So from July 8 to July 21 I only ran just shy of 24 km so I’m now about 243 km from home. I’m just past Odessa Ontario – so halfway between Greater Napanee and Kingston. I have such fond memories of Kingston….but more on that next week I hope.
After last Sunday’s race I figured I’d take a day or two to recover then jump back into training for the September 28 half. Only by the end of the day on Tuesday I was lightheaded and nauseous. I actually stayed home from work on Wednesday. Then add the heat and humidity of the past week and another week of crappy running has passed by. BUT Suzy and I went out today – I went a little fast for me (a 10k fastest time if it had been a race) and slow and easy for her. So glad we did it, even though we were both a little hungover. We went out for supper last night for Toby’s birthday:
July started so well and then went so downhill! For the first time since this whole thing started (which was really only back on May 1) I’ve gained weight this week BUT only because I weigh myself both Mondays and Fridays. I’m actually down ½ a pound from last Friday and up 2 pounds since Monday. Weird
I’m going to chalk it all up to the insane heat and humidity Toronto’s gotten this week (and my corresponding lack of exercise and uhm over-drinking) and I’m actually just going to turn off thinking about it for today and tomorrow. It seems if I dwell on it too much I just get a headache so I’m going to use this time as a scheduled downtown and will restart on Sunday.
Today’s title seems fitting if only because of the heat but Wikipedia tells me that on July 19, 64 Rome started to burn.
Maybe I should take bets… or have a contest or something about what week it’ll be when I actually GET to PEI. What do you think?
Just when I thought my running couldn’t get any worse, well, it did. Only two runs last week – including a 5k race that I was (obviously) woefully unprepared for.
On Monday we had a huge storm roll through Toronto and cause huge amounts of damage and generally make life annoying for a day or so. Toby wouldn’t let me go run at the track so I ran on the treadmill and did my intervals there. It’s hard to think that the last time I started to run (in 2008) I spent the first few months on a treadmill afraid to go outside. I swear, I only stayed in on Monday ’cause there were police alerts asking people to stay in unless absolutely necessary. There’s a TV and everything down there now but between the treadmill and the fan, it’s hard to hear the TV. Maybe I should pay attention next time to those ads “wear this device and hear sounds 100s of yards away.”
and there’s my ed belfour autographed goalie stick too. Clearly we didn’t have any power outages or water issues during the storm.
So I ran Monday. Then uhm. 5 days went by and the next thing you know my friend Suzy picked up my race kit and I was gonna get her Sunday morning and head up to Sunnybrook park. Wheeeee. The race was Dawn at the Don and it was pretty good. Only about 350 runners total (between the 5 and an 8k race). It wasn’t exactly cheap but overall I was satisfied with it. There was one water/gatorade station and the usual tents set up. The race kit came with a choice of hat or water bottle and the usual flyers and a treat sized chocolate. Not sure I’d go out of my way to run it again but I also wouldn’t refuse to run it (like I won’t run any of the Toronto Women’s Runs races).
flat runner; and the skirt is awesome
I had a couple of bad running weeks in June but July had started really well and despite the lack of running this week I thought I’d stick with my initial plan: start recklessly fast and hold it as long as possible. I essentially pulled a number out of a hat and thought I’d go at 6 min/km (my previous best 5 km race time worked out to 6:57 min/km) and hold it as long as I could. I was aiming for 15 minutes. I lasted 5. True it was warm (over 30 with the humidity) but man oh man was it too much!
My garmin messed up, or rather I messed up with my garmin, so I didn’t know the time or distance since the start just my current pace. Suzy tracks her runs on the map my run app and she says we did the first mile in 9:47 which was awesome. We did the 3rd in 11:47 (or thereabouts) which is much less awesome. Suzy though, all round awesome. She stuck with me and listened to me complain about my ribs hurting to breathe etc. She encouraged but never made fun of. And at the end she sped up a little knowing I’d do my best to keep up and then she slowed right down at the end so that I’d pass the line first. She knew how much I wanted to beat my best time and, even though she could have left me behind half way through and finished far earlier, she got it into her head that she was gonna get me through it. I have some pretty nifty friends don’tcha think?
