9km- Combining running with parenting

Running for me on the weekends presents a whole different challenge that during the week. On weekends, I have to combine running with being a parent of three small children (1,4 & 6yrs. old). Leaving them with the other parent is not always an option, so one option is to take them with. I have devised two ways of doing this and I was hoping to try option 2 today. The first method is to have the oldest one on a bike and the two younger kids in a double stroller. This gets me at most 5km, but when running after a 6yr. old on a bike, pushing a double stroller and on top of that screaming 65% of the time, "Stay on the side of the road" or "car coming!" the work out is good enough for me.
My second option was going to be to go to the high school track. It was sunny when I woke up and thought this may work. I don't know if 5km would be possible, but it was worth a shot. The kids would get out and run around a bit and I could run around the track and see them the whole time. I planned on bringing a single jogging stroller for the little one just in case. The weather had other plans and as I stepped outside it began to rain. Thus, my second option has not yet been tested.
There is actually a third option. If the little one naps, then theoretically I can run up and down my street (a 200m dead end) about a billion times to get something resembling a work out while the two bigger kids ride bikes on the street or play in the yard where I can see them. I did this once for a grand total of 21 minutes. It was horrendously boring, so I am really not up for repeating the adventure.
In any case today I went outside, saw the rain and left the kids home with dad. I took a new route today and ran to a lake where we swim in the summer. Often the road is blocked because it goes behind a shooting range. But today it was open. Then I ran to another lake that I often run around, but not right next to it. So quite the scenic run today.
Check out my run online.

12km- Nothing new to report

The weather is still crappy, motivation is still low, inspiration lacking. But I did 12km today and that is good in my book. Today's 12km was slower than last week's 12km and I wonder why since I thought I was doing better, but the mind plays funny tricks on you while running. I also noted, that the smell of fast food travels at least 1.5km, judging by the waft coming from Hessburger, a local fast food place about 1.5km off my route. I should see if that smell slowed me down or made me speed up!
Check out my run online.

9km- Layers and High Intensity Interval (HII) Training

Today I almost made the mistake of forgetting that it is practically the end of November when leaving the house. I stepped outside and quickly retreated and threw on another layer over my first three layers. Not much worse than being inappropriately dressed for a jog. I once had to run through the woods in heels and 5 months pregnant. Talk about a bad run. But I digress...
Last week I did not run intervals, so I decided to try them again today with my fabulous Garmin Forerunner 305. I did the same amount of intervals (10) as I had last time so I could compare today with my last interval run two weeks ago. The comparison is quite interesting. My first interval run was mostly on a track. On the track I definitely ran the HII much faster, but my recovery runs were slower. Today I ran my regular 9km loop but with HII. On the track run, my average pace was slightly slower. Today's cool down pace was significantly faster, but then again, my cool down today was 32 minutes vs. the 14 minutes after the track intervals. My unscientific conclusion? I run faster on a track and no matter what I do it is better to run than sit on a couch.
Check out my run online.

5km- Getting the job done on a rainy day

I will skip the standard rant about having no motivation to run but doing it anyway, which has become almost a daily monologue I have with myself. As the weather gets worse, I suppose this is to be expected, but I will try to keep it to myself. I think most people have motivation issues when it comes to exercise. I wish I was one of the rare few who did not need the internal pep talk to go out there and get the job done. Sometimes it does not take much, sometimes it is a system of "at least put on your running clothes and see how you feel." And taking it from there.
Either way, I suppose how you get out there is not important. It is just that you have gotten out there.
An easy, slow 5km today.
Check out my run online.

5km- Running faster

Nothing fancy today, just a simple 5km trying to beat 30 minutes. Relatively simple. I did it in 29:21. I suppose I could have one faster, but the first half was a bit slower than I should have run. In the back of my mind I may have been deliberating going further since 5km is a bit too short of a distance for me. But since I have done 12 the 10km in the last two days and the joints are feeling some pan, I thought I would try for short and fast today. "Fast" is relative. I would like to do 5km in less than 25 minutes. On a treadmill speed was not that hard for me, but since I have said farewell to treadmills, I have become much slower. This was a good start to increasing my speed on 5km. Next week I will run "against"myself with the Virtual Partner feature on my PS watch and see if I can't kick my own butt.
Until then! I have a long holiday weekend coming up, so I am not sure I can get in any runs Fri-Sun, but I will try for at least one.
Check out my run online

10,47km- Pain, less pain and a little bit of freedom

Today started out like any other day. I talked myself into running and had decided on a new route- run 5km in a new direction and back. I had had some lingering joint pain recently that I attributed to my over worn running shoes, but I did not think about it too much. I went outside, "located satellites" (I love that part of turning on my GPS running watch. I feel so high-tech), and started down the road, but OUCH!! My hip and knee hurt so much that I debated first, walking (Gasp!) or just turning around.
Before I did either, I thought of an article on barefoot running that I coincidentally read this morning. The article mentioned that many people who had joint pain due to running experienced a certain amount of relief when switching to barefoot running. To start the transition to barefoot running it was recommended to first to "experiment with a forefoot strike on your regular runs using your usual footwear." Well, I tried that and voila! pain one. Nice. So I ran like that for 10 minutes and switched back to regular running heel-toe and I felt fine. I happily completed my 10km.
Upon reaching 5km, suddenly realised that duh, I do not have to run exactly back the way I came from. I have my fabulous PS watch which will tell me when 10km are up, so I don't have to run to 5 and back like I used to pre-GPS days when I measured most distances with time or the car odometer. This lead me to a beautiful area where with the adrenaline pumping in my blood and the sun shining in my eyes and reflecting off a dazzling blue lake, surrounded by lush green moss and pine trees, I could almost imagine it was 5am on a brisk summer morning rather than 11am on a rare sunny day in November.
A photo of the lake I ran to.
Check out my run online.

