Slightly crazy writer and passionate educator for those who struggle
Day 1
New goal. I want to be able to run five kilometres (just over three miles) within 100 days. This seems a bit daunting to me. The furthest I have managed to run in one continuous stint is about 500 metres. This is a long way from 5000 of the buggers. However, you don’t get to be a ninety-year-old kayaker without some effort in your forties—at least, I don’t think you do.
When I started the New Fit Me blog, I wanted an accountability partner. I got that—thanks to my readers and one sister in particular. I know I stopped posting just before Day 100, but I didn’t stop exercising, aside from the week of no power after Hurricane Ida. I do not do well in high humidity with no air conditioning! I did plenty of rowing and had a partner for my walks. The end thought I came to is that having a goal of exercising consistently is fine, but once I achieved and maintained that, improving became a challenge.
Why work any harder? I have met my goal!
Thus today, I decided to aim to run five kilometres by the time the next 100 days of blogging are up. It started well. I did two decent length jogs and three smaller ones within my four-kilometre walk today. My total time was better than 5 km/hr, so I am actually rather chuffed with myself.
I started my walk listening to a person talk about how to improve the length of your run. Of course, I was listening to it on my phone, and now I can’t find the clip to post here. The important things I got from it were
I practiced my breathing on the longer runs, and it was quite effective. As with anything new, it takes time to incorporate, so it was quite a challenge to concentrate on breathing, but it worked. I did manage longer distances.
I won’t run every day as I still enjoy rowing which is excellent for my core. I also need to work on my posture, thanks to a genetic growth disorder in my spine. Historically, I have found that I improve in my main exercise goal if I cross-train as well. Thus, running will occur at least twice a week. Some days I will walk (with a companion); other days, I will row or do weights. Ideally, I would like to run three days a week.
Anyway, here’s to a new physical fitness goal. And just because I like to fill my life up with heaps of things to do, I will drop back the artificial sweeteners to only a couple of soft drinks (sodas) a week—when I am super bored of water and tea.