200 Days Until the Disney Princess Half Marathon

So Monday ended up being a bit of a cluster and I just decided that Tuesday would be day one. I went down to the gym in our building at lunch and got on the treadmill. I walked the first five minutes and I was feeling okay. Considering that I hadn't done much physical activity in the last two MONTHS I was worried about even the walking portion of this adventure. Then it was time to run. 

Now, running for some people means 6 minute miles, for some it means 13 minute miles, but for me personally, running is much harder than that. It's not a secret I'm a bigger girl. I'm okay with that, I've accepted that. In the 5k class I took this past spring, I had a hard time reconciling that fact and the fact that I'd never REALLY run before with the pace I thought I should be doing. Even with running intervals, at my size and fitness level an 18 minute mile is PUSHING it. That means that I was running at a 14 minute mile pace and walking at about a 19 minute mile pace. 14 minute miles are way too fast for me to be running right now. 

It's hard to except that I need to slow down, MUCH slower than what most people walk, for me to be able to run and maintain running. I tried a 15 minute mile pace and that was still to difficult be be considered an "Easy" run. So, I decided to move on from my preconceived notions and do the smart thing. My goal is to do the Princess Half Marathon WITHOUT getting swept. So, that's what I'm going to train for. I am following a plan that was written to get me over the finish line. I am training for a 15 minute mile (in case I NEED to slow down because of heat or something during the race), but, as I was told by a runner friend of mine, that doesn't mean that I need to run all my training runs at that pace. 

I went to a website that I could plug in my expected finish time (3 hours and 15 minutes) and see what paces all of my training should be run at (including the speed work in my plan). It said that I needed to run my long and easy runs at just a 16:24 minute pace. It seems slow I'm sure to the people reading this, but when I saw it I thought... is that obtainable for me? My main goal is to finish this race. I need to keep a 16 minute mile pace to do that, and that is VERY close to this "Easy" pace. Well, yesterday I was going to find out.

I set the treadmill to 3.7 and began my run. On day one of my training plan I was only scheduled to run for 30 seconds. I started to run and it honestly felt great! I didn't breathe heavy. I probably could have talked through it, though I was too busy talking to myself in my head about how shocked I was that this felt so different from the last time I was running. I kept going. The next run on my training plan was a 45 second run. I kept going. I ran a full minute before slowing down to a walk. A full minute! That may not seem like much to others, but I was SO proud of myself. I am so happy with this plan. 

I finished the remaining 24 minute walk with some back pain creeping in over the last ten minutes, but I finished anyway. I didn't slow my walking pace or quit. I finished. 

Today at lunch I'm heading down to the gym again and the goal is a two minute run. I am hoping today feels as great and easy as yesterday did. I know it won't all be like this, but right now I needed to feel this way. I needed to feel like I can actually get there. That if I put in this work, chase this goal, I will catch it and I will get even better. 

Race you to the castle! <3

Mel <3