Couch to 5K: Week 7, Day 1 update!

Well, I didn't die! :) I also really hate these 25-minute runs -- SO not fun, LOL! I'm so seriously ADD, I am good with "small" projects that don't require long stretches of time, LOL. It's a challenge keeping my mind engaged, un-bored, and body moving for a whole twenty-five minutes straight. I think the next three weeks are going to be challenging for me for this reason -- gotta keep my motivation up somehow. :-) If nothing else, with sheer dogged determination, lol.

I did NOT get up at 0500 to run this morning, because it was labor day, and after several weeks of working 50-60 hours a week, PLUS college, PLUS my 75-90 minute commute, PLUS God only knows what else... I was TIRED! I slept quite a lot this weekend (which is why I'm still awake and doing laundry, lol). I spent most of today (Labor Day) curled up in bed watching the Ghost Hunter rerun marathon on the SyFy channel. :-) Cool, huh? OK, not so much, but whatever. I was officially 100% off-duty today, darn it! :) Anyway, at about 7:30 p.m., it had cooled off enough to make it acceptable jogging weather. Gypsy and I piled into the car and headed for Bay Creek park. We got there at about 7:45, just as the last remnants of a kiddie football game was wrapping up. Still LOTS of people milling about. I circled the parking lot a couple times, trying to decide if I REALLY wanted to humiliate myself in front of all these people. In the end, I decided it didn't matter, and off we went.

The first five minutes of the jog (following the warmup walk) were, of course, icky. I've found if I can survive the first 5-10 minutes of it, the rest isn't so bad. I kept having to keep myself in check -- so many people around always makes me jog faster than I should, without even realizing it. I am SO slow, it's kind of embarrassing, especially when surrounded by others who are "really" running. But whatever, I'm not jogging for them, I'm jogging for me, so to heck with what they may think. So, we continued on.

At about the time I was starting to wish for death, the podcast announcer guy came on and said we were just over halfway done. I spent the next minute or so (I'm not good at math, lol) figuring out that that means I should have about 12.5 minutes left - easy, right? OK, not so much "easy," but do-able. I kept plodding along, eventually finding myself going on "auto pilot." Make it to that light. OK, great - now make it to the next light. Now make it to my car... keep going... next light... etc.

I was super happy to hear that the twenty-five minutes were over! :) By the time Gypsy & I finished our five-minute cooldown walk, we'd circled the track a total of six & a quarter times - or just a few steps over two miles. Of course, this includes the warmup & cool down laps, so I'm totally not breaking any speed records here. In fact, I may be breaking some SLOWNESS records, come to think about it. ;) But whatever.... as I was doing my after-workout stretches, I saw a friend of mine walk by. :) We were chatting a minute and I was telling her about c25k. I told her how i thought I'd never ever survive the first week, that I couldn't even jog thru a full sixty-second initerval - and now I'd just jogged thru twenty-five minutes straight -- so if fat, out of shape me could do it, then surely absolutely ANYONE can, lol!

Wow. Hadn't really thought of it like that - from not even being able to jog for a full sixty seconds to jogging for a full 25-minuets straight - until I was talking to her. Pretty darn amazing. Who'da thunk it? Certainly not me! Wow!

Week 7, Day 1 down. Just under three weeks -a mere 8 jogging days - to go and I'm a c25k graduate! Keep yer fingers crossed for me! :)