Trying Again

It's been so long since either of us posted, we couldn't remember the blog's URL. I couldn't remember my log-in or password. But here we are, back to this fun little blog, attempting again to be less like kickball girls and more like real athletes.

Alena is again training for the Cherry Blossom 10-miler. And she'll be blogging about her adventures. (I'll humiliate her if she doesn't.) I'm trying a different tactic before jumping feet first into the world of running a lot. This time, I'm participating in a monthlong, after-work boot camp, offered by a friend who is also a former roommate. So Alena will blog about her running foibles and follies; I will, no doubt, have similiar stories to tell from boot camp.

So, about boot camp (I like to call it booty camp so it doesn't conjure such an image of scary Army life.): I'm excited and nervous at the same time. This is probably a typical reaction for anything new and different. I'm excited because this is 4-week, 3-days-a-week program that is FREE. And I'm doing this with a bunch of great gals (including Wendy, who is leading the sessions). I can't seem to stick with much when doing it alone (or as I learned during my training/blogging time with Alena, someone who is just as unmotivated as me and who can rationalize any decision to gravitate toward laziness.) So a group of people--especially who know me already--seems to create a high level of accountability.

I'm already psyching myself up with simple math. There's the maximum of 12 sessions. Wendy is missing one. So that's 11. I'll going on vacation, so that's two less, leaving only nine sessions. THAT'S IT! I can count how many times I have to do this on two hands. When I was a kid, I forced myself to do something new at least three times before deciding that I hated the activity. This time, I'll tell myself I need to do it nine times.

What sucks most is that it snowed this past weekend. So there is snow on the ground, and under the snow is muddy national parkland. Since the National Mall doubles as a kickball field, I am quite familiar with the yuckiness that is that mud. However, it's just mud, right? I've been dirtier before. So I have a a backpack filled with various sets of clothing, ready to work out in the snow--hopefully things will be warmer and drier next week. But it is February, so anything goes.

We're doomed!

I think I can write this on behalf of Alena also -- we've been slackin'. Christmas and the New Year and the related breaks really cut into our training. I broke out the running shoes one day morning while staying with a friend on Long Island. I was jazzed and ready to pound the sidewalks of suburbia, but I didn't have any headphones for the iPod.

My friend didn't have any either. So I had to run without any music (gasp) or the soothing, motivating voices of NPR. (What? The podcasts are interesting.) Honestly, I just couldn't do it. After 10 minutes, I was soo bored. Houses, sidewalks, trees, a gas station. A man filling his gas tank telling me to run faster. If I had the headphones on, he would've known I couldn't hear him and he would've stayed silent. I've decided that running outside without an ipod (or music provider of your choice) is far, far more boring than running on a treadmill without one.

But I managed to make a game out of it. See that stop sign at the end of the block? Run to that? Yay! You're there, now let's go to the blue car. OK, now let's walk until we get to the lit-up plastic snowman (Why is that snowman lit up at 10 a.m.?). I went for at least 40 minutes. So that's not so bad.

I did walk a lot while in New York City. I also ate a lot of pizza and chocolate. So I'm sure all the walking did was clear out all the goo building inside my arteries.

So Alena and I have 12 weeks or so to go. But we're back, and we're more motivated than ever. I need a new cute running shirt!

Oh, my aching muscles

My legs have been aching since last Saturday. It's been a while since I put them through this sort of strenuous exercise. It's a good kind of ache, though. My training officially started this past Saturday when I decided to run 5k and see how long it would take me. There's a website that Angel told me about, SparkPeople (linked on the side of this page), which has messageboards for people looking to get into shape, among other things. There's a particular messageboard for "Rookie Runners" which does a monthly 5k challenge, asking members to run 5k over the weekend and post their time on the board. I figured that this would be a good way to start off my training with a bang, despite not having run farther than a mile in forever.

So last Saturday morning, I decided to step foot in a Gold's Gym for the first time in at least a month (Yes, I know, every month I don't go, I'm wasting $40...). I was feeling extremely proud of myself for getting up at a decent hour, eating breakfast, and heading to the gym, instead of my usual Saturday morning routine, which involves lying in bed until my stomach's about to digest itself or I've gotten bored with the Internet. With my new running shoes on and my spirits high, I set forth to walk to the gym, which is about 3/4 of a mile from my house. And... I promptly got lost. Yes, I got lost less than a mile from my own house. In my own defense, I've only been living in this neighborhood for about, uh, 2 and a half months. So I ended up taking the "scenic route" to the gym, tacking on another mile to my trek. No problem, I figured, it was a good warmup! I was ready to hop right on the treadmill and breeze through 5k (3.1 miles to you non-metrically inclined folks).

