…I’m alive, despite what you might think from my lack of posts lately.
Laura (my beautiful, awesome girlfriend) was in town last week, which meant no training, which meant no updates on training. We did, however, walk so much that my feet hurt for two days after she left, so I’m going to pretend I trained a little bit. Touring the city on foot is not only a great way to take in the flavor of the neighborhoods, it’s a great way to wear yourself out.
Today was my first day back at the gym. I did a 5K run (3.1 miles) in 28:27. I held an 8:37 mile pace for the first two miles, a big first for me. Most of the last mile, after a little walking, was a 9:30 pace, about on par for me. My heart rate was 184 for about the first 18 minutes, and for the last six or so minutes… For a little while I thought my heart might explode, messily, and that would suck because they’d probably make me clean the blood off the treadmill. My next goals are to do three miles at 8:37 pace, and then to break 25 minutes for a 5K, then to add distance a half mile at a time. At the same time I’ll stick to my loosely interpreted version of Hal Higdon’s schedule, with a weekly long run and cross training day.
I’m seven pounds in to my 20-pound weight loss goal, so that’s going well. Laura bought me a stovetop espresso pot, so I’m drinking lots of very strong coffee. I mention this because supposedly coffee, being a stimulant, not only suppresses your appetite and lowers your blood sugar but also allows you to exercise harder, longer. I’d drink it anyway though, I looooove my coffee.
I loaded up some different music on my iPod for the run today. Modest Mouse’s We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank is a surprisingly good running album. I’m to the point now where I don’t have to listen to Dragonforce to distract myself from how hard running is, which I count as progress. Dragonforce is still awesome though. I’m toying with the idea of reviewing albums based on how they help with a workout, so maybe look for that in the coming weeks.
Overall I’m pretty happy with how training is going. After a week off I was still able to accomplish a personal best, and each goal I set I accomplish fairly painlessly. Maybe I should be setting the bar a little higher, but I like feeling like it’s easy to be awesome.
Tags: health, music, running, san francisco
