Day 3

It's raining today so I decided to hop on my treadmill to do the program. The program specifies repeating the run 1, walk 2 min 7 times for a total of 21 minutes, but after you add your warm-up and cool-down time, you are in it more than a half hour. I was walking at 3.3 mph and running at 4.5 mph (start slowly, I've been warned) and I wasn't even close to my 2 miles that I try to get in. I decided to throw in and 8th repetition at the last minute and I ended up doing 1.86 miles...good enough. I really wanted enough time to get in a good stretch before the kids come home from school.

I have now been challenged to train to do a 5k in the autumn with my good friend. A year ago, you couldn't have been able to get me to do a 5k for anything but so many different events have changed my mind about that. The biggest one was watching my cousin do a triathlon. It was so motivating, if I could swim halfway across a pool and wear my enell in the water, I think I would want to do that. I have been trying to increase my swimming abilities, but this is the year for running.

My friend has been running since high school, but recently had a baby and is working on getting back into the routine. She gave me a good tip yesterday that I tried today and was impressed by how well it worked. When running, keep your arms close to your body. Don't swing them. It really does help you breathe better. I had always thought swinging my arms would give me increased momentum, but if you think about it, it's more muscle movement, which raises the heart level even more.