Adventures in Running
Over a year ago now I started losing weight (again), but was not really kicked into gear until the end of August when I joined a program that has so far worked. As at today I am 17kg's (about 37 lbs) lighter than I was at this time last year (the last time I remember being at this weight I was in about year 8 or 9 of High School).
During this weight loss I have been learning to exercise. I started off walking, round the block, round many blocks, a round trip to the supermarket (up and down a large hill), but my staple has been two rounds of Centennial Park (7.2km or 4.5 miles) which has taken me just over an hour. More recently I have started to find that I physically cannot walk any faster than I have been doing, and I want to move faster (me, move faster, what a laugh). So thanks to my little sisters urging (and a surprised yelp of "you walk that quickly"), I was convinced to try running. It took a lot more effort on my part to actually start running. First there was a jog round the kids bike track (on a miserable Saturday evening in barefeet), which I succeeded in completing in 3 minutes without stopping (I don't actually know how long the track is though). It was all the motivation I needed apparently, the next morning when my walking partner cancelled on me I made the decision, I was going to try to run around Centennial Park (just one round). My sister had reliably informed me at the height of her fitness she could run around the Park in 22 minutes.
Off I went, I found a good tree to start from (one that I would be able to find again once I had finished, and started running. I didn't get very far (only managed 2 minutes of running) at which point I continued by walking a bit and once I had a little more breath started running again. This continued the whole way round and I finally completed it. 28 minutes and 59.67 seconds later (2 minutes less than the time it would take to walk around once). I was ecstatic. I couldn't believe that I had managed to run at all, and even after the walking time (which seemed to be slower than my normal walking speed), I had taken time off my round. I made myself a promise at this point. "I will run around this park every Sunday morning". That was a week and a half ago. Last Sunday, I got up and went for my run. My first run lasted 3.5 minutes and my completed time was 27 minutes and 17.21 seconds. Even better than I could have imagined.
Today (Yesterday afternoon), my walking partner again cancelled on me, so I found myself wondering if I should go for a walk by myself, at which point hubby arrived home, and asked if I would like to come for a short walk with him (he only walks for 30 min), I started off by saying no, but after a short discussion it was decided that we would go over to the park and I would run while he walked (he has a much longer stride than me so he thought that he would 'sort of' keep up with me), and we would finish about the same time. (I still have no idea how the decision was come to). So I went, got to my tree and started running. Almost 6 minutes before I ran out of breath, and the final result... 25 minutes and 41.63 seconds, and I had to wait 5 minutes for hubby to reach the end.
I have been invited (sort of) to join my sister's for their twice weekly run (but I don't think I am quite ready for that, it's 4km up and down hills, once I can complete my circuit without walking I will).
I'm still in shock that a couch-potato like me can actually run, even for a short time (although, that could be because I still have a hard time believing that I am no longer obese). Well lets see how I do next time.
During this weight loss I have been learning to exercise. I started off walking, round the block, round many blocks, a round trip to the supermarket (up and down a large hill), but my staple has been two rounds of Centennial Park (7.2km or 4.5 miles) which has taken me just over an hour. More recently I have started to find that I physically cannot walk any faster than I have been doing, and I want to move faster (me, move faster, what a laugh). So thanks to my little sisters urging (and a surprised yelp of "you walk that quickly"), I was convinced to try running. It took a lot more effort on my part to actually start running. First there was a jog round the kids bike track (on a miserable Saturday evening in barefeet), which I succeeded in completing in 3 minutes without stopping (I don't actually know how long the track is though). It was all the motivation I needed apparently, the next morning when my walking partner cancelled on me I made the decision, I was going to try to run around Centennial Park (just one round). My sister had reliably informed me at the height of her fitness she could run around the Park in 22 minutes.
Off I went, I found a good tree to start from (one that I would be able to find again once I had finished, and started running. I didn't get very far (only managed 2 minutes of running) at which point I continued by walking a bit and once I had a little more breath started running again. This continued the whole way round and I finally completed it. 28 minutes and 59.67 seconds later (2 minutes less than the time it would take to walk around once). I was ecstatic. I couldn't believe that I had managed to run at all, and even after the walking time (which seemed to be slower than my normal walking speed), I had taken time off my round. I made myself a promise at this point. "I will run around this park every Sunday morning". That was a week and a half ago. Last Sunday, I got up and went for my run. My first run lasted 3.5 minutes and my completed time was 27 minutes and 17.21 seconds. Even better than I could have imagined.
Today (Yesterday afternoon), my walking partner again cancelled on me, so I found myself wondering if I should go for a walk by myself, at which point hubby arrived home, and asked if I would like to come for a short walk with him (he only walks for 30 min), I started off by saying no, but after a short discussion it was decided that we would go over to the park and I would run while he walked (he has a much longer stride than me so he thought that he would 'sort of' keep up with me), and we would finish about the same time. (I still have no idea how the decision was come to). So I went, got to my tree and started running. Almost 6 minutes before I ran out of breath, and the final result... 25 minutes and 41.63 seconds, and I had to wait 5 minutes for hubby to reach the end.
I have been invited (sort of) to join my sister's for their twice weekly run (but I don't think I am quite ready for that, it's 4km up and down hills, once I can complete my circuit without walking I will).
I'm still in shock that a couch-potato like me can actually run, even for a short time (although, that could be because I still have a hard time believing that I am no longer obese). Well lets see how I do next time.