- Loving opening up the calendar for next week and seeing Richard has written in each of our personal columns: Earl R, Duchess J, Maid K, Maid H and Stable Boy N
- Looking forward to Susie and her lovely daughters coming over later, we're going to bake cookies
- Thinking about my brother, it's been 2 years today
- Trying to balance work with the huge pile of laundry that has built up (where does it come from?) and second guessing what Maid K will want to take with her on her Duke of Edinburgh award weekend!
- Smiling every time I remember opening up the fridge one morning and finding this:
Friday, 18 June 2010
A List of 5
A random list of random things.
Wednesday, 9 June 2010
I Did It!
I completed the Couch To 5k running programme. All 9 weeks.
It's unbelievable. I feel like I should pinch myself to see if I'm really awake and haven't dreamt the whole thing.
This year was my second attempt at it. The first time I tried was summer time last year and I did manage to make it to week 2. Yes, all the way to week 2. Woohoo! LOL. The problem was that we went away for 5 days and even though I took my running shoes with me I just didn't have the courage to go running in a new place and I just never picked back up when we came back home.
But not one to give up easily (well, OK, maybe a slight exaggeration, alright, alright a big exaggeration - I usually give up very easily!) I decided to try again this year. You can read my updates on my progress here, here and here but I thought it was about time that I brought you completely up to date.
So I finished week 9 a couple of weeks. Week 9 consists of 3 runs of 30 minutes duration. And I ran them all. Impressed?
I am. In fact, and I probably shouldn't say this but, I am very proud of myself! It has been hard, there have been ups and downs. Some runs were great, I finished feeling amazing but if I'm honest most were hard. Never impossible but hard. And yet despite this whenever anyone asks I always reply that I love running. However let me clarify that statement. I love the feeling I feel after I've run! I've not ever looked forward to going for a run but then I've not yet thought about not going either. But that feeling after you've completed your run? It's amazing. The sense of accomplishment. The looking back to see how far you've come, from those early days where the thought of 8 x 60 second runs filled me with dread, to that dreaded 3rd run of week 5. All of you who've done this programme will know what I'm talking about - that first run without a walking break, a full 20 minutes of non-stop running! But it's been worth it and each and every run I completed I could see an improvement. My breathing improved, my speed improved, I ached less, it took less time to recover (no longer 2 days to just stop hurting)!
So does this mean at the end of week 9 I was running 5k? No. It doesn't. In 30 minutes I can run around 3.8km so not quite 5k, close but not close enough.
Which brings me to today's run. I had a slight health problem last week and the doctor told me that I had to rest for at least 48 hours. What? 48 hours? That would mean I would miss a run!!! Oh my, that would mean that I would fail! That would mean I'd never get back on track. I'd give up and not carry on...
In fact I ended up missing 2 consecutive runs and today was my first run in a week. I was really nervous, trying not to think about it when I woke this morning. I thought I'd ease in gently and just do a 20 minute run. That would be do-able, wouldn't it? It was. But do you know what? I ended up running for nearly 39 minutes... I ran 4.91km... which in my opinion is pretty much a 5k run (what's 90 metres between friends?).
So my fears were unfounded. I'm back running and plan on keeping it that way. But what's next?
Well, I'll be running the Race for Life this year and if you feel the urge you can sponsor me online by clicking here.
But in the meantime I'm going to participate in a few local Park Runs. If you don't know about these they are 5k runs organised in various local parks all over the UK (and Denmark for some reason). And what's more they're free. All you need to do is sign up online before hand and then just turn up on the day. Simple as that. They log your times for you and keep a track of how you're doing, logging personal bests and all sorts of other information, like age grading. What's age grading? Age grading takes your time and uses the world record time for your sex and age group to produce a score (a percentage). This score allows you to compare your personal performance against other people's performances even though they might be a different age and a different sex to you. And for a statistic/gadget freak like me that's all very interesting! If my scores aren't too dire I may share with you...
Right, enough talk of running now, next post will be a scrapbooking one. It's about time :D
It's unbelievable. I feel like I should pinch myself to see if I'm really awake and haven't dreamt the whole thing.
This year was my second attempt at it. The first time I tried was summer time last year and I did manage to make it to week 2. Yes, all the way to week 2. Woohoo! LOL. The problem was that we went away for 5 days and even though I took my running shoes with me I just didn't have the courage to go running in a new place and I just never picked back up when we came back home.
But not one to give up easily (well, OK, maybe a slight exaggeration, alright, alright a big exaggeration - I usually give up very easily!) I decided to try again this year. You can read my updates on my progress here, here and here but I thought it was about time that I brought you completely up to date.
So I finished week 9 a couple of weeks. Week 9 consists of 3 runs of 30 minutes duration. And I ran them all. Impressed?
I am. In fact, and I probably shouldn't say this but, I am very proud of myself! It has been hard, there have been ups and downs. Some runs were great, I finished feeling amazing but if I'm honest most were hard. Never impossible but hard. And yet despite this whenever anyone asks I always reply that I love running. However let me clarify that statement. I love the feeling I feel after I've run! I've not ever looked forward to going for a run but then I've not yet thought about not going either. But that feeling after you've completed your run? It's amazing. The sense of accomplishment. The looking back to see how far you've come, from those early days where the thought of 8 x 60 second runs filled me with dread, to that dreaded 3rd run of week 5. All of you who've done this programme will know what I'm talking about - that first run without a walking break, a full 20 minutes of non-stop running! But it's been worth it and each and every run I completed I could see an improvement. My breathing improved, my speed improved, I ached less, it took less time to recover (no longer 2 days to just stop hurting)!
So does this mean at the end of week 9 I was running 5k? No. It doesn't. In 30 minutes I can run around 3.8km so not quite 5k, close but not close enough.
Which brings me to today's run. I had a slight health problem last week and the doctor told me that I had to rest for at least 48 hours. What? 48 hours? That would mean I would miss a run!!! Oh my, that would mean that I would fail! That would mean I'd never get back on track. I'd give up and not carry on...
In fact I ended up missing 2 consecutive runs and today was my first run in a week. I was really nervous, trying not to think about it when I woke this morning. I thought I'd ease in gently and just do a 20 minute run. That would be do-able, wouldn't it? It was. But do you know what? I ended up running for nearly 39 minutes... I ran 4.91km... which in my opinion is pretty much a 5k run (what's 90 metres between friends?).
So my fears were unfounded. I'm back running and plan on keeping it that way. But what's next?
Well, I'll be running the Race for Life this year and if you feel the urge you can sponsor me online by clicking here.
But in the meantime I'm going to participate in a few local Park Runs. If you don't know about these they are 5k runs organised in various local parks all over the UK (and Denmark for some reason). And what's more they're free. All you need to do is sign up online before hand and then just turn up on the day. Simple as that. They log your times for you and keep a track of how you're doing, logging personal bests and all sorts of other information, like age grading. What's age grading? Age grading takes your time and uses the world record time for your sex and age group to produce a score (a percentage). This score allows you to compare your personal performance against other people's performances even though they might be a different age and a different sex to you. And for a statistic/gadget freak like me that's all very interesting! If my scores aren't too dire I may share with you...
Right, enough talk of running now, next post will be a scrapbooking one. It's about time :D
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