Celebrating Independence Day 2013

July 4th, 2013 - I went for a walk from our house in Media to Independence Hall. The first question is probably - why? My initial answer is why not? It was kinda cool to do something just because I can on the day we celebrate freedom.

I am a softball widow frequently on the July 4th holiday. There is almost always a tournament of some kind and Dave is almost always umpiring one of them. This year he is in Quakertown at the TNT tournament. We do lots of things together but long distance walking or running is not one of them so being a softball widow from time to time works for both of us.

I got it in my head to do a lengthy hike of some kind and somehow tie it to a 4th of July theme. I thought about mapping a route on www.mapmyrun.com that would look like "July Fourth" or " 1776" but that would only work if I confined myself to Media borough where the streets more or less are in a grid. That did not sound like fun. And it wouldn't take very long either. I've done Valley Forge a lot plus I plan to be at the MLC meetup there on Saturday so I ruled that out.

On a whim I asked Google Maps to map a walking route from our house to Independence Hall.

I can do this!

13 miles today. I feel great. I truly do.

This is my increase week. After two weeks at 25 miles per week. I am due for 27 this week (Mon-Sun). I wanted 13 today so I adjusted the rest of my schedule accordingly. Tues - 2 miles; Wed - 4 miles and Thurs - 2 miles. Sat - 13 miles and Sun 6 miles.

I did my 2 miles on Tuesday at the Audobon Loop HILL. I need hill work. I parked at the gravel lot and jogged over to the hill for warm up. I set my gymboss for 30 sec and 15 seconds. When I got to the hill I started the timer. I ran steady up for 30 seconds then walked down for 15. I repeated this four times. On the fourth time I continued past the beep to the top of the hill (the old stone tower). I'm happy to say I was almost there anyway. I turned around and jogged back down and back to the gravel lot for a total of 2 miles. Eventually I'd like to  I will get to the point where I can do hill repeats from top to bottom.

On Wednesady I met John T at the Chester Valley trail for a little over 4 miles total. I like these weekday runs with John and other Phillyfitters. I end up going much faster than I would alone and that's good for me.

Thursday I taught new member orienation at work. Typically I bag my runs after NMO. I am drained after them. I love doing them but it's a lot of work being 'on' for 8 hours. And for a girl who prefers sneakers or bare feet even the smallest heel is difficult for that long. But I'm really trying to have no tolerance for excuses so I brought my running gear to work and changed there. I stopped at Ridley Creek State Park and went out for two miles. It was awful. I did it but it was awful. It hurt and I felt like crap. However, I was pretty excited that I did it anyway.

I came into today determined to focus on my breathing and my posture. My watch was set to beep at mile intervals where I could take a walk break. For the most part I stuck to that. There were a few extra breaks; at the turnaround, the restrooms and one stop for gravel removal from John's shoe. I ran the first 3 with Russ, Maggi and John T. The next 2 with Maggi and John and the remaining miles with John. Bless him for sticking it out when he had only planned to do 9 or 10. Running really is better with buddies. :)

Focusing on my breathing was to keep me from going out too fast. I decided it didn't matter what this did to my run pace I have 6 miles tomorow I didn't want to be dreading that. I focused on my posture to avoid fatigue in my neck and shoulders. It worked :). I'm happy to say the limiting factor in today's run was my legs. By mile 11 they were feeling quite heavy. Even that wasn't terribly bad. I was certainly happy to be done at 13 but I also felt like I could have gone another mile if I really had do.

I am really happy with the pace too. It was a comfortable I-can-still-talk pace. Yet when I checked it periodically (about once each mile) it was around 10:20-10:30. With the walk breaks the overall pace was 11:36. Not bad for me right now. I have a long way to go to get to my 2:15 half marathon but I also have 8 months to get there.

I was pleased that through mile 10 I was not looking at my watch begging it to move faster to the walk break. I was often pleasantly surprised when it beeped.

Next week is the 4th week in this plan I've worked up so only 13 miles total for the week. All I have to do is get through the 6 tomorrow. After the successes of today I'm NOT dreading that. Of course my legs might be telling me a different story tomorrow morning but I'll get through it.

SUNDAY UPDATE: I finished the 6 miles. My legs actually felt ok this morning. Alleve at bedtime helped. My brain however was a little skeptical. I debated going out of my neighborhood - maybe on some trail at RCSP. In the end I decided on two 3 mile ciruits around my house. This way I wouldnt have to carry my water belt. I left it on the front porch and stopped their for a drink after 3 then continued on. I set my gymboss for 3 and 1's but put it in my jacket pocket. I only wanted to use that for backup. I really wanted to continue with 1 mile intervals. I didn't have to resort to the gymboss. :) My pace was pretty slow but also fairly steady and I only walked at the mile breaks for 1 minute each time. So all in all a good outing.

Oh and someone commented that 2:30 is slower than 10:20-10:30 pace. That is true. I should have made clear that was only through the first 10. I slowed up in the last three.