OMG I can't believe I did it! 20 minutes straight jogging. I was sure I was going to fall down the whole last 5 minutes but I didn't. My jogging distance was 1/4 mile less than the total distance here. My total distance was about a 1/4 mile more because I was so excited I hit the forward button right after the cool down started and you can’t back up from there.  I’m so stoked.  This was the one jog in the entire program that I was actually afraid of. I had all these plans for it I couldn’t’ do it, but I did it!  Someone better tell me what an awesome job I did!

Kristi I’m sorry about the accident but glad you weren’t badly hurt.  Amazing that you can have an accident like that and not not be badly hurt and someone else can have a minor accident and have pain for weeks or months.  (My accident that benched me was not one I would have expected to hurt someone at all.  It was a freak thing because I was turned at the waist handing my son something when the girl rear ended us.  I felt a these needle like pains all along my spine and I just had this bad feeling.  I tried to run 3 days later but I was in tears pretty fast.   I hope you are still feeling OK today. 

Laura:  Good for you following the doctor’s orders.  No sense jumping the gun and making your injury flare; that could put you off for another 3 or 4 weeks on top of what you’ve lost.  Can you maybe do some swimming or bike work to keep your cardio up?  I’m not sure how those work with the injury you have.  I was doing some work on the bike in PT after I hurt my back and I really liked it.  Then the stupid insurance co insisted that I couldn’t have been hurt that badly in such a minor accident and refused to pay.  Pretty sure with another few weeks of PT I would have been back to jogging instead of suffering for a few months. 

Tiara:  WTG on your run.  I’m feeling ambivalent about taking such a huge step back at the beginning of week 6.  I just can’t see the logic.  Maybe to rest your body after a longer run?  Now that I’ve done 20 I don’t want to back all the way up to 5 or even 10.  How did it feel to you backing up like that?    I’m sorry about your divorce.  Sound like it was a long time coming.  Hopefully this will be a new and amazing start for you.

Anne: Great news on W6D1.  I’ll ask you too.  How did it feel backing up at this point?  Since I wasn’t able to do the entire 20 minutes my other attempts it didn’t seem like a big deal. 

As I worried I was up all night because I was nervous about this run.  When I started out I was breathing too hard because of it.  Well that and because I discovered that I couldn’t breathe thru my nose and I kept trying to clear it while I was jogging.  It was past the 5 minute mark before I settled down and honestly if you had asked me at any point before the last few minutes I’d have said no way am I going to make it the whole time.  When I realized how much I was struggling, my goal the first 10 minutes was to try and make it to 10 minutes.  Then after that it was pretty much minute by minute with the hope that I might make it 15.  I continue to be amazed by how far I can push myself by focusing on making it just a little further instead of the whole distance.  Everyone always says “if you think you can’t, then you won’t” (or something like that.) but I seem to keep doing runs that I don’t believe I can do.   Ergo it must not be true.    LOL    Wish me sweet dreams because I’m going to try and sleep for a couple of hours. 

Geo - great job on the twenty minute run!  I'm so sorry for the bad luck some of you are having.  Hopefully everyone will be on the mend quickly.  Today is W7D2 for me and my daughter.  We're running 20 minutes again.  I was so nervous two days ago thinking about it.  Now that we already have one under our belts, I'm really looking forward to it. 

I can see the light at the end of the tunnel!

Kristi -- glad you aren't too sore after your wreck!  You and I must be using the same program -- my W6D3 jumped to that 25 minute run, too -- and no looking back now!  Week 7 is all 25R. 

I just finished W7D2.  I picked up a little speed, but still struggled the last 2 minutes of the run.  I just had to keep focusing on the next few feet, then the few feet after that!  I have been adding extra walking to my cool down so that I am walking/running a full 3 miles.  I was able to finish in 39 minutes, including the warm-up and cool down walks.  I am guessing I ran about 2.25 miles during the 25 minutes -- which is a personal best for me -- I can honestly say I have never run that far without stopping in my life!!!  I was really struggling at the end, I just kept this board and all the encouragement running through my head.  So thank you all!!

A special shout out to Geo -- great job!!!!

Tis - sorry for the news you received, but glad you are using running as your therapy instead of using the news as an excuse to stop.  You are better for it!

