Ah, late February. The hum of air conditioners, the feel of 97% humidity in the morning, the rising dew points, the temperatures in the 80s....
Wait, this should really not be February. Come on, Florida.
But it was today's actuality. So I decided to get my revenge by breaking out the aqua jogger.
If you're wondering what an aqua jogger is, it is basically a buoyant belt that allows you to 'run' in the water. Now, I am not claiming that this is the same as a land workout, although it does pose different challenges (for instance, water weighs more than air, as you undoubtedly know, so you are pushing more weight upward with your quads). It is much nicer as a workout than running with rampant humidity, at least as far as I'm concerned. So today, rather than sweating like a maniac, I opted for the aqua jogging instead.
If you're wondering whether you wind up looking like some old lady at Aquafit class when you use an aqua jogger, the answer is absolutely you do. And there is no way to get around it, really.
I did half an hour with some 3-6 minute sprints in there. Wasn't awful. Probably wasn't the hardest workout I've ever completed. But it was significantly better than nothing.
Saturday I did get to the gym (yay!). Did 17 minutes on the treadmill, then just wasn't feeling it any more. Is there such a thing as runner burnout? I did do some weights, though, for the first time in months, and that felt really good.
PS - That was kind of a facetious question, but I hadn't done much research yet. Yes, there is running burnout and it is common after a marathon. One of the tips: "You don't have to run your heart out in every race you enter. Sometimes it's fun to run at an easier pace than your race pace and just enjoy the race without putting any pressure on yourself." This would be easier to do if I didn't walk in the middle of a freaking 5k. But let's hope that this weekend's race goes better (...boo, it's still going to be hot....).
Showing posts with label Weight training. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Weight training. Show all posts
Monday, February 28, 2011
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Back to running, back to humidity
This morning, I ran a 5k with a friend of mine. My 5k didn't go so well. Hers was awesome because she completed her first 5k ever where she ran throughout. Yay!
I've been mulling over why mine didn't go so well (at one point, I walked *shudder*). In part, it is undoubtedly due to the fact that I haven't been running as much as I would like. There's no getting around this. However, now that the deadlines are past, I'm hoping that running can be restored to a normal event on my calendar. It should be doable for the next little while.
The other part of it, though, is that this morning got humid again. Not summer hot by any means, but high humidity (low-ish dew point). Accuweather put the humidity at 93% to start, then rising to 97% (!) by 8am. Which is to say that in the process of the race, the humidity went up instead of abating. Ick. I was reminded of the last time I ran a half-marathon in Florida, which was two years ago as part of the Gasparilla weekend here in Tampa. The temperature started at a reasonable level, in the 60s, but the humidity was about like this morning. After the first hour, I wanted to quit and never run in Tampa again unless there was a cold front--actually, this is the race where I vowed to never do a long distance (i.e., over 10k) in Florida again. Fortunately, a storm came through after the first hour and things were much more manageable, even if there was a driving wind in the wrong direction for a chunk of the race and downpour-level rains. This was vastly superior to icky sweat.
In addition, the warm weather returned just a couple of days ago, so there has been no time to adjust. As I know already, I'm useless in humid weather. So although I know that I need to step up my workouts (or at least get them back on track), I think that this morning's run was not helped by the weather, not one bit. I still can't quite believed that I walked, but I just needed to. I can't explain it any better than that. My head was pounding like crazy when I did. Obviously, it's still bugging me.
Along with increasing the number of times I run per week (from zero to a value larger than zero), I'm hoping to add weights for real this time. Here's how crazy the last month has been: I got a book on weight lifting out of the library, had no chance to read it over the 3-week loan period, and had to give it back since someone else had put a hold on it. Crazy. Today's I went and got three more (different) books out and am hoping to find something with a good routine for me in it. Going twice or three times a week would be great. However, I don't want to overload myself now that I am able to get back into things because I feel like that would defeat the purpose.
I've been mulling over why mine didn't go so well (at one point, I walked *shudder*). In part, it is undoubtedly due to the fact that I haven't been running as much as I would like. There's no getting around this. However, now that the deadlines are past, I'm hoping that running can be restored to a normal event on my calendar. It should be doable for the next little while.
The other part of it, though, is that this morning got humid again. Not summer hot by any means, but high humidity (low-ish dew point). Accuweather put the humidity at 93% to start, then rising to 97% (!) by 8am. Which is to say that in the process of the race, the humidity went up instead of abating. Ick. I was reminded of the last time I ran a half-marathon in Florida, which was two years ago as part of the Gasparilla weekend here in Tampa. The temperature started at a reasonable level, in the 60s, but the humidity was about like this morning. After the first hour, I wanted to quit and never run in Tampa again unless there was a cold front--actually, this is the race where I vowed to never do a long distance (i.e., over 10k) in Florida again. Fortunately, a storm came through after the first hour and things were much more manageable, even if there was a driving wind in the wrong direction for a chunk of the race and downpour-level rains. This was vastly superior to icky sweat.
In addition, the warm weather returned just a couple of days ago, so there has been no time to adjust. As I know already, I'm useless in humid weather. So although I know that I need to step up my workouts (or at least get them back on track), I think that this morning's run was not helped by the weather, not one bit. I still can't quite believed that I walked, but I just needed to. I can't explain it any better than that. My head was pounding like crazy when I did. Obviously, it's still bugging me.
Along with increasing the number of times I run per week (from zero to a value larger than zero), I'm hoping to add weights for real this time. Here's how crazy the last month has been: I got a book on weight lifting out of the library, had no chance to read it over the 3-week loan period, and had to give it back since someone else had put a hold on it. Crazy. Today's I went and got three more (different) books out and am hoping to find something with a good routine for me in it. Going twice or three times a week would be great. However, I don't want to overload myself now that I am able to get back into things because I feel like that would defeat the purpose.
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