I saw 4:00 am twice this week, which is two times too many. At least both of my adventures at 4:00 am were harmless, if annoying, and later, exhausting.
Adventures At 4:00 AM
My first adventure at 4:00 am was my own fault. I woke up, and before trying to go back to sleep checked my watch to see how soon my alarm would be going off. I needed to get up on time because I had an 8:00 am conference call, so I didn’t want to go back to sleep only to have to fight the urge to hit the snooze button in a few minutes. So, I checked my watch, and when I saw it was a few minutes before 5:00 am, decided to just get up. (My alarm goes off at 5:00.)
After I’d gotten up, I saw 3:57 on the digital clock radio in my bathroom. WTF. Since I was fully awake, I reminded myself I used to get up almost that early to go to Orangetheory, and so I stayed up.
I like the sleek look of my Garmin watch face, but I guess I can’t tell the difference between 3:55 and 4:55 without my glasses–or my coffee! At least I had plenty of time for my morning routine before that conference call ….
My second encounter with 4:00 am was Scooby’s fault, but he would blame the raccoon. Somehow Scooby knew there was a raccoon in our backyard, and he could NOT deal with it. He barked. He whined. He whimpered. He paced anxiously between our bed and the window. When I sat with him by the window to try to see what he saw, he quieted, but was shaking. Turning on our backyard floodlights didn’t scare the raccoon away, so my husband got up and turned on the sprinklers. After that, I did go back to sleep–and so did Scooby.
Weekly Wrap
We had nice running weather most of the week, but I didn’t let myself run everyday. My Achilles continues to improve, and I want to keep the trend going in that direction. I managed to do two indoor rides, which I tend to see as something I should do versus something I want to do. Darlene’s post reminded me of several reasons it’s worth doing.
Monday: Core + 5.1 Scooby Miles
It was so nice, I opted for a longer run instead of trying to squeeze in a short strength workout.
Tuesday: Core + 30 min Strength + 30 min Ride
This was the day I accidentally got up at 4:00 am. I made Scooby wait until 5:00 for his walk, so I did a few strength workouts, took him out, and then hopped on my bike.
Wednesday: Core + 5 Scooby Miles + 20 min FB Strength
I plotted a new 5 mile loop, which included a loop through a park, where I couldn’t resist these purple flowers. There’s been a debate on my Facebook post as to what they are. One friend says azalea. Another friend says rhododenron. The PictureThis app says they are Southern Indian azalea, with the botanical name Rhododendron indicum, so I guess they are both right!
Whatever they are they are pretty!
Thursday: Core + 3.25 mile Tread
I didn’t realize I was doing my 250th Peloton running workout until it was done, but I earned that badge with this HIIT workout–seven one-minute intervals at 2% incline. He cued a 90 second walking recovery, but I walked 30 sec and then ran easy for 60 sec because I have a hard time gearing up again after a long recovery.
Friday: Core + 30 min UB Strength + 20 min Ride
I’m trying to make Fridays an upper-body focus so my legs aren’t too tired for my Saturday “long” run. I stacked three 10 minute classes that targeted all the muscle groups, and then let my physical therapist work out the kinks. 😉
This must be the add-a-chin Prisma filter.
Saturday: Core + 8.3 Scooby Miles
It was in the low 40s, so I had to dig out my long sleeves and capris again, but it felt fantastic. I also felt good and my Achilles felt OK, so I did my full 8-ish mile loop.
Sunday: Core + 3.3 Scooby Miles + 23.8 miles Cycling
I hope my neighbors were ready to wake up at 7:00, because that’s about when the Scooby alarm went off as the deer crossed our path! They were actually standing in the middle of the road when we first saw them. They stared down Scooby for a few moments before they decided to run off.
After breakfast and Zoom church we headed out for a lovely spring ride. My Garmin registered 23.88 miles. It’s just too hard to round up cycling miles, especially when we live at the top of a hill on a cul-de-sac.
Weekly running miles: 25.0
Thanks to Deborah and Kim for the Weekly Run Down link up.
Have you accidentally gotten up too early?
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I need to remind myself when it’s nasty out and I do not run to just hop on the bike.
I wake up too early every day even on weekends. Hopefully it will warm up enough to push me out the door.
Now that it’s light by 6:00, that’s getting me out of bed and out the door.
It’s light but it’s still 30 degrees.
Wow, not once, but TWICE up at 4am! I think I would have gone back to bed on both instances. 😉
Nice that your Achilles is holding up, Coco!
I am very paranoid about my Achilles and I found that rolling it every day with a small mini-foam roller keeps it happy. And calf stretches on the stairs after every run.
Oooh. I’ll try the massage. There’s a fine line between giving it enough and too much attention.
I would be just miserable getting up that early twice in one week! I wonder how Scooby knew the raccoon was there in the dark? I also missed a stretching milestone this week. Oops! Looks like another solid well rounded workout. I second the massage idea or come try the IR sauna and stretch
We think maybe he heard it? It had to have woken him up because Scooby usually sleeps until my alarm goes off.
I get up by 4:00 a few times a week, but since I didn’t feel well this week I tried to “sleep in”. However, my son’s coughing had me up during the night and early in the mornings. Its frustrating when you wake up much earlier than planned and can’t go back to sleep!