Mb - good job to both you and your daughter.  I wish I could have gotten my kids motivated to do this with me, but at least I didn't let it stop me.

Anne - you are doing great and keep believing in yourself!  You can do it -- and it isn't a race - you can work on speed after you accomplish the time.  Trust yourself.

Not trying to leave anyone out -- responding to the posts I can see right now! 

I don't envy you the heat!  We're in the Pacific Northwest and we haven't had that many days above 70.  I started out running in a sweatshirt this morning!  I'm on W5D1.  I ran at the school track this morning.  At first I was a little discouraged looking at how far I have to go.  Then I realized that the last time I was at the track I could only run about half way around.  Today I ran one and half times around - three times!  All total, I ran/walked 2.1 miles, which is only 1 mile short of a 5k and I did it in 31 minutes.  There is hope yet!!  Still a little nervous about those 20 minute runs, but I'm trying not to jump ahead of myself.  And if I have to walk part way through those, I am not going to beat myself up.

Much cooler weather for the run this morning, so I was really looking forward to it - still feels weird to say that!  However, I felt like gravity was pulling especially hard today...I felt heavy and clunky. I did the complete run and the second 10 minutes felt better than the first 10, but man, starting off was hard. And Camaro, I know what you mean about checking the timer! I looked down (ready to give up) and saw I had 30 seconds!!! so I kept going and made it!

Glad to see everyone is moving forward!

Congrats to all...any races in anyone's future? I'm working towards a Sept. 8th Diva Dash here. Was excited when I signed up; I know as I get closer I'll be a basket case!

HI everyone. Thank you so much for the great responses. Wish I could get some from friends and family on facebook. 1 lousy like was all I got so it felt awesome to come here and some praise. I mean I'm not doing it for them, but it's nice to have hard work acknowledged. God knows they are quick enough to jump on my mistakes.

Loving all the wonderful posts. Sorry that I'm not going to respond to each one right now. I've had a major headache for 3 days. I think I slept most of yesterday and I kept thinking when I wake up it will be gone. But it's not. sigh. Not sure what else to try. I did want to come here and read what everyone has been doing and say keep up the great work. Hopefully that means this headache is on the outs. I'll try to check in tomorrow after my next jog.

Oh I have been looking at some 5K's to sign up for. I have 2 that really look fun but neither is until Nov and I want to do both, but they are only a week apart and the cost is holding me back. Both are fun runs. The one I want to do most is in Galveston and it's called the Gritty Goddess. It's an obstacle course type mud run, thingy.  LOL  It just sounds like a blast.  But it’s $70 to enter.  That’s way on the high side for my budget.  I’d pretty much decided to spring for it when I found another run in Houston that sounds like a blast.

It’s called “the color run” and as you run the 5K people toss color at you so by the end you look like a rainbow.  It’s billed as “The happiest 5K on the planet.  They are giving away a few free entries to the best comments on their facebook page and I left one hoping for the best.  I asked my friends and family to like my comment hoping that would help me win but not 1 person swung over there to do it.  Sigh.  Not too enchanted with them right now.  It’s not like I would even have been hard to find my comment was near the bottom of the 500+ comments.  It talks about being an older mother and how I want to teach my son that age is just a number and it’s never too late to follow your dreams.  About our battle with infertility and how much of the color had washed out of my world while we were trying to have our son.  About how I want to teach him to love colors as much as I do...  That’s the short version.  The cool thing about that one is that there is no lower age limit and I could take him with me.  Not sure he could do the whole 5K so I’d have to use a stroller for when he got tired, but it’s not timed and I’d love to expose him to something like that.   If I won a free entry I wouldn’t have to choose. 

We just found out we are going to FL sometime in Aug thru Sept?   My parents were supposed to come visit us, but they decided they can’t come and they will pay our way down there instead.  Really excited because I haven’t seen my family in a year.  Plus my Aunt and Uncle are having their 50^th Anniversary and some family from out of town that I haven’t seen in years will be coming.  Since I don’t know our exact dates of travel yet I can’t make full plans.  But we are driving and will be flexible.  I think I can earn some money while we’re there.  I want to find a 5K to do there for my 1^st one.  But I’m not having much luck finding one that is not t0o far and doesn’t clash with our schedule.  I can find several up around Tampa, Orlando or even further north, but we will be in the Ft. Laud. Area.  Anyone know of a good 5K in S. FL for late Aug or Early Sept?  Not including the holiday weekend.

