Week in Training: Jan 5-Jan11

In order to keep me more in tune with my training plan, I've decided that every friday I will post my week in training starting with the previous saturday. This will include not only my runs but what I've been doing for cross training (not my favorite by any means, but hopefully since I'll be writing about it, I'll feel more of a need to do it.) That being said...

I started this week off really well with a 5 mile run. In attempt not to injure knee again, I used a run/walk method, which means after every 1 mile to 1.5 miles I walked for 30 seconds. Surprisingly this didn't really affect my pace as much as I thought. I completed the run in 53:41 which is about 10:42 per mile. The run was a huge success considering back in October I couldn't run even one half mile without my knee feeling like it was going to explode. There is nothing quite like running in a Midwestern winter snowstorm. Not only was it snowing like crazy, it was the slushy kind that sticks to everything. Tons of fun but had to watch for the black ice on pavement and blacktop.









On to the two shorter runs, on Monday I ran 3.02 miles in 29:42, a pace of 9:50 per mile. During the shorter runs during the week, I don't plan on walking until maybe they get a lot longer. No bad weather to speak of during this run.















For Christmas my wife picked up a copy of UFC Trainer for XBOX 360. I'm implementing some training through my XBOX Kinect so that I don't have to go to the gym to get a good workout. Let me tell you it was rough and showed me just how important cross training is to overall fitness. I was surprised how well it tracked my movement and counted repetitions for up/downs, pushups, squats, etc. After going through the 25 minute circuit there, I felt like I could do more so I threw in some Yoga with Henry Yee.

Yoga was a suggestion from my sister-in-law. After bringing up some of the pain I was experiencing to her, this is one of the things she mentioned I should try. I had done it before as a part of P90X so I wasn't surprised to hear it, although I didn't particularly like it. The DVD I purchased to follow along with has 20 minute yoga sessions geared toward certain parts of the body. I did the one to focus on strength and upper body. Holy crap I hurt after, just saying, people who think yoga is for sissies, you should try it. That will change your mind. Reading this won't.

Anyway, shameless plug here, My sister-in-law is Mary Shutan, she owns Lotus Body Work in Evanston, IL. If you don't believe me, just check the reviews here.

The next day, I was excited to get back on the road. I was supposed to do 4 miles, for some reason I had in my head I only had to do 3. I ran 3.11, which is exactly 5 kilometers, a very popular race distance. This one I felt like running a bit faster than I ran on Monday but I also wanted to see what trying negative splits looked like. This was a lot of fun. I started out running the first mile in 9:53, the second at 9:05 and the third at 9:04. Technically that's a negative split but I was hoping to get that third mile in less than 9:00.

This morning I was scheduled to do yoga again. I'm not sure why I didn't get up in time, but I'm not happy about it. I know I was tired, but I know I feel better during the day if I get up and get moving early. Perhaps I justified it to myself because I did yoga 2 days ago and wasn't scheduled to. Either way, I took today off.

 All in all, not a bad training week. I was happy with my time on Saturday for 5 miles given that I ran on snow and ice packed roads and my 3 miler times weren't too shabby either. I also learned that I'm digging UFC training, which I wasn't too sure about at first.