Week of rest did me good.
So today I had another wonderful run. I pushed myself to not step off the treadmill and I only had to once during my 65 minute run. That once shouldn’t even count since I HAVE to check on the baby after 45 minutes if she’s napping while I run. She goes to sleep either in her playpen or swing so I know she can’t hurt herself or get into trouble but I usually check her after 3.1 miles (5k) or 30 minutes to make sure she’s still asleep. If she’s up I’ll cut my run short, but at least I can get my 5k minimum in. I’ve got crazy mommy hearing so if she cries I can hear her from pretty much anywhere in the house (which sucks when daddy is trying to give me a bit of me time and she cries) which is good when I’m running. And in case you’re wondering the toddler is asleep in her big girl bed in her room and I run with her baby monitor with me. She doesn’t leave her bed when she wakes up, only calls me so it’s not a big deal.
Anyway back to the run. I was inspired after yesterday’s tempo run so I increased the warm up/cool down from 4.2 to 4.5mph and just did my forever pace for as long as I could. I planned a 60 minutes total run, but then at the 50 minute mark decided 60 minutes of forever pace would be better, so I did that instead. I even managed to not step off the treadmill except to check the baby. To be honest I step off it far too often which is a bad habit I’m going to break. From now one I plan to record the number of times I step off my belt every run, which will force me to be accountable for it. I always have a good reason, but they are more excuses so I can catch my breath. I mean, checking the baby and having to pee are real reasons, but adjusting my hair or clothing, refilling my water bottle, writing my speed/time/distance on my notepad, these are all just excuses to let me breathe so I can “keep running” at my pace I like better than a slower one. If I want to feel good about running 5.2 or 5.5 or even 6.0 for a set amount of time, then I should fully do it, and from now on I’m going to be much stricter about stepping off.
My new running shoes are really helping me since my shins and calves don’t hurt at all. They ache a bit from yesterday’s run, but the good workout ache, not the my shoes suck and my legs are killing me ache. My stairs don’t feel so bad anymore either. So I’m feeling pretty good about myself today.
Enjoy the video below of my babies. If you wait till the end you’ll see true sibling rivalry right before the camera died.