Running: First Week of March 2010

[colby]

You gals have had a productive week so far!

I was traveling this week and it was pretty rough. The hotel we stayed at had a co-operative gym membership last year that let us go to an actual gym, but discontinued it sometime since then. That left us with their "fitness center" - 1 treadmill, 1 elliptical, 1 recumbent bike, free weights, weight bench, and weight machine, all in a space the size of a small hotel room. Close quarters, humid, and usually you had to compromise or wait for the equipment you wanted.

I only wore FiveFingers the whole time I was traveling (it was a conference where we were on the expo floor with other software/hardware vendors giving demonstrations of our stuff), except when we went out to our nicer dinners and I'd have got the stinkeye for doing so. I stood in my Sprints all day, and exercised in my KSOs in the mornings. Elliptical the first day (treadmill busy), bike the second day, and treadmill today. Because I'm not used to standing all day and we ate late dinners, I was not able to stick to my normal schedule and just tried to get the time in and be close to the schedule rather than stress about not doing the exact program for 3 days. It was my first time wearing them on the treadmill, which took some adjusting. I was tired and it was a weird treadmill, so I just tried to relax and get the workout in.

Anyway, this weekend is either 12 miles or an easy week re-test of my perceived effort scale, which I will probably run in the VFFs since I only had one other run in them and feel pretty good. In my long run on Sunday (the 28th), I wore shoes for about 11 miles. I am looking forward to being able to run in the FiveFingers almost all the time, especially while I get over whatever it is that bothers my heel so much in shoes.

[Crankin]

You guys humble me.
I keep trying to get back to running; my back/hip hurts no matter what I do, but the yoga up dogs that Knott recommended helps a lot.
I did one of my regular interval run/walks on the treadmill this week. Forty minutes, with 5 intervals of running, for 2 minutes at a 9:57 pace. The rest is walking at 4.0 at various elevations. I found that I no longer am feeling like my breathing is really labored when running at this pace. Not sure why, maybe the winter training on the bike, core work, combined with the x country skiing.
This weekend is the beginning of the outdoor riding season for me. I really want to run outdoors this afternoon, but I don't want to compromise my body for riding. It seems no matter what kind of stretching I do, I am really sore and tired after running.

[limewave]

Another 7-miler for me today. With 3 acceleration strides. So happy to see the sunshine again this week. I do love winter, but I'm ready for SUN!