Sunday, February 28, 2010

New Challenge

I was reading Shape Magazine a few days ago and I can't remember what celeb said it, but she does 75 pushups, 100 lunges, and 200 crunches every night before she goes to bed just to make sure she ends the day on a healthy note. Nice.

In high school my sisters and I followed a similar routine...a couple hundred crunches before bed. Now I think, "do I want to get all sweaty before hopping in-between the sheets?" Heck yeah! BAM! New challenge!

So, who is hopping in with me? You can set your own pushups, lunges, crunches goal...just let me know what you're in for.

I think I'm going to try to mimic Miss Celeb and go 75, 100, and 200. The pushups might be a bit pushy...for all of my "buff arms" I can be a wimp!

You have this week to sign up, don't be afraid to start now (I'd better work my way up to 75), and then we'll officially start next week, March 5th-11th.

Are you with me?

*****sorry, I looked at the wrong month...next week is the 8th-14th!!!! But if you already started....keep going!

Thursday, February 11, 2010

Training Log

It's pouring down rain outside, so treadmill it is. I've been running the same 4 workouts for a couple of weeks now:

-hills
-10 mile pace work @ 7 min miles
-10k pace work @ 6 min miles
-long run of 60+ mins

Plus drills and weights

with the occasional

-8 x 200 meter run w/ 2 min rest


...and all on my stinking broken toe. getting tired of it slash ready to chop it off

TODAY I pulled out a new workout from RT, taped up my toe, and had a really great workout...that almost had me in tears the last three intervals:

-12 x 800 meters w/ 2 min rest jog @ 6 min mile pace. When I got to where I thought I had 4 intervals left, I felt like crying, but then I realized I only had 3 left and, relieved, BUSTED THEM OUT!


-you should try it. Make your 800 meters you 5k race pace and then jog your two minutes rest in between. It's a long workout, I ended up running about 9 miles, including my mile warm up (and I would have loved to cool down with a mile, but I had a kiddie in child care that was ready to go). After effect: FEELS GOOD!

a note on training

I just cover to very last page read my Running Times magazine. Sometimes the articles are a bit to namey/timey/statish for me, but usually I like to see what the great high school, colligate, professional, and masters runners are up to. This time I came away with a new take on my training. For about the past two years I've "been training for a 5k." Mysteriously, I've been side tracked by 1 marathon, 1 half marathon, a 10 miler, and a 10k. No 5k.

I've ran several time trials on the treadmill and can just feel my new 5k PR dying to get out. I find myself waiting for the perfect time to sign up for a race and really go for it. But as you can see, and as RT pointed out, the "perfect time" might never come...so why am I still on the treadmill? Not to mention, I have the wondrous Woodlands $1 5k race every 2nd and 4th Sat. practically sitting in my back yard! No promise that there will be good competition, but at least I'd be out racing. NOT TO MENTION, the really high expectations that I'd be placing on myself if I just trained and trained and then signed up for one "perfect time" race. If I can start racing a bit more frequently, I'd give myself a greater chance of reaching my goal.

What am I getting at? Feb. 27th, The Woodlands $1 5k race and me.

and that's our new challenge! Sign up for a race...are you in?

647

647. Yesterday on the treadmill I tried counting how many cars would go by between one yellow car to the next (not counting taxis or buses, yes, including trucks/vans).

Conclusions:

Not very many people drive yellow cars.

OR not very many people who drive yellow cars pass in front of the gym between 9am and 10:15am.

10 miles on a treadmill takes a lot more time when my shuffle is out of juice and I'm counting how many cars pass between one yellow car to the next.