It's a Women's Prerogitive

I've changed my mind.  I'm a women, and that's what we do.  A few weeks ago I told you here that I was going to slowly add a little distance with each run.  Eventually I would be able to run my full 4 1/2 mile route.

Well, I'm throwing that out the window!  I've changed my mind.  I decided that if I'm going to do a marathon (ok...a virtual, month long marathon) that I needed to set some goals for myself.  So far I've only set one goal...but I've got 2 more months to come up with some others.  That goal is to complete a 10k during the marathon.  That's what made me change my mind.  Running one driveway further each run is never going to get me there in time.  What I need is structure.
Once upon a time in a land far, far away I started using an app called Bridge to 10k.  It's designed for someone who can already run a 5k and wants to move on to the next level...a 10k.  I didn't get very far.  If I remember correctly it was fall and starting to get cooler cold outside and I was having a lot of ankle pain.  The kind of ankle pain that makes it hard to even walk through Walmart.  The kind of pain that made me want to cry every time I ran.  I had to stop running for a while.

This week I pulled out the app and dusted it off.  I've been using another app called Runmeter.  It tracks my mileage per month, how many miles I have on my shoes and all kinds of other cool stuff, so I decided to stick with it instead of switching back and forth with the Bridge to 10k app.  Fortunately you can program your own running program in Runmeter, so I took all the intervals from the Bridge to 10k and set them up in Runmeter.   Everything was set, now all I had to do is run!

Today I decided to start.  After a 5 min walking warm-up I was supposed to run for 10 min and then walk for 1.  Once I completed this 4 times (40 minutes total running) I would have a 5 minute walking cool-down and be done.  My app would tell me everything I needed to know.  Each cheesy...or so I thought.

I started out and everything was fine.  I reached the 15 minute mark (5 min walk + 10 min run), but my app didn't tell me to walk.  Strange.  It gave me my 15 min update...maybe that interfered with it telling me to walk.  After all, Tracy (the name of the voice on my app) can't tell me two things at once...right?  Surely it will all work out when it's time for me to run again. I started my walking interval, but Tracy never told me when it was time to run.  I had to keep looking at my app to figure out when to walk and when to run.  That's the whole point of using an app, so I don't have to keep track of these things in my head.  Doing math in my head when I'm exhausted just doesn't work.

I finished my 40 minutes of running (I think), and kept on walking.  My intent was to cover a full 10k so that I'd have a route figured out on my phone.  Since the intervals weren't working correctly I have no clue what my running pace actually was.  I guess it really doesn't matter, as long as I was running.  I never did finish my 6.2 miles.  I got back to my driveway after 5.6 miles and called it quits.  I'm going to have to figure out a better path.

When I got home I started looking closely at my app and found the problem.  Instead of setting my run interval for 10 minutes I set it for 10 HOURS.  What the heck!!! (If anyone ever finds me running for 10 hours please have me committed...because it means there is more than one screw loose in my head.)  I programmed it yesterday morning...and evidently my caffeine hadn't kicked in yet.  That explains a lot!

This run was just a mess...so I'm calling a do-over.  I'll try this whole thing again on Monday.  I'm off to reprogram my app...have a great weekend!