Bummed Out

     It's a scheduled Recovery day and I'm bummed out. I woke up rested and ready to go but the schedule says today is a day off. I've found long ago that I work much better, at anything for that matter, when I have a schedule to follow. I am just anal retentive enough that if a schedule says I'm supposed to do something like, for example, get out of bed at 5:30, walk through a blizzard and do hill repeats,  I have a tendency to do just that. Today's schedule said it was a recovery day even though I wanted to run.

     I don't know if it a concession to my age or the new wave of training but I don't run as many days as I use to. I remember once running every day straight from January 1st to the end of August without ever missing a day. Today's running gurus would say that is nuts. But in the old days that was the way it was done. If you took a day off, you were considered a bit of a puss. Today, the conventional wisdom is to run maybe four times a week, cross train and lift weights. Starting January 31st, I officially start on a program to run a half marathon, the Ogden Half Marathon in Wheeling, and my schedule calls for just that. I guess I'll get use to it.

     My biggest concern right now is that, because of the terrible weather we have been having, I actually haven't run outside the entire 22 days of this year. That is sacrilege but better that I'm hammering on the treadmill than not running at all.

TREADMILL CONVERSION CHART

Miles per hour	Minutes per mile	Calories burned* in 30 minutes
3.0	20:00	103
3.5	17:08	110
4.0	15:00	118
4.5	13:20	170
5.0	12:00	236
5.5	10:54	276
6.0	10:00	295
6.5	9:14	309
7.0	8:34	340
7.5	8:00	350
8.0	7:30	374
8.5	7:04	399
9.0	6:40	443
9.5	6:19	457
10.0	6:00	473

 

     This is all I have to go by so for now it will have to do. I'm having a good time and improving rapidly so it's doing no harm. But I long for the fall when it was cool and dry and sunny, and I ran like a gazelle. I'm just shittin' ya actually. I just sort of shuffled along then too. It's OK. I've discovered podcasts and audiobooks and there are a surprising amount of books and podcasts about running and endurance racing. When I'm listening to a guy talk about how great the 100 mile Leadville race was in Colorado, it helps me suck up the last mile I have to run in my Sunday five miler.