The official time has us crossing at 34:11 which would be a PR by about 30 seconds for me from the Toronto Challenge on June 9. Suzy had us timed at about 34:50 so I have my doubts about the official time but as that’s what I’ve used for all my races that’s what I’ll use here.
I told Toby afterwards that I’d just have to run more 5ks if I want to be able to work past that “oh my goodness my lungs are on fire” feeling (or wait for more suitable temps). If I want to get better at them then I have to do more of them. BUT I’m not so sure I care enough about them to want to get better at them. I mean, I guess I will as I lose weight generally and get stronger running the longer races but I don’t want to fuss about a 5k. I LOVED the 10 miler I did in 2009. I LOVED the 15k night race. Those were great distances. Clearly, I love half marathons. I have no desire to go further (except if the Around the Bay is on my birthday again) and really, no desire to race 5kms. Except of course the compulsive part of me wants a PR under 30 so I’m gonna have to keep trying.
Only 14 k last week so I’m just going to add it to next week’s total when I map it out on my journey to PEI.
It’s been a week. Sigh. I fell out of tracking and exercising got pushed aside for play time with Q and, well, just resting and being lazy.
And yet somehow I’m down 1.5 pounds for a total of 27 pounds. Or a little over 12 kg. Not too shabby overall but it hit me today that I’d be doing a lot better if I applied myself.
Applying myself eh? Lately I’ve been coasting in a lot of things. Gotta figure out what I want to do and why and how. Prioritize.
Jeez, sound all very meta there. Oh well. Like I said it’s been a week. And thankfully there will be another one starting soon 😀
Oh and Toby’s big meal experiment of the week was Indian food – he made paneer! Saag paneer, beef rogan gosh and gobi gobi (cabbage and cauliflower – the cauliflower was good; cabbage is still really only good when it is encasing ground meats and rice).
And the title? On July 12, 1812 US Brigadier General Hull crossed the Detroit River and thus began the first US invasion in the War of 1812.
Three of 5 runs done this week – but they were three GREAT runs so I’m okay with missing the two shorter runs I was gonna do. I also did a strength training at the gym but no spinning or swimming this week. I’ll have to work on that.
Monday – intervals – this week (and last) I added a 2 km warm up before I started the intervals. An online running friend suggested I do so in order to be sure that my muscles and breathing were warmed up before I started the intervals. Hopefully this means I won’t be injuring myself. So 2km warm up and then 6 km of intervals (running a km and then walking about .22 of a km)
Tuesday – weights – did this!
Wednesday – On the schedule was a “hard tempo” run – so a warm up, 20 minutes at a fast pace and then a cool down. It was hot and humid all day AND I went to the TFC game with my dad and I STILL got the run in. At 10 pm. 🙂 Don’t tell my mom, she freaks out a little when I do that. 6.3 km.
Thursday, Friday and Saturday were all rest days 😉 Thursday was planned to be but I had hoped to get a short run in on Friday and Sunday and do a “race sim” run on Saturday. Well, I did the race sim run today and didn’t do the short runs.
Sunday – race sim run – 9.5 km easy and then 5.5 at half-marathon goal pace PLUS 20-30 seconds. So my goal pace for a 2:30 half is 7:10 or thereabouts. So the goal pace today was 7:40 – 7:50.
ran twice around a lake in Lake Ontario
My easy pace started off around 7:53 and 8:00 per km but the heat and humidity and running in the sun in Tommy Thompson Park (aka the Leslie Street Spit) got to me and the last few kms were between 8:14 and 8:29. (Plus the walking parts too which add to the average). It was actually so bad that I drank all my water during the 9.5km portion and stopped for about 5 minutes at the lighthouse while I waited for the temps to drop ’cause it looked like rain clouds were rolling in:
So, thankfully, for about 4 of the last 5 km I ran in the cool cool rain. And at a 7:35 min/km pace 🙂
Yippie!
Okay so last week I only ran on Monday for about 7.7 km (warm up and intervals) and this week was:Monday: 8, Wednesday: 6.3 and Sunday: 15 so a total of 37 kms. And 219 km away from Toronto and right on the verge of downtown Greater Napanee. The area was settled in 1784 and incorporated in 1854. The town’s website has a few driving tour options to explore.