Ugh! Listing to a sick child cough at night is tough. You want to make them better!
I chuckled at your watch incident as I could so see myself making the same mistake – my eyes need digital LOL
Congrats on your Peloton running milestone!
It’s good to hear your Achilles is holding up – I think a massage would be a good call.
Next time I’ll check my phone before getting up! I’m walking a tightrope with my Achilles but so far I’m holding on.
Ugh 4 am. That is what time my hubs gets up for work. I just can’t…
Glad to hear your achilles is behaving!!!
Wow, that’s early. Mine gets up at 4:45 if he’s going into the office. Otherwise he sleeps in until 6:00.
Great variety of workouts for you this week and congrats on the milestone. Sounds like Scooby has had his share of wildlife adventures lately! Ozzy came face to face with a racoon the other day (I think racoons are living under our neighbor’s deck) and sort of head-butted it. It took a swipe a him, thankfully there were no injuries or fights.
I seem to wake naturally at 4:40 every morning then I make myself lie there until 5-5:15ish. 4 is entirely too early for this girl.
4:40 is that snooze-danger zone for me, but I would definitely try to go back to sleep until 5:00.
We were afraid to let Scooby out to chase the raccoon away — I didn’t want any contact!
Yes, I agree with you- waking up at 4 am twice is two times too many! My personal philosophy is that wake-up time should not start with a “4”. Sounds like you had a great week in spite of it though!
I think you have good instincts about your achilles. I agree with you that sometimes you can give it too much attention- like I just can’t stretch my hips too much. It always aggravates them. So keep doing what you’re doing! It seems to be working.
Thanks! Once my PT is done with my back, I’m going to have her work on her Achilles. I have to brace myself for her advice to cut back on running though.
This is all too familiar. I’m going through a phase where I wake up at 3 and can’t get back to sleep. I’ve been listening to meditation podcasts at night to make me drowsy and hopefully I’ll soon be out of this cycle.
Ugh. That is so frustrating. I’ve gone through phases like that, but luckily not in a while.
I wake up before my alarm almost every day LOL Even this morning, I set it for 4:30 (for our early departure to Des Moines for our race), and I woke up at 4:00. Once my eyes open, I’m seldom able to fall back to sleep (especially knowing the alarm will “really” sound off in such a short while). Poor Scooby! Once in awhile, Max will wake us up if he hears something outside (like another dog), but he’s usually in zombie land until one of us gets out of bed.
I know you are an early bird! Scooby is our guard dog! He used to “woof” (just once, pretty quietly) when the newspaper hit the driveway, but these days I’m up long before that happens.
Oh no on being woken up early! I am a natural early riser (which also means early to bed). Luckily I’m very near sighted, so I can see things up close without anything — it’s the distance that’s hard for me.
I know azaleas and rhododendrons are very similar; I don’t think I’d be able to tell them apart. We have one azaela bush in our front yard luckily — toxic for dogs. Fun to have a loop with them in there!
A lot of houses have bushes with pretty purple flowers here & I’ve no idea what they are!
Sounds like it was a great week, Coco.
I saw the watch face fine, I just didn’t interpret it correctly. 😉 Azaleas are very popular around here—in all colors, but they have smaller flowers.
I do love our azalea bush. Now that I’ve discovered it.it was pretty much completely covered by another bush & we didn’t even know it was there until last year (after 11 years in this house).
When I was working in the office, I saw 4a.m. more than I would’ve liked. Now it’s later and later, but still pre-sunrise! You rock!
In the before times I got up at 4:15 for OTF or 4:45 for cyclebar. That habit will be hard to get back into!
I always wake up at 4 or some unearthly time. Sometime, I can get back to sleep. Sometimes it’s a no-go. Meh.
So happy to see so many Scooby pics! Those are my favorite miles.
You are really rocking it, especially with that bike ride at the end of the week!
Thanks. It’s great to be out there with Scooby again. I prefer to wake up at 5. 😉
I am in awe that you can tell time on that watch ever. I really need to go back to elementary school to learn all I missed
I love how much Scooby sees it as his duty to keep his castle safe and way to go on 250 runs
Yes, Scooby takes his job very seriously! He gets very upset when we don’t heed his warnings.
Scooby the home protector! Dogs are so silly 🙂 I’m sure mine would be the same if they saw a raccoon! And deer! Big week for him!
It will be a shock to me when I have to get up in the 4’s again…I will miss starting runs in the 6’s instead of the 5’s!
It might be an accident but my cats wake me up early. Mateo is the bad influence. He likes to chase Lola and she wants nothing to do with him. Sometimes I do manage to go back to sleep and sometimes I don’t. Congrats on the Peloton milestone! I am also trying to do more bike classes. I enjoy them and know the benefits of them but there are times when I am just too tired.
goodness 4 am is the middle of the night!!
great workout week for you and congrats on your 250th running peloton workout!!
My cat woke me up at 3:47am yesterday. Boo on that! She wouldn’t leave me alone so I stuck her in my bathroom. Problem solved 😉 Luckily I went back to sleep. Congrats on hitting 250. Great job!