Y5K #19

Normally I post these on Monday morning, but as I'll be out of town for a few days, I'm posting it early on Saturday.  2 weeks in a row with 3 runs pleases me. Nice to be seeing some progress. Here's the details:

• Monday: Did my first 7.5/1 split and I have to say that 7.5 minutes is a long time to be running and I'm starting to go far enough that I might have to start planning some new routes.  Today I ran out of sidewalk and had to finish my outbound leg on the shoulder of the Van Winkle Expressway. Granted it was a pretty roomy shoulder in all but one tiny section, but I'd still rather not end up there again.  In any case, I felt pretty good throughout most of my run, especially considering that I went downhill first and had to come back uphill. All in all, I went 3.8 miles in just over 45 minutes. My feet are feeling a little sore, but it more of a soreness that I would expect than any weird foot pain. Just feel like I ran a few miles, which I did.

• Wednesday: Did another 7.5/1 split and went back to my old standard, the uphill front half/downhill 2nd half spot. It's exciting to be going further than I've gone in the past. But I guess in part that was because the beginning training schedule I was using pretty much always had me going about the same amount of time, just the split of jogging and walking changed over time. I keep wondering if I should cut back to just 3 legs and keep focusing on a distance of around 5k if that's my ultimate goal... Don't know.  In any case, I went 3.7 miles in 42 minutes.  If I just look at the non-warm-up/cool-down portion then I did 3.1 miles in 33 minutes. So that's basically a 5k with just 3 minutes of walking, with half of it being uphill. Sometimes it seems doable that I could actually run a full 3.1 miles without stopping. I mean does a minute of walking really rest me THAT much? Actually it kind of does.  Ah, patience...

• Saturday: Thought about running Friday night, but was feeling kind of worn out, so I decided to wait til Saturday morning.  And Saturday morning I was kind of lazy, so it ended up being about 10:15 before I finally got out for my run.  So not quite as cool as it might have been if I'd gone at 9 or something.  Nevertheless, I decided I push for 4 sets of 8 minutes jogging with 1 minute rests in between. And it went much, much better than I could have ever hoped.  I took a route that had me alternating between uphills and downhills in a neighborhood not far from my house, and I was surprised at how well I did. I never really felt like I was going to die (is it sad that that's my measure for a "really great" run? That I didn't feel like I was going to die?).  Having just mapped my expedition, I can happily say that I just finished my first 4 mile trip (4.02 miles in 45:45).  Looking at the portion that I ran, I probably jogged about 3.6 miles in 35 minutes.