Running With Perseverance

Ya’ll, I’m so excited my hamstring is finally really recovering. You’ve put up with months of mopey posts—now I may bore you with posts about how happy I am to be really running again—albeit cautiously.

Saturday morning smiles!

Really Running Again

At my second appointment of my second round of shockwave treatments, my orthopedist encouraged me to keep nudging up the load on my hamstring. I did that in two ways—nudging up the distance of my runs with Scooby and nudging up my treadmill intervals from 2 min/1 min run/walk intervals to 3 min/1 min intervals. The truth is, I feel my hamstring a bit at the end of these nudged-up runs, but the fantastic news is that it quiets down on its own by the time I’ve moved on to the rest of my day! I have been icing it post run (by sitting on an ice pack), but even the need to do that is diminishing.

The trick now is to keep making myself do my PT exercises and hold myself back from doing too much too soon.

What’s not really running this week is my Garmin. After three years of nearly constant wear my Garmin Venu Sq won’t hold a charge anymore. I contacted customer support and tried all the tricks, but it won’t last more than 8 hours. Garmin offered to send me a refurbished watch for $99, but I might just buy a new one for $199–or wait for a Mother’s Day sale?

Weekly Run Down

I’m so happy to be really running again, I focused on running and did minimal strength workouts this week. I did all the classes in the Breakthrough Crew Shamrock Shuffle challenge, but most were only 10 minutes.

Sunday:  Another reason I scaled back on strength this week is that it took days for my arms to recover from the stack of upper body classes I took on Sunday. I thought Jess’s chest + back class would be a good compliment to Andy’s arms + shoulders class, but Andy’s class burned out my triceps that were recruited in all the push-ups Jess had us doing. I followed the programming of Jess’s HIIT run, but didn’t push my pace during the running intervals.

Monday: I dragged myself out of bed with the time change, and was glad to be working at home ahead of my orthopedist appointment. My legs felt good after Sunday’s tread run, so I did another tread run, knowing I would be using the Peloton bike at my office gym on Tuesday.

Tuesday: Still suffering from DOMS, I did a light strength workout at home, and then headed to the office gym to use the Peloton bike.

Wednesday: Marcel Dinkins is back to really running after her own injury and recovery from a torn ACL and surgery. She uses her Walk + Run classes to focus on a specific aspect of running form, and this class we focused on keeping our shoulders back and down.

Thursday: I celebrated Pi day and Kim’s birthday with a 3.14 mile run! Since I was working at home I missed the Pi day celebration at work, but we had “pizza pie” for dinner.

Friday: A rare Friday in the office because I was meeting Carianne after work for her pre-race dinner. Peloton dropped a Joan Jett artist series of classes this week, which I kicked off with CDE’s ride. She used those fast-paced songs to push us through some high cadence pedaling.

Saturday: Now that I’m back to running with Scooby, he has to be patient while I do a warm-up in my basement gym. He’s such a good boy, but starts complaining (whining) after about 15 minutes. 🤭 I played Jess King’s Joan Jett run and it was fantastic. If you need a playlist to pump you up and motivate you to run hard, this is it! I covered 3.3 miles—my longest constant run (not counting Scooby stops) in ages.

The neighbor’s dogs were out in their front yard during our post-run photo session, and barked at us so much they got other neighbors’s dogs who were inside riled up—it was a cacophony of barking, but Scooby wasn’t phased!

A huge thank you to Deborah and Kim for hosting the Weekly Run Down link up. And thanks to all of you for putting up with my hamstring saga!

Would you take Garmin’s offer for a refurbished watch or just buy a new one?

It was a hectic week with several changes to my usual morning schedule, but I was happy to get out for a few Scooby miles before we spring forward to dark mornings again.

Friday’s fiery sunrise!

A Hectic Week

My hectic week started Monday with an 8:30 am shockwave treatment. Another sign of my hamstring healing is that it didn’t hurt so much as feel like a really intense Theragun session. Wednesday I had an absolutely crazy morning with an 8 am hair appointment I squeezed in before a 9 am conference call. I had another conference call at 10, and then had to take an 11 am conference call in an Uber to an actual conference that started at 11:30 in D.C.

I signed up for the Peloton app at the start of the pandemic, so this week I got my 4 year badge.

I used the occasion to download my workout history from the website. I wanted to see how many times I’ve taken my favorite stretch, and counted 234 times—I’ve added a few more since. I’m tempted to figure out ChatGPT enough to ask it to tell me other interesting things about my workout history.

Weekly Run Down

I did three runs with Scooby this week, and my hamstring was okay with them, but with the time change I will go back to using the tread—or bike—this week.

Sunday:  I did a long lower body warm-up before hopping on the tread for Jon’s run, which I did with my 2/1 intervals.  I also took a long time afterward to stretch on my own.

Monday: I runfess that I decided to take Scooby out for a run figuring the shockwave treatment would undo any harm. I stuck to my ~2.5 mile loop and enjoyed the mild weather and daylight when I finished.

Tuesday: I did a short strength workout at home, and then headed to the office gym to use the Peloton bike. I had it to myself for a few minutes, but by the time I finished it was pretty busy. A guy hopped on the other bike for a few minutes, but didn’t log in—maybe he just wanted to move his legs a bit before his own strength workout?

