The lungs are strong but the legs are weak

I thought I had a 5k to run this past weekend. That was until I rechecked my directions to the event as I was heading off and realized that I was two years late for the race!
Nevertheless, I did go out to run on the track (actual running) for the first time this year. I put in three miles with four interval laps. This is when I noticed that my fast intervals aren't even as fast as my slow laps used to be! At the fast end, I was only running slightly slower than 8 min miles. I think it's good that I didn't have a race yesterday to be honest. I would have cried after seeing the time I'd turn in.

I'll look out for another race, but I am going to have to do something about these weak sticks I'm carrying around.


Jack

slugging along

This is the toughest time for me. It's not yet nice enough outside to really compel me to get out and run - even though the temperature couldn't be better! And I'm languishing in terms of making noticable improvement. Perhaps that might be due to my penchant for fresh cookies and bagels, but I've leveled off and I can see that I'm going to really have to commit myself to breaking through to the next level.

Thank god there's a 5k coming up. I hope I can get out there for it, competition really helps me. I do hate to lose.

vermont country store

Perhaps this isn't the forum, but I just realized that in addition to Dr. Scholl's footwear, Clove chewing gum and Bon Ami the Vermont country store is now stocking a vast assortment of vibrators. Does this reflect some demographic change in the older population?
"Remember the good old days when your vibrator looked more like a flashlight then a predatory alien?"
or are they just responding to market pressures and will soon be selling fully upgraded world of warcraft characters and linking to porn sites?

sickness

Runners' World says that it's OK to exercise when sick so long as your sickness doesn't have any lung involvement. But I just got over something that just left me feeling so tired all the time that the thought of hitting the bike just made me want to lay down. It was four days off in all. The day before yesterday was my first day back and I'm fighting to regain momentum.

If anyone ever reads this, tell me if you actually exercise when your sick. How sick do you have to be before you give it a rest?

Phlegmish

Man, I'm not feeling very good this evening. On my way to my evening biology class I started to feel a little off and throughout the class I just kept crashing. I'm not dead on my feet, but if class was another hour, I would have been.
Luckily, this only just started and I was able to get in a real killer workout this morning. I put a hard 45 minutes on the bike followed by an easier 10 minutes on the elliptical to approximate a short brick. The whole thing felt great and I must have lost a pound of sweat. I'm really looking forward to better weather this spring for running outside and some interval training on the track.
In the past, intervals have been the best workouts for me in terms of feeling good afterward and making very real, noticeable improvements in my race times.
I don't think I've run an interval in more than 18 months now and I have it in my head that just doing that workout means that I'm back. That and the upcoming 5k in late March are my near term goals. I won't even go into any talk about time goals for that race.
Well, not out loud, at least.
I do know one thing though. It will be a course PR for me, even if I finish walking.

J

Day 11

Like the rest of my family before me, I've caught this mild cold. It's mostly a sore throat and runny nose - nothing much. So far I haven't let it keep me from my renewed efforts at getting daily exercise.
It was nice and sunny here yesterday, so Harry and I spent a lot of time outside. I worked on the chicken coops, he talked to the chickens about star wars. The work I did out there wasn't enough to count towards my daily dose, so I also put in an easy 20 minutes on the bike. I would have put in more time, but I had to make dinner and I put in a very hard 40 minutes yesterday, so I was feeling on top of things.
I have not yet weighed in this morning,  but I'mm get to that as soon as possible. I'd really like to figure out how to post an updated graph of my weight on here, but I haven't figured that out yet.

The only other thing I wanted to comment on, was that Mars was high near Orion last night. This is, I think, the first time Mars has been in the sky since we moved here. At least it's the first time I've seen it. It's amazing. I knew it was Mars instantly, it was so brightly red, it couldn't be anything else.

the day after ?

I'm stagnating. My weight is idling: not loosing any more, not gaining (I don't think.)
This is in part probably due to my feeling like I had a handle on things and the weight was falling off easily. My response to that feeling was to exercise only every other day (maybe a little bit more than that) and to let out the reigns on eating a little bit.

I haven't been pigging out or anything, but I did have a couple beers this week (left over from the Superbowl.) And I made a pastry today - actually they were apricot bars with a crumb topping. I have a weakness for sweets and I love to bake. I've been eyeing his recipie for a couple of weeks now since buying a new cookbook... titled something like "A Passion for Baking." It's a good book, lots of advice and lots of pictures to help you through the process.

So, the long and short is, I forced myself through 40 minutes of hard cycling a sweated up a storm. It felt really good, like the old days, except I'm going to have to find some better podcasting to listen to.

I will exercise hard again tomorrow, but I think I expect some return on my investment -and I'm worried it's going to take a lot more work to get that return.

Jack