January 04, 2010 - 5K Training...Day 1

And it begins...

With only 83 days left until the 5K (notice the little "countdown of doom" widget in the corner?) it's time to start preparing in earnest.  Ok...at all.

I went to the gym today with nervous excitement.  I even snuck out of work a few minutes earlier just because I couldn't handle the wait anymore, and let me tell you that is saying a lot. I was looking forward to running.  Clearly I've either been hit on the head or been invaded by a body snatcher.  Either way, I was almost giddy in the car.  Don't get me wrong.  There was also a little bit of an "I could throw up at any moment just thinking about what I'm attempting to do" thing going on as well, but mainly it was excitement because if there is one thing I love, it's a challenge.

In the same way that I find out all of my information (remember when there was a such a thing as a card catalog and encyclopedias...when you actually had to go to a library when you had a question you wanted answers?), I went to the internet and found a site called "Couch to 5K."  Perfect!  It has a nine week training program, which is two weeks less than I have, leaving me room to repeat a week if necessary, and looking ahead I'm predicting that's gonna happen around Week 5.

Week 1, however, is not what most people would consider very strenous.  But when you're obese and running for essentially the first time since the damn mile run twice a year in 9th and 10th grade, it's a little more daunting.  Today the goal was, as it will be twice more this week, to start with a brisk 5 minute walk followed by 8 repetitions (or about 20 minutes worth) of 60 seconds of jogging and 90 seconds of walking.

By the time I got changed into my workout clothes, I was feeling a little more nervous than excited and decided to ease myself into things with fve minutes on the bike.  Finally I struck out on the track and realized two things immediately.  First a crowded track sucks, and second, I don't really enjoy running (or even walking really) in a continually clockwise pattern.  I don't know what that says about me, but I guess I'll have to get used to it because the track runs clockwise and Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and guess when I've chosen to get in my three training sessions a week.

It wasn't as hard as I thought it was going to be.  The fact that I didn't have to be revived with oxygen and/or fluids at the end is pretty much a success in my book.  My calves started hurting about halfway through, and I definitely could have walked faster than I was running during the last lap, but I made it through.  Success.  And as I kept reminding myself when I felt bad for not going faster or craving my next round of walking...it's a start.

Random thoughts:

1.  People at the grocery store: If the self-checkout lane says "1 to 15 items" that does not constitute a cart load.

2.  Three years in Kentucky, and it still cracks me up when they cancel school because it's cold.

3.  Despite the comment above, I'd like to say "DAMN, IT'S COLD!!"