Knee Pain = Short Run & BIke Ride

Well Mike's knee has still been acting up. We went to go out for a run on Monday and we barely made it off our street and it hurt so bad that he had to go back home. I pressed on, but cut my run short (only 2 miiles instead of 3). I am really beginning to not like running by myself. It is really more motivating when you have some one there suffering with you. So as to not irratate his knee anymore, we went for a 4 mile bike ride on wednesday instead of running. It was really nice to do something different for a change. The funny thing is, the bike ride hurt MY knees...lol. It only hurt when we were going up hills though. Anywhoo...that night we took a trip over to Fleet Feet and got Mike some new shoes. Hopefully that will solve the knee problem and I won't be losing my running partner. We're going to give it a try for a run together tomorrow morning. I hope it goes well. Our next 5k is 2 weeks from tomorrow. I'm looking forward to it. :)

A Sunny, Windy Run

Well we got another run under our belt today. We decided to venture out to Creve Couer Park for a run. They have a 2.8 mile course and a 3.7 mile one. We opted for the 2.8 miler. It was a nice course but today has been the hottest day we've had so far and it was also windy. Going at 12 noon was probably not the smartest idea on our part due to the heat. Oh well, we did it anyway. At least we got a good sweat out of it. :) This week we need to up our running minutes to running 7, walking 3. Only 3 weeks left until our next 5k. We're going to run again tomorrow since we didn't run yesterday. Hopefully it will go well. Maybe we can get our neighbor to watch the girls so we don't have to push the torture device. :)
After we went to Creve Couer park we headed to Walplehorest park for a picnic lunch, a little kite flying and some playground playing. Then on to Culver's for some much needed ice cream. :) Over all it was a nice day to be together with the family. I am so blessed to have such a great husband and beautiful girls. The Lord is good! :)

First time on new course

Well we did the 3.14 miile course today. It took us 47ish minutes. Obivously we didn't run the whole thing. We ran 5 walked 5 to the 2.7 mile mark and then Mike's knee was hurting him again so we just walked the rest of the way home. I'm looking forward to the day when we can run the whole thing with out stopping and at a good pace. I put our time and distance (34 minutes at 2.7 miles) in my account at FavoriteRun.com and it figured our pace at 12:32/mile. Which is only 10 seconds faster than my pace at our last 5k. Our new course is also kinda hilly in spots which makes for more work and we are pushing the jogging stroller (or "torture device" as Suzy likes to call it) so that does slow us down a bit. All in all it wasn't too bad of a run, I'm pretty tired now but looking forward to doing it again. I'm so thankful for the nice weather! :)

Me and Riley in Jail at the Botanical Gardens. :) Riley says "I didn't do it! I promise!"

Back again but dissapointed....

Well, after 2 weeks of not running, I finally got back out there today - Only to be sent home early with a terrible side ache. I had only been running for about 5 mintues when I started feeling an ache in my side. I've had them before but this was unlike any other I have had. I decided to walk for a few minutes which made it feel better, but when I started running agian it hurt so bad that I almost doubled over in pain. So I decided to walk a few more mintues, my side felt better but the same happened again once i started running. It was like when i started running someone was stabbing my side with a dull knife. So unfortunately I had to just walk home. Has anyone else had this happen? I don't know if I drank too much water before or what. Needless to say, I was very dissapointed. I was really looking forward to getting a run in. Oh well, we'll try again Wednesday. Only 26 days until my next 5k (May 12).

A Million and One Excuses

Well it's been a week and a half since race day and I haven't ran a day since then. Here are my excuses:
1) I needed a day or two to rest
2) Mike hurt his knee
3) My allergies turned into a sinus infection that turned into a chest cold
4) Busy weekend with Madison's birthday and Easter
5) I hurt my neck
6) I am lazy
Anyway, I really want to get back to running though. We want to run another 5k May 12th and I really would like to be able to run the whole thing this time. I"ve got a little over 4 weeks until then so that should be an attainable goal. Hopefully I won't come up with anymore excuses and the weather will get nicer between now and then. Until next time....

Race Day Wrap Up - I finished at least....

Well yesterday was race day. We got up bright and early and made our way to the course. It was sunny but a little chilly. There were 8 of us from Liberty that ran so that made it a lot of fun. So at 8 am the race gun went off and we were off and running in our first 5k. The first mile went great. I felt great and felt like "Ok I can do this." I was toward the back of the pack but fine with taking it slow. Mike went off with out me so I ran with Jen and Chelsea. Once we hit the half way point I was starting to feel it. So we walked for a little while. The rest of the race was definately much harder. My legs were tightening up and it was also a windy day and we were running into the wind. To make a long story short, I was not able to run the whole thing, which I knew but 3.1 miles is farther than I thought! :) So I finished in 38 min 27 sec. I did not look and feel glorious as the woman in the picture in my last post. I was dead. I am not at all happy with my time. This race was a good gauge to tell me where I'm at though. I am a lot slower than I thought and still have a long way to go to be able to run the full 3.1 miles. There is another race coming up in 6 weeks that I think we're going to do and I hoping to be able to run the whole thing and much improve on my time. In the end, regardless of my time, and deadness, it was lot of fun. It was great to run with friends even though we were all at different fitness levels. The comradere before and afer the race definately made it more enjoyable. And not to mention that afterward there was a raffel and Mike and I both won gift certificates! :) It was a good day. Anyway, I've got lots of work to do! :)

That is what I looked like after crossing the finish line!