Its the motion of the... oh wait, no, that's something else entirely.
It is
absolutely the length of the run.
As it turns out I'm a bit of a workout size queen! Today I finished week two of 5k to 10k and the mileage drop is becoming a real point of annoyance.
First there's the
actual mileage drop. I'm sticking to the training program which means three structured runs per week, which is about what I was doing before, but given the structure of the runs I'm only doing about one and a half to two miles per workout compared to a minimum of 5K per run previously. It doesn't help that mile two is typically my least favorite part. Today's run was actually long enough to get a full 5k in but looking at the next few workouts I probably won't get to do that again until next weekend.
While I'm sure the speed-work will help me make better use of my time so that I will be pushing my mileage back up again quite quickly I won't get to exceed my current longest run (time wise) until week 6 day 3! It's kind of frustrating at the moment to be cutting my mileage in order to... run more miles? I'm sure it wouldn't be as much of an issue if I hadn't run so little in the storm aftermath, but regardless scrolling back through my last month and a half worth of workouts is making me feel like a massive slacker and I'm itching to rack the miles back up.
As much as I question whether running a marathon is really a good idea for me, based on my reaction to this mileage drop I have a feeling that in the long run (hah!) I'm going to end up doing one anyway. "That's good enough, I'm done now" did not come as a standard feature in this model.
Secondly there's the Nike/treadmill issue. As flawed as its measurements have been Nike has been my favorite fitness community hands down. It's shiny and I get all sorts of awards and badges and nifty metrics when I do stuff. Apparently I must have really internalized all of that gold star sticker stuff when I was a kid because every time I get a new badge on Nike+ I totally eat it up.
However I don't have the Nike footpod so none of my treadmill workouts are counting toward my stats and it is kind of driving me a little bit bonkers. My listed November mileage is literally half my October mileage.
 |
| I feel rather blessed that I can recognize just how much of a ridiculous First World Problem this is. |
Luckily Gigi from
Running on Candy showed me this super nifty
conversion site that takes Garmin data and uploads it to Nike, but it seems like the code is being a little glitchy at the moment so I'm hoping that's back up and running soon (and thank you to
Angus Smithson for setting it up in the first place - please consider checking out his page and donating for his chosen cause "
In 2012 I am running 2,012 miles
(equivalent to nearly 77 marathons) to raise money for CLIC Sargent, a
charity supporting my cousin’s son Hamish who is fighting
rhabdomyosarcoma, a rare form of children’s cancer").
While we're on the subject of First World Running Problems - I tried to pull out a pair of dressy pants for a work holiday party this weekend and all of mine are too big, including a brand new pair in size small that are so new I hadn't even had a chance to have them hemmed! Pants shouldn't puddle when you are wearing five inch platforms, right? Hopefully I can just shrink the new ones a bit in the wash and re-claim them but finding out I'm too small for a pair of smalls was a bit ridiculous at that point in time.
It actually isn't so dire as that as I still have a lot of old clothes I have yet to slim down to, but even if it fits my body I don't know if my college wardrobe will fit
me so much anymore.
5k to 10k Week 2
Sorry, I know I've been slacking on this, I have no excuse really.
Here, have three days worth of runs!
Just for reference I'm aiming for about 10:00 or under as "fast", somewhere between 11:00 and 12:00 as "steady", and anything over 12:00
as "jog
".
Day 1 - Tues Dec 4 - Treadmill - Steady run
1.7miles at an average pace of 11:46
goal - 20 min at an "easy pace" plus warmup/cooldown
It's just way too hot in the gym
Day 2 - Thurs Dec 6 - Treadmill - Intervals
2.11
mi 27
minutes at a
12:35 pace
goal - 10 min jog, 2 minute fast runs alternating with 2 min jogs - 2 times
, 8 minute steady run
plus warmup/cooldown
I could have pushed the fast run way more but I have been feeling like I am maybe coming down with something and I'm still trying to get used to the treadmill. I figure there's plenty of time to work up to it.
Still way too hot a the gym
Day 3 - Sun Dec 9 - Road - Steady run
3.23 miles at an average pace of 11:10 min/mile
goal -35 min at an "easy pace" plus warmup/cooldown
I think I pushed myself a bit overly hard during the first half of mile three, anything slower than 10:15 at that point felt impossibly slow! As a result I got a sidestitch just before mile three but otherwise I felt good.
It rained in a really annoying spitty manner the majority of the time but I got to see a red fox make a full-on dash across the street about thirty yds in front of me so that was TOTALLY worth it.
