This Running Life

That was the question posed to me by a good friend last night at a football game. She reads the blog and hasn’t seen a new entry in some time. It has been a while, no? I have some good reasons for not posting. First, I’ve taken over as a department head at my university and have been swamped. Things are settling down now, but for the past couple of weeks, it was rough. Second, not running for 3 weeks now has left me with little to say about running. I went today to our local Race for the Cure, but did not run, only watching some friends complete their races. I wish I would have stayed home. One more week and I can try to run again.

I did order the foot pod for the polar heart monitor that I have been using. No more charting courses on google pedometer to get my miles in. Now I just fire that baby up and let it calculate my distance, pace per mile, and coordinate with the HR data already collected by the chest strap.

In lieu of running, I have done lots of spin classes at my health club. I also started twice weekly “body pump” workouts. This is an hour-long class that works the whole body with low weights and HIGH reps, while at the same time elevating your HR to give you a solid aerobic workout. It has done wonders for my “muscle tone” and for my knees. We do lots of squats and lunges, which hurt like nobody’s business at first. Now my knees are without pain as I climb stairs.

Not having run for almost a month now has allowed me to work on weak spots of my fitness, to recover sore parts of my body, and to remind myself (as one commenter put it) that running should be treated as a practice, not a tool to get fit, or a chore to complete. I think that when I return, my mind will better appreciate the nuances of running, but also allow me to prioritize those things in my life that need more attention. And there’s no better time to think about those things than while running!

I have also returned to yoga class on Fridays and try to stretch the calves twice a day in anticipation of running again.

Here is a shout out to Amy, who tells me she has this linked (yea!) and to Kelle another friend who isn’t sure what a blog is. I’ll link her here but first I’ll plug her store: Eskamoes Frozen Custard. Custard is creamier than ice cream and tastes so good, I am positive that it is stuff I am not allowed to have. (I do sneak a bite of my kids’ ‘moes from time to time.)