The run itself actually went quite well. I tackled it in intervals, walking for 90 seconds at a 3.5 miles/hour pace, and then running for 90 seconds at 6-6.5 miles/hour. I completed it in 38 minutes and 10 seconds, averaging to about 12.5 miles an hour. By the end of the run, I was completely dehydrated and more red-faced than Ted Kennedy, but I was an actual runner. Fueled by the endorphines, I then dropped $200 on Christmas gifts in the shopping area near the gym and walked on home with 4 heavy shopping bags in hand. So I guess my legs AND my wallet are aching.

Lessons learned from the run:
- I really need to learn how to navigate around my own neighborhood.
- Bringing a bottle of water with me on the treadmill is a Very Good Idea. I think I sweated out a full pound of water.
- If I don't start rewarding myself with other things besides shopping, this running habit is going to be very expensive.

Not so much

You know how I said below that I'd do the elliptical after work? Know what's better than an elliptical workout before a tough game of indoor kickball?

A nap. So I took one.

I *am* going to get a 40-minute hard-core kickball workout, right?

If it's not a running day, it's just so tough for me to do anything else. Let's hope that kickball workout is as tough as people are saying.

technorati tags:kickball, procrastination

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Still so far to go

I started running about two weeks ago. About every six months, I say that I'm going to be a runner. I'm going to do a 5K. And about a day later, after one run (that is mostly walking), I say, "Well, I can't do this today." And being a great procrastinator, it's three weeks later, and I've yet to follow up on that first run.

Two weeks ago, I started again. And then I took a break for a day and went back the next day. And the next. And one more. Then another Saturday. And so one. I'm starting Week Three of consistently working on that thing called being a runner.

This time, I can't really stop because I've told about 101 people I'm running a 10 mile race in April (those people include my friends, my grandmother and my VP). Plus, I already picked out the cute bracelet I will buy when I finish the Cherry Blossom 10 Mile Run.

What better motivation is shopping?

Training? I'm doing OK. Since it gets dark kinda early, and since there's no way (yet) that I can wake up in time, I've been hitting the treadmill after work. I started just doing 20 minutes or so at a speed of about 4.1 mph. I'm now going at least 40 minutes, working toward a solid 12 minute pace.

I'm much more of an outdoors person, so I love going outside when I can, especially running on those natural trails through wooded areas. I visited Theodore Roosevelt Island yesterday. The loop was not as loop as I'd hoped (only 1.6 miles). I guess I could've just done it twice. But it's also not as secluded and serene as I expected. At any rate, I had a good run(/walk) and the weather was great.

Today I'm playing indoor kickball, so I'm going to attempt to do some working out on the elliptical before I play. The kickball-dork side of me can't believe I'm working out before actually playing a game.

Beginnings

I have never been a runner. I've never seen a point to running when you can just walk or, better yet, drive to places you need to go. In high school, the only thing that prevented me from getting the Presidential Fitness Award was the shuttle run. Admittedly, I might still be a little bitter about that... after all, who doesn't want a piece of paper saying that Bill Clinton thinks you're fit? But I've always rationalized it by thinking, some people are just made to run, and others are not. I'm not a long, lithe, willowy runner. My best sport is ... flipcup. As long as I can down a quarter-cup of beer and upend the cup in record time, who needs to be able to run 10 miles?

Until today. I've signed up for the Cherry Blossom 10-miler on April 1st. I have less than 3.5 months to go from running to first base in a kickball game to running 10 miles in less than 2 hours, 20 minutes. This means actually making use of my gym membership, going to the treadmill after work instead of going to happy hour, and buying really cute running clothes. I can't even run a mile without stopping. So I'm scared.

The good part is, I'm not doing this alone. My kickball buddy, Angel, is my partner-in-crime for training for this race. We both have friends who are avid runners; her roommate just completed the Marine Corps marathon, and my roommate once tried to run 50 races in a year (I think he topped out at 15 or so.) But we're both starting from the same point... complete out-of-shapeness. So we've started this blog to chronicle our journey from the kickball playground to the running trail. Let's hope it works...