12.05km/ Bright sun, small revalations & good samaritanism

Today three things stood out during my run.
First of all, the sun. I live in the land of long summer days and short, grey winter days. From October to April, any sunlight is greatly appreciated, but today it was blinding as running towards it was unavoidable during my first 1,5km. It was the kid of blazing sunlight that can make you run into a pole, or as I saw at km 3,5- a car accident. I really felt for the guys at the side of the road talking to the police. That was really bright sunlight, but what are you gong to do? Wait for a cloud to leave the house?
Around km 8,5, as I was practicing my foreign languages in my head as I do when I run, I had a suddenly small revelation that my grandmother for many years had been calling my grandfather "little mouse" in Russian. no big deal if I had a Russian grandmother, but I had the opposite- a anti-Russian grandmother (pick up a history book to find the reason a Latvian grandmother would hate all things Russian). Hmm.
Lastly during my final stretch, when I could almost see home, I decided to be a good Samaritan and tell a unknown neighbor that her dog had gotten out of the fence. Recently I got some bad feedback when I did not do more to help a lost dog, so I thought I could redeem myself a bit. Well, the lady came out of the house and yelled at me to stay away from the dogs. You're welcome, lady.
Check out my run online.

Motivation and the Virtual Partner (8.78km)

I love running. Don't get me wrong, but to get out there and actually run it takes an extreme mental push out the door for me. Perhaps because second to running, I love being lazy. (Third is baking, but that is a whole different blog). Me, the couch, a movie, what could be better? Luckily the running beats laziness most days, even on a day like today when the frost has set in, I am still shivering from my morning child drop off and even the first cup of coffee has not warmed me up. And it is only about -1deg C. (30deg F). This is only the start of winter.
So to increase my motivation, I turned to my trusty and new toy, my GPS running watch. It saved me in the woods yesterday, so maybe it could get me out the door today. I remembered that it has a virtual partner feature that lets you run against your own data from a previous run. So I set out to race myself in a standard 8,78km lap I frequently do. Its a nice, easy 70% paved route with some nice woods at the end. I must admit my enthusiasm for this new watch has not lead me to read the whole manual, just to go out and play with it, so I was kind of shooting in the dark. I clicked around until I chose "run course" and went with it. At the beginning I was not exactly sure which fields were which and if I was actually beating myself, but after a while I got the hang of it and tried to increase the distance between myself and me a week ago. Kind of eerie, kind of fun to think that there is a ghostly doppelganger from the past running right behind you. Halloween is past, so I tried to not let it freak me out during this middle-of-nowhere run. My work paid off and I beat myself by a whole 45 seconds. OK, but I thought I was running faster. I see how this can get you to put a little extra hustle in your step.
Saturday and Sunday I am most likely running after little ones vs. running the trails, so until Monday. Maybe I will race my today self!

Check out my GPS data for today.

Introduction

Hello! Welcome to 1000 km a year. I created this blog about one year ago and I think that in the last year I have easily met my 1000km a year goal. Running, that is. I love running. I decided that for the rest of my able-bodied life I would like to run 1000km a year. On average that puts me at 2.73km a day, 19.23 a week or 83.3km a months. For me this seems doable. I like to run the occasional half marathon and I hope to one day run a full marathon. On average I definitely run 20km a week, sometimes less, most often more. I would prefer to run more but because that pesky thing called life always gets in the way and seems to knock me off the exercise wagon it does not always turn out that way. Rather than worry about a week (or even month) off once in a while which is bound to happen, I am going to concentrate on getting in my 1000km every year. Can I stick to it when returning to work full time with a commute? Can I stick to it without neglecting my family (hubby, 3 small kids)? That is yet to be seen. I hate getting up at the crack of dawn or before.* I am too exhausted at 9pm when the house falls silent and I could theoretically go squeeze in a few km. I do however see a way that I could run partially to work or run at lunch, so that will be my aim come January. In any case I will have to work on making running a priority when I return to "reality" after a long maternity break. In the back of my mind there is a local May 2012 marathon that I have been yearning to attempt, rather than just the 1/2. We will see.
I will keep you posted.
Time to go log some distance. :)

*-before because for 1/2 of the year the sun only rises between 7am-9am where I live (note-author's unscientific estimate)



Update:

Today's log: approx. 15km: Got a bit turned around, lost in the woods, followed some luckily frozen over deep mud ruts recently left by a logger, potentially sprained my toe. Home again.

Check it out via Garmin connect.