Hills and Yards and Fartleking... Oh my!

This week has been an amazing training week for me. Heck - this has been the eye opening simple week that I needed to get me back on track with my ped sport - running.

Monday I did a 1.2 mile run at lunch. :o) I did it in work clothes and snowboots and managed a very easy 12:30 pace. I mean it actually felt easy. I RACED at that pace just the day before - but then again, I really didn't race. lol. I really did keep it slow to make sure I was fit enough to run the whole distance.

Tuesday I swam 600 yards easy and after quite a few 25's I decided to just go for it. I did a 150 out of no where! WOO HOO!! Then after about :20 of rest I did another 100 just for fun. My swim fitness is improving for sure.

Wednesday was the day that I discovered a great way to not hate my time on a treadmill... by doing hill repeats on it.

No.

For real.

You see, Runner's World online has a great video on hill challenges - you do a 10 minute warm up, then a set of hill repeats at or just above 10K pace. I did all the hills and the run at a nice and suprisingly EASY 11:30 pace. The repeats then go as such (staying at your pace!!!)

90 seconds at 3%
3 minutes recovering at 0%
90 seconds at 3%
3 minutes recovering at 0%
60 seconds at 5%
2 minutes recovering at 0%
60 seconds at 5%
2 minutes recovering at 0%
30 seconds at 7%
60 seconds recovering at 0%
30 seconds at 7%
60 seconds recovering at 0%

The cool down with 10 minutes.

I was happy that I was able to maintain the 11:30 - which shows me that I am improving in speed. I actually could have gone into the 10's but I wanted to be comfortable (at least the first time I do the challenge!)

I am doubly happy about my heart rate as it was MUCH lower after this crazy run than a few weeks ago - hmmmm.... improvements in fitness? Guess what? They really do happen! You just sort of have to work for them.

I did the hill repeats at lunch at the gym by work. The after a 3 hour trip home after work(SNOW STORM!) I went to the gym (AGAIN!) and did my swim workout. :o)

This time my workout was courtesy swimplan.com - the BEST swim website evah! It gives you a personalized swim workout based on your fitness, endurance, pool length, equipment, and goals. So I did the 750 yard workout (granted in my gym's pool it is only 690 yards due to the whole 23 yard length thing - how odd!) with no issues.

I went back to swimplan.com today and asked for a more difficult workout and the leads us to today's great swim!

W/U 100 yard FS easy, rest :20
Build up (did this set 3 times) 1 x 50 FS single arm (6xleft, 6xright) rest:10, 1 x 50 FS lateral kick, rest :10
Core 12 x 50 FS target time 1:25 (I completed each in an average of 1:09!) :15 rest after each 50
C/D 2 x 50 FS easy

Of course it ended up being only 1012 yards due to the pool length - but it was a nice workout. The 12 x 50 actually took less than I thought it would and the 100 warm up was great! As my mentor over on BT said - those yards are really starting to add up. Man 1 month ago I did not think that I would be able to do a workout like that. Amazing how so much can change in so little time!


I really owe Triathlon a huge thanks. Without the diversity I would be a sore runner. Sort of like a sore loser, only worse. That girl who laces up only to dread every step. NOW... well now I love running again - to the point where I am actually training not just running. Hill repeats, tempo runs, easy recoveries, and long runs will all be in rotation. I look at swiming, running, and cycling as equal parts in who I am and the activity I partake in. No longer will activity detract from my running - all this alternate activity is making me a better runner!

In addition to the swimming and eventually cycling (you know, when I get that bike in the next 3 weeks!) I am going to be training for the CRIM (a huge 10 mile race in Flint, MI)- no not just running to get ready... I mean actually training. I want to toe the line and have a plan to follow on the course. I want to toe that line and be excited for the next 10 miles... I want to toe the line knowing that not only will I finish - but I will finish STRONG.

I want to run the CRIM with no more than 11:30 pace per mile. So that means the addition of tempo runs and real speedwork. Oh yes - this year I am fartleking.

Excuuuuuuse me.... I am about to fartlek.

Also on the plan - two half marathons - the Brooksie Way (held in Rochester, MI by the CRIM organization) and of course - my favorote run - the Detroit International Half Marathon.

So see - all this triathlon training has made me a better person all around. I no longer see running as a necessary evil - I see it as an extension of who I am, and triathlon is just making the running all the more fun!


Swim, Bike, and above all else - RUN.

})i({ Runnergirl to the end!

Michigan Intolerance... it could happen to you.

I went home sick today AGAIN. Not a sinus infection this time - but a serious-out-of-left-field-hell-hath-no-fury-like-this, illness. blah.

I am intolerant to Michigan I have determined. I was perfectly healthy in Florida. I was perfectly healthy in Chicago. Upon returning in both cases I fell quite ill. All in the past 5 weeks. Grrrrrrrrrr I think a few more trips out of Michigan can help ease the pain of my intolerance for this state of many sasons. Also I am getting my metropark passe for $16 this year (thank you corporate discounts!) and plan on spend a lot of time on the lake again - both in the boat and in the water or on the beach. Very niiiice.

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So my hopes of getting to the gym tonight are nilch now. Even if I do feel better, one of my co-workers works out at the same facility I do in Novi, so if she saw me there... that would just look strange given that I left work in a flurry of tears at 11:30.

I really wanted to get in some strength training tonight. I guess I can go to the gym here in our complex... that would work. But I feel a lil weak.

This raging headache needs to leave my body! I have had ringing ears all day, and a headache that "headache" meds won't cure. I am thinking it is something else, but I do not want to go there... again. I have had a nice 1.5 year break... I am not quite ready to go back there... to that place.

Aside from the pending doom that it my stomache/head/sinus cavity/brain, I am proud of my workout last night. I felt really strong running, and the 60 seconds zoomed right by. My hopes are that I will emerge from this program with a sub 30 minute 5k time. :) If I can sustain that, then my goal is to run a 10 minute mile CRIM this year. Oh and that would be the 10 miler. Man if I could run the CRIM in an hour or less... I would be so happy!!!!

The end of the C25K program for me will fall in the week of May 26th. That will give me around 2.5 months to get in gear for the CRIM and Chicago Distance Classic which I am running on my B-day weekend. I can so do this! The C25K program will leave off right about week 3 or 4 in the Hal Higon approach, which will end right at the time of the Chicago Distance. How perfect?

Man... I finally found my rehab plan. Slow introduction, find a good pace, run like a mad woman for 13.1 in August.

I love this rehabilitation - bad habits out... good habits in. I feel like the bionic man saying - stronger, faster... just all around better!