Couch to 5k - FINISHED!!!!!

WOOOHOO! "IT IS FINISHED!"

Today, Gypsy & I headed out to Bay Creek park (the nice, FLAT track that makes it easy to calculate distances for me, lol) for our graduation run. We got there at about 5:50 a.m. It was really nice out this morning - a pleasant 64 degrees, low humidity. There was a whole bunch of crickets, frogs, and even one whipoorwill singing their chorus this morning. It was such a nice day, and the crickets, etc., sounded so cool, I decided to listen to them rather than podcast this morning. I hung the earphones around my neck and had the volume up, so I could still hear the podcast and verbal cues & stuff, but also could hear the crickets, etc. (Besides listening to the neat early-morning sounds of the day, I also have to get used to running without an ipod for my 5k coming up on halloween, which is an iPod-free run, darn it, LOL).

Anyway, not much to tell - we went out and ran. There was a great big deer wandering around the parking lot this morning who kept us company. She must've been used to people, because everytime we circled by, she just looked up from her breakfast and watched us watch her as we went by, LOL. I tried to get a pic of her, but it was too dark and she was too far away to get a pic on my phone. Oh well. :-) Anyway, when podcast announcer dude said, "Congratulations, you've run for 30 minutes! Now on to our 5-minute cooldown walk!" I was still 1.25 laps away from having completed a full two miles. So, instead of going on my cooldown walk, Gypsy & I kept jogging thru that last 1.25 laps and made it exactly a full two-mile run! I had wanted to try for distance today, to see if I could go the whole 3.1 miles of a real 5k, but didn't have enough time to do so cuz I got there later than I wanted. x-( BUT, we did get in a full and complete two miles! Took me a total of about 40 minutes to do that two miles, give or take a few minutes. I timed how long it took me to go around the track one time - one loop was 6:09 minutes - and since 3 loops equals one mile, that means my running time is 18:27 for a mile. ack. Very slow. Practically crawling, in fact. BUT... a heck of a lot faster than I was 9 weeks ago, I can tell ya that!!!! 9 weeks ago, I woulda NEVER thought in a million years I would be able to say that I'd run a full two miles - much less that I ran a full two miles in only 35-40 minutes - and still more amazing, that I did not die - or even fear dying - while doing so! Whod'a thunk it??????

So now what? On to the one-hour runner program, AND training in earnest for my Halloween 5k.(Which just might take me a full hour to run, LOL! )Thank you all for your support - couldn't have done it without ya! Will still be posting my progress as I go thru the OHR program, cuz i need the accountability and encouragement to git-r-done.

Week 9, Day 3 Done and Graduated. ONWARD & UPWARD!!!! *high fives all around*

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! :)

Couch to 5K - the Dreaded Week 5, Day 3 TWENTY-MINUTE Jog!

Today was the dreaded W5D3 20-minute jog with NO walking intervals to make it easier - the first "really big run" in the C25K program. And........ Gypsy (the dog) and I survived! Yay!!!! Jogged the whole entire 20 minutes! Woooohoo!!!!! CLICK HERE for the song that was gonig thru my head when I finished. :) **high fives all around** I was sooooo nervous about today, seriously.... I knew I could run for 20 minutes, but wasn't sure if I could do it *yet* LOL!


The first five minutes were the worst... my legs were complaining about being forced to move so quickly, so early, warmup stretches & walk notwithstanding! I remember thinking, again, "People do this for long periods of time and actually have FUN????!?" Ha! But I kept at it and eventually my legs quit their complaining as Gyspy & I got into the jogging more.

It was interesting to notice all the various mind games and thoughts I had to come up with thruout the 20 minutes to keep going! I alternated between focusing on where I was jogging next (next light post, next sign, etc) to mentally calculating approximatley how far along I was, to thinking, "Only XX more minutes to go! easy! piece of cake!" etc. And all along, I just kept plugging along - really slowly, lol - but plugging along nonetheless. :) And before I knew it, the jog was over! Including my five-minute warmup walk, I'd circled the track 5 1/4 times - just shy of two miles. So I tacked on an extra five or so minutes to my cooldown walk (which was at a snail's pace cuz I was TIRED! ha!) to complete that final lap on the track. During the course of about 35 minutes total, Gypsy & I went a grand total of exactly two miles - 20 minutes jogging, about 10-15 minutes of warmup & cooldown walking. Me moving forward on my feet for ANY miles is nothing short of amaziing - ha!

When we got back to the car, I put Gypsy in the backseat and turned on the a/c. Left the front door open so I could hear the radio as I did my after-stretches. Then, in a really neat coincidence, one of my favorite radio devotionals came on: "Christian Working Woman" with Mary Welchel. I positively got chills when I heard the opening verse - and actually, the whole entire message was eerily accurate and very well-timed -- it was on perserverance! Check it out:

Friday, August 28, 2009 - Five Things We Need to Re-Learn

Do you give up too easily? Do you keep wishing for the easy way out of everything you face? It's likely you, like me, could use a lesson or two in how to persevere. Lots of people make good starts; not too many complete the course.

We read in Hebrews 12:1 that we should run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Note that each of us has a unique race marked out. Your race may be different from mine, but the important thing for both of us is to hang in there and cross the finish line.

The night is darkest just before the dawn, and all too often we quit the race when it gets dark and bleak, when the finish line is just around the corner. In the first chapter of James we read that "perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything." Without perseverance we won't reach spiritual maturity. That's why we need to learn perseverance.

How often do you feel like quitting? I can remember just a few weeks ago saying to the Lord, "What use is it, Lord? I don't see light at the end of the tunnel and I'd just like to walk away from the whole thing." You know, if you have those kinds of thoughts you might as well talk to God about them. He knows what you're thinking anyway. But God reminded me that I'm called to be faithful, to persevere, and I had to learn it all over again.

Hebrews 12:13 says, Don't wander away from the path but forge steadily onward. On the right path the limping foot recovers strength and does not collapse. Therefore, we need to make certain we're on the right path, and then by George, stay on it regardless. Even if you're just limping along, don't stop. As we hang in there, our limps are healed and we're able to cross the finish line.

How often do we quit as soon as we develop a limp? We failed, we weren't able to accomplish something we had planned, the resources we were counting on didn't come through, things didn't go as smoothly as we hoped. We got a "hitch in our get-along," as the cowboy said, and that ended the race for us. We quit! But the Bible says keep going on the right path even with your limp.

Paul wrote to the Corinthians, "Now it is required that those who have been given a trust must prove faithful (1 Corinthians 4:2)." Proving faithful is perseverance, and we can learn to be faithful and to persevere. I'm telling you, I'll take a faithful person any day over one with bigger talents or gifts who isn't willing to hang in and get the job done—to stick with it through thick and thin times.

I want to encourage you to learn perseverance. Quitters don't win and winners
don't quit, and God's looking for people with endurance. Let's stick by the stuff and make it to the finish line by his grace.

To order Mary’s book
Think About What You Think About, call us at 1-800-292-1218 or visit our website http://www.christianworkingwoman.org/.

“Keeping Your Heart and Soul at Work” is a one-day seminar on September
26 for the woman who wants to better integrate her work and her faith. Click on
this link to register and for a brochure http://www.christianworkingwoman.org/events_details.php?eventKey=46

I mean, seriously - how amazingly dead-on is that?????????? I about fell over! It seemed to me that this was God's way of letting me know He was smiling with me, and encouraging me to keep going! :) Too darn cool.

So, Week 5 officially done! On to the next!!!!!!! ***big giant grin***