One, two, one, two, one, two...
Stand up straight, no velociraptor running! Don't tense your hands into fists!
Breathe in, out, in, out, in, out.... Expand your lungs.
I can show you the world. Shining, shimmering, splendid. Tell me, princess, now when did you last let your heart decide?
You are halfway there.
I wonder if I can the "cool mom" scene. Need to find someone in the office who has had a boob job. But that's a really inappropriate question to ask.
Urgh, I'm getting tired. Shouldn't have gone to bed so late last night. Just keep running. One, two, one, two. In, out, in, out.
I wonder if French movies don't need as much exposition because they don't treat their audiences like idiots, which in turn means that the general French movie-going population knows that they need to actually think while watching the movie, which means that they've conditioned themselves to read between the lines.
Eyes on the prize, once you get home, it means you can eat breakfast!
One minute remaining. Oh, wow, that was sooner than I thought.
Just finished Week 6 of the couch to 10k app. I was going to post after week 5, as that featured a huge milestone, but had other things to write about, so postponed it to this week. So here's the run progression so far:
Week 1 - Alternate jog 60 seconds, walk 90 seconds x 8
Week 2 - Alternate jog 90 seconds, walk 2 minutes x 6
Week 3 - Jog 90 seconds walk 90 seconds, jog 3m, walk 3m x 2
Week 4 - Jog 3 minutes , walk 90 seconds, jog 5 minutes , walk 2.5 minutes , jog 3minutes , walk 90s
Week 5.1 - Jog 5 minutes, walk 3 minutes, jog 5 minutes, walk 3 minutes, jog 5 minutes
Week 5.2 - Jog 8 minutes, walk 5 minutes, jog 8 minutes
Week 5.3 - Jog 20 minutes
Week 6.1 - Jog 5 minutes, walk 3 minutes, jog 8 minutes, walk 3 minutes, jog 5 minutes
Week 6.2 - Jog 10 minutes, walk 3 minutes, jog 10 minutes
Week 6.3 - Jog 22 minutes
Each session has a 5 minute warm-up, and 5 minute cool-down phase.
So you can see why week 5 was a big milestone - the first continuous running block! I was pretty hesitant when I first saw it, and was dreading that run in the week leading up to it. I told A, and he said to take it easy. My goal should be to build up endurance first, and work on speed later, so even if it means I'm only jogging at half-pace the entire time, it doesn't matter. He also said that when he runs, all he thinks about is his breathing, and his feet hitting the ground, so I've been trying to focus on that.
It was incredibly windy that day (last Sunday), and there seemed to be some sort of party going on near where I was running, so there was a lot of loud music playing. I could barely hear my own music, and ended up missing all of the prompts. It wasn't until I well past the point where I'd usually get the cool-down prompt that I thought to check my phone, and I saw that I was already 2.5 minutes into my cool-down. Which meant I had been running for 22.5 minutes continuously.
So when I got to today's run, I wasn't that worried, since I knew I could do it. I managed 4.2km, so if that's 22 minutes of jogging, and 10 minutes of warm-up / cool-down:
22x + 10y = 4.2
assuming my jogging pace is about 1.3 times my walking pace:
x = 1.3y
28.6y + 10y = 4.2
y = 0.11
So my total running distance was:
3.11km
A bit slow, given I was supposed to have run 2 miles today, which is 3.22km, but I'm pretty happy with today's run.
I've caught the running bug, and I actually look forward to my runs now. Maybe it's just because I'm making progress towards something, and that feels good, but even if that's the case, I think it's a good thing. There's just something rewarding about having the self-discipline to wake up early in the morning and exercise.
I know I sound like I'm bragging, or I sound like one of those crazy cross-fit people, and for that, I apologise, but that isn't my intention at all. I just feel happy that I've managed to stick with this for so long, even though it's getting harder and harder. I just really enjoy the peace of mind that comes with running. I find that my mind is always processing a hundred things at once (but that's probably a blog post on its own), but when I run, I manage to achieve this single-minded focus, and I can actually think about one thing long enough to process it.
According to the app, I have another 8 weeks to go until I hit 10k, but in two weeks' time, I should have hit 5k, or 30 minutes of continuous running (though at this pace, that'll only get me to 4.29km). Will check back in then!
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