Running In Place

It’s been a good week. I got out there 4 days and did the 8 min/1 min gig without much at all in the way of discomfort. Really only one day with a slight achilles twinge and it was brief. I think I am fortunate that I don’t (and really didn’t before injury) have trouble with sore muscles or joints during or after running though that may change when I am running actual distances for actual uninterupted periods of time. Right now it’s kind of like me telling a triathelete that I don’t get sore from laying on the couch

So that brings me to why I’m silly. If all goes according to my schedule, next week I will go 12 minutes running /1 minute walking, the following week 15/1 and the next week 30 minutes continuous running. For some reason, last night while running I started to fret about losing my 1 minute walk break. I didn’t realize what a security blanket it had become. Pre-injury, while I was going through the beginners schedule - increasing run time/decreasing walk time, that walk break really bothered me. I convinced myself that it was what was keeping me from being the famous, elusive “real runner” that we beginners keep waiting for like an epiphany from above. This time around I think that I equate losing the walk break with getting injured and I am reluctant to let it go, even though at that point I imagine I’ll be physically ready and I will logically know that I in no way rushed this training. Ultimately, I’ll just do it, just run and get accustomed to it (and yes I can walk any time I please, though that’s not the goal), and all this worry will have been wasted energy.

Not going mountain climbing after all this weekend. Wind gusts of up to 50 mph are expected and the last thing we need is a bunch of little girl scouts fluttering down the mountain like leaves from trees. I got some super-cool books the other day:

50 Hikes in the Adirondacks: Short Walks, Day Trips, and Backpacks Throughout the Park

Fifty Hikes in Central New York: Hikes and Backpacking Trips from the Western Adirondacks to the Finger Lakes

Longstreet Highroad Guide To The New York Adirondacks

I’m also reading:

Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal

but that’s for another post.