WTG Geo, 20 minutes!  The Color run sounds brilliant, I'm doing nothing that exciting - though I've sort of signed up to a 5k at the beginning of October, one I've helped out at before, and done as a walk.  It's on trails through parkland, so it's a scenic run rather than a fast one, and it's organised by one of my friends - I've helped out at it a couple of times - so I'll have lots of support there.

More exciting is, a couple of friends are going for the Paris to Versailles run in September, so off to Paris to support them - the Paris-Versailles race is a little out of my league for now, but maybe next year, who knows?

Camaro, you have my sympathy.  Did W6D3 this morning, a perfect morning, cool and sunny, but my legs just weren't co-operating.  I did the 25 mins, but I could feel it all the way, my breathing was fine, but however much I slowed down, it felt like running through treacle.  But even a bad run's still making progress, right?

Camaro: Good job on keeping going. No shame in having an off day and having to walk some. Not sure what you mean by "lactic acid" building up or why you think that's a bad thing. I know that in the past they thought that was what caused muscle cramps but newer research says that lactic acid is actually a good thing and it helps keep the muscles firing. I've noticed that when my legs start to feel really tired sometimes if I push thru they start to feel good again. The hard part is pushing thru when you feel like you just can't do it.

Tiara: Paris! Wow, that sounds amazing. I'd love to go there someday, but I can't see ever having the money to do something like that. sigh. Right now my impossible dream trip is Alaska. But I've always longed to go overseas and see some of the amazing countries there. when I was younger I always thought I'd have a job that let me travel, but stuff always happened. I know a lot of people who have big fancy houses and never go anywhere, which I don't get. I'd much rather spend money on travel 1st. Although I'd like a nicer house than I have now, because it's just such a crazy layout. I did have a house I loved with my Ex and wish I could have kept that one. Great work on W6D3. Those longer runs are really hard. One reason I didn't like backing up for W6D1 was that you have that new memory of how hard less running was to overcome again. I was on such a high after the 20 minute jog and I knew I could do it again. But when 5 minutes in I feel like my legs are like rubber and I have to work thru that 3 times now the final jog of this week seem harder than it did a few days ago. KWIM?

Here is my facebook post. I did Week 6 Day 1 today:

I still have a killer headache (4 or 5 days now.) but I couldn't put it off another day. Then tonight we had storms came before I could go and I thought oh goodie I can wait till tomorrow. But I knew if I did I'd never sleep thinking I had to jog at dawn since I was already a day late doing this. Thankfully they rumbled thru rather quickly and Joe was OK with following me after 1 am.

Didn't help the headache, but it's not worse. This day went back to some intervals but longer times on the road. Week 6 Day 2 does too. After that it’s all jogging. I swear I almost think the 20 minutes straight was easier. It seems like the 1^st 5 minutes feels really hard and then somewhere are 7 minutes I start catching my rhythm a bit. (Which I lose again when I walk.) When I got to 8 I felt good to go awhile longer. (went ahead and did 9, but didn't want to push it longer. OK so I was going up hill at that point and even the slight hills we have here seem like mountains when you are running and don't do this much. (This comes from someone who was in some real mountains a few months ago (Colorado - Feb.) and actually walked up a little ways to a waterfall, um in showshoes. LOL Which I highly reccomend.) OK so maybe not mountains so much, but I swear it seems at least twice as hard as on the flats. I think that is in part because I don't hit the hills (Laugh if you want, but, I refuse to call them inclines no matter what anyone else says.) until about the 1 1/2 mile mark when I'm already struggling.

I really enjoy being out on the road feeling it beneath my feet as I travel along. Not sure I’ll ever be a "10 minute mile" girl, but I’ll get there when I can. Once I hit 30 minutes I think it will seem like child’s play to add another 5 or 10 which I’m hoping is all I’ll need to make 5K. Today I slipped past the 2 mile mark by a hair. But that's still including my slow warm up and cool down. Which leaves me really short of where the program wants me to be at this point. I'm still OK with that. Really proud of myself right now. I hope everyone else is feeling that way. You should be. Even those of you on hold for a bit who have plans to get back to it, should be proud.

Hoping for more updates soon.