The beginning of my week was somewhat low mileage, with 3 on Monday and 4 on Tuesday. I was proud of myself, though, for running on Friday, which I usually take off. Just a short 3 miles, but it felt great! I treated myself to Chicken Tikka Masala for dinner (which, with lots of veggies and brown rice, ended up being a surprisingly healthy meal).
Saturday was my big run. Previously, my last long 'run' was the 8.2 over a month ago on trails, that featured a lot of walking. I had been wanting to try 8 on roads with continuous running but kept running into excuses. With Ed gone for a short conference, I had an empty day and motivation to give my 'long' run a try. I did a great job procrastinating, cleaning the house, reading, napping and eating my way to 2pm. Finally, there was nothing else to do but get out and run.
I had a fully charged ipod and had plotted out an 8 mile out and back route, and was ready to go with my watch timer. I was feeling pretty strong for most of it, and even overshot my turn around by about a quarter mile, because I didn't believe that I could have already reached it :). The second half was definitely harder, and by the time I reached an underpass that was about 2 miles away I was really starting to feel it. I pushed through, though, and finally, I finished.
The last section, as I was running through the parking lot of my apartment complex, I explicitly though, "wow....I can't imagine doing a marathon right now!". It's interesting how hard 8ish miles can feel so hard, when once upon a time I did 50. But, I am so proud of that 8.55 miles I ran :).
Speaking of feeling proud, I am now officially 19 lbs down, over 10% of my starting weight :) (And, you really don't need to do the math to figure out that first #, which is less than 10%, I promise :) ). Even though I was going to wait until 20 lbs to post some progress pictures, I figure one pound won't look any different, and I'm feeling like celebrating now. Pictures are nice because I can really see my progress. So far, besides the people who love me and have to compliment me on my efforts, I've only had 2 other people comment on it, but I just have to keep reminding myself that I'm doing this for me and because I want to feel healthy :). I am happy to be looking healthier and more like my 'old' self.
edited to add: I guess people are noticing :D. I was talking to a coworker today about what I did over the weekend and mentioned my run. He replied by telling me that I've been looking really great lately - fit and healthy! *smile*
4 comments:
Addy, great job on the running, as well as on the weight loss and feeling healthy! That is just fantastic, and how nice it must be to see such results. Keep up the great work!
You're making great progress! One of these days soon 8.5 will seem easy again. :)
Oh, Addy, it's so good to see you looking so fit and back to running! Keep it up!
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