just a liiiiiiiiitle bit more excited about this experience.

Friday... ahhhhh....

Well, I'm not in tremendous pain, so that's good news. However my cold seems to be operating on an alternating days schedule, because while I was fine yesterday, I feel pretty nasty today.

Last night, I typed up the 15 week training schedule for my sister-in-law and training partner, M. And it was horrid. Typing out "5 mile run", "7 mile run", or even "12 mile run" just about killed me. How on earth am I ever going to do this? While M and I were stretching after our run yesterday at the gym, we admitted that we both had little mini anxiety attacks while on the treadmill doing our 1.5 miles. It was like two sides of my brain were having a battle:
"How on earth am I going to run 13 miles? This is not good, not good at all, what did I think I was doing, signing up for this?"
"Stop it! That is not the attitude to go into this with, you're never going to get it done if you keep thinking you can't do it. You're only on day 1 of a 5 month plan, there's plenty of time to get there."
"Yuck. Yuck yuck yuck. It's going to hurt and be hard and I don't want to do it."
"Stop it. Just be quiet and run."

I expect this battle to rage on for quite a while, but I'm hoping once I get back to my 2 mile level and start hitting some new goals, I can kick that other voice out of my head. Because I'm not sure I can just tell it to be quiet and run for 13 miles!

here it goes again

The first time I went out running (we're talking back in August) it was absolutely pouring. But, I had said I was going to go, and so, I went. I made it about half a mile before I started walking, out of fear of exploding my lungs or my heart. It was awful, I couldn't understand why ANYONE would actually CHOOSE to do such a thing. And then I couldn't move without making strange groaning sounds for the next two days.

Thankfully, today was not THAT bad. I was worried that it might be, after two months of nothing, and we'll see if the strange groaning sounds emerge tomorrow. But I made it a mile and half, not too shabby.

And yes, I did mean to reference the best treadmill work ever in my title. I myself have some excellent treadmill tricks of my own.

Gearing up for tomorrow

Starting my pre-training tomorrow (as opposed to Tuesday, when I was knocked out by the plague...)

Pre-training? Yes, I have to get back to where I was in September before I can begin my ACTUAL training program, which is a 15 week program. Which means I have to be comfortably running 2-3 miles at a time by February 10th. I was up to about 1.5-2 miles when I stopped back in September, so I feel confident I can get there 8 weeks out - even with the holidays wrecking havoc with my schedule.

Total side note, but I'm still totally confused as to why I'm doing this. It's like I turned 31 (on 12/4) and the next day woke up as a completely different person, and apparently that person wants to run a half marathon. Seriously, I am NOT an athletic person, nor a competitive person, nor a goal-setting person, nor a disciplined person, nor a particularly health-conscious person. I'm a wimp, and I like to eat, watch TV, and mess around on the computer. But apparently the new me has decided to ignore all of those factors and change my life. I'm not sure if I'm so happy about that!

I'm using a training program from the book Absolute Beginner's Guide to Half Marathon Training - can you beat a title like that? I'm about halfway through the book, and so far I've learned a lot. So I'll be running Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays (long runs) and cross-training on Mondays. Fits perfectly with my schedule (or more accurately, Max's preschool schedule).

The half marathon I'm running is the Covered Bridges Half Marathon. It takes place about a half-hour from my house, which is kind of nice. I'll be able to run parts of the course for some of my longer runs, and will be able to sleep in my own bed before the race. The course drops 200 ft. over the 13.1 miles, with a small uphill at mile 5 and a short, steep climb at mile 8. I say these things like they mean something to me. Sigh... I'm so out of my league!

hmmm...

hope this isn't a sign... first day of training postponed because I have a nasty cold. Harumph.

WHAT????

This is (will be?) the tale of how a lazy, lumpy, 31-year-old gal goes from couch potato to (half) marathon babe.

In August, I started running for the first time in 10 years. I was up to 1.5 - 2.0 miles about three times a week by the end of September, and then life got in the way. I returned from an extended trip about three weeks ago, and ever since have been wanting to get back to running. But it just wasn't happening! And then one day, I got the following email from my cousin:

I wanted to tell you that I am planning on signing up for the covered bridge half marathon in june. I think there are going to be four of us running!!!!! Any chance you want to do it???? So I will come visit in june and finally get to see your new home.

At first, I laughed. And then, I thought. And then, I convinced my three sisters-in-law to join me. We registered this morning. We start training tomorrow. Stay tuned for the adventure!