Beauty on the Backroads

Stories of grace for life's unexpected turns

running

Does pain equal gain?

Week 2, Day 1. Today we ran for 90 seconds and walked for 2 minutes, according to the plan. It was our first afternoon run, and the temperature happened to be over 80 today. A gentle breeze kept us cool as we tackled the first day of a new training week.

But I have to say, I’m a little confused. Is this supposed to hurt? Because I’m not feeling much pain or soreness in my muscles after I run. I feel good, but for some reason I don’t expect that to be right. As we ran, I was recovering well in those 2 minutes of walking, catching my breath and able to gear up for the next run. Am I not working hard enough? Or is this what it’s supposed to be like?

I’m expecting to feel it more the more time we spend running with less walking in our routines, but I’m pleasantly surprised to be feeling good. I even lost a little over a pound this week. So far, I’m hooked on this plan.

I welcome your experience and advice. I feel like I could push myself a little harder when we run, but I’m just not sure if that’s wise.

One week down

Week 1, Day 3, thereby completing week one. I didn’t feel particularly challenged by today’s run/walk. Is that normal? I’m glad it gets increasingly more difficult, though I may regret saying that. Part of me wants to push it harder, but I definitely don’t want to injure myself, so slow and steady is the way it goes for now. I appreciate the encouragement that anything we’re doing is better than nothing, so even if I don’t feel like I’m working that hard, at least I’m working. Right?

We drove our two previous routes and discovered we’re covering about 2 miles with our warm-up walk, the 20 minutes of alternating running and walking, and the cool down to get us back to our starting point. That’s nice to know, too. I like measurable goals and that sort of thing, so knowing that we’re doing 2 miles encourages me that at some point we can do 3.

Feeling good still. Saturday begins week 2.

Press on!