Monday, October 10, 2011

Running Update: 5 months=New Direction

So I've been running for 5 months now. I can officially, with minimal difficulty (although the difficulty definitely still exists) run for 20 min straight.
I am writing this to hopefully boost my confidence in myself.
When I started this running thing, I could, at most, run for 4 minutes straight. This was done with great difficulty.I have to remember that although 20 minutes is not long for a lot of people, it is a vast improvement for me. So hooray for me! :)
Today was the first run where I logged my time per mile. I used the iMapMyRun app on my phone for the first time this morning and found that I ran:
  • Time: 20 min
  • Distance: 1.5 miles
  • Average pace: 13:40min/mile
  • Average Speed: 4.38mph
So I am looking at this as my starting point from here.
I was sort of lost as to where to go now. Since I didn't get to run my 5K and my online training regimin was up, I haven't been as motivated to run, because I didn't have a goal, a reason, a real motivator.
Well I mean, my legs/waist/stomach/butt are pretty good motivators.. but I needed a goal to work toward.
So now that I have my ability to run for a steady amount of time under my belt, I can focus on increasing my mile time, speed, distance all gradually.
I've got my starting points, and now it is up to me to increase/decrease those numbers where appropriate.
I'm not even sure what a decent min/mile is... I guess I'll look at it like this: I'm currently at a 13.4 minute mile. So, I think I'd like to aim for eventually a 10 minute mile. That sounds pretty decent to me.
I realize there are people who run 6 or 7 minute miles, but they're not me. I've struggled a LOT with this running thing, and I think that a goal of a 10 minute mile is really good for me and I would be damn proud of myself for reaching it.

On a slightly unrelated note: On one of my runs last week I managed to some how get stung by a bee, while running! That little bastard got me right on the head, in the midst of all my sweaty hair and I didn't get the stinger out until well after I'd been home.
Now I've been stung before, about 8 or 9 times when I was a kid. But this was the first one in almost 20 years. I thought that whole "bee sting" era of my life was over. Apparently, you're never too old for bee stings.

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