Wednesday: This was my most hectic morning, so I maximized my workout time by taking Scooby for a short run—that same 2.5 mile loop.

Thursday: I had to leave the house @ 7 am, so I used my tight schedule to convince myself to give my legs a break from cardio. I did do my PT exercises at the end of Matty’s walk.

Friday: I expected it to be warmer than it was when I took Scooby out for a short run again, but the damp air made the mid-40s feel brisk. Garmin awarded me a badge for doing something on International Women’s Day.

Saturday: It was supposed to rain—and it was drizzly when I took Scooby out—so I had planned an indoor workout. I don’t usually take non-English stretches because I don’t like to have to look at my screen, but I took Irene’s class as part of the Breakthrough Crew challenge and it was a good one.

A huge thank you to Deborah and Kim for hosting the Weekly Run Down link up.

Do you have clocks in your house you have to change?

I know it’s cliche to say, but I can’t believe it’s March already. I’m having a harder time believing my son turns 30 this week—how did that happen?

Those cheeks!

Moving On To March

Now that we are moving on to March, I am trying my luck with the Breakthrough Crew’s February challenge. I like the variety of classes and encouragement to take yoga and stretching classes.

I will have to screen Callie’s lower body class for my hamstring, but everything else seems fine.

Speaking of my hamstring, I had decided to give it to the end of February to decide if I would undergo any more treatments. While it’s definitely improving, it’s still finicky, so I am going to start another round of shockwave therapy this week. Hopefully it will push the healing process to the finish line. 🤞

Weekly Run Down

I did one run with Scooby this week, but my hamstring wasn’t too happy with it, so I am back to the discipline of the tread—or the bike.

I earned the cute Garmin Leap Day badge, but runfess I wouldn’t have noticed it if I hadn’t seen other people posting about it on Facebook. Even then I had a hard time finding it on my profile. 🐸

On Saturday I crossed the 5K minute mark of Peloton workouts. They add up fast with daily 20 minute walks with Scooby, and about 60 minutes a day of workouts.

I think my favorite class of the week was Camilla’s Miami Bass ride. Kim, if you are looking for fun on the bike, this class should do it.

Sunday: After Saturday’s run with Scooby, I gave my hamstring a full day off—no running or riding or lower body strength. Instead, I stacked two upper body classes and used 25 lbs for the chest presses for the first time. 💪

Monday: Andy’ class is lower body-focused and was a good warm-up for Allie’s ride.

Tuesday: I was tempted out for a (short) run with Scooby by warm temperatures in the 40s. I even wore shorts!

Wednesday: Core + Upper Body + Peloton Ride

Thursday: I took Rad’s bodyweight class as a warm-up for the tread and it was perfect. It covered all the warm-up moves I usually do—including multi-directional lunges.

Friday: Core + FB Strength + Peloton Ride

Saturday: I was tempted to run, but my hamstring was a bit grumpy on Friday, so I gave it another day off from running. Andy’s strength class was tough, but I made it through that circuit with 60 seconds of push-ups three times! Camilla’s ride was a blast! 💥

A huge thank you to Deborah and Kim for hosting the Weekly Run Down link up.

What are you looking forward to in March?

I wouldn’t go so far as to say my hamstring is happy, but I am happy because my hamstring is finally getting better.

Messy hair, and really don’t care! 

Weekly Run Down

If you saw my runfessions, you know I am convinced my hamstring finally is really healing, although it is still finicky and susceptible to flare-ups. For the past few weeks I haven’t felt  it during the running intervals of my run + walk stints on the treadmill, but this week I also noticed not feeling it when I got up from my desk and walked around my office. 🤞

Sunday: I really enjoyed Hannah’s Valentine’s Day ride. She dedicated each song to a different type of relationship status and shared funny stories from her own love life. 💘

Monday: While President’s Day was a holiday for my office, I had to work on the “homework”  some of the Senators sent as a follow-up to the hearing I testified at (officially called “Questions for the Record” that I need to answer). I still took time for a leisurely workout including Susie and JTR’s “Galentine’s day” class.

Tuesday: I don’t take many cycling classes with Matt Wilpers because he mostly does Powerzone classes (which work best if you’ve done a pre-test to find out your levels, and I haven’t done that) but his basic classes are full of form tips and coaching gems, and this new beginner class was no exception.

Wednesday: I used Marcel’s walk to both walk Scooby and do my PT exercises, and then hopped on the tread to do my own run/walk intervals during Camils’ Green Day run—it would be a great class to take again when I am healthy enough to push myself.

Thursday: I got hit by the ATT outage while walking Scooby, so I didn’t get to finish Logan’s walk. After doing Adrian’s strength class at home, I headed to my office gym to use the Peloton bike. I was surprised at how busy the gym was at 6:30 am—there were four others there.😱

Friday: I took some detours from my 2:1 run/walk intervals during Jess’s Nicki Minaj run and probably did more than my hamstring was ready for, but it felt good in the moment. I didn’t follow her crazy cuing, but did my own variations on some of her intervals.

Saturday: I wasn’t planning to take Scooby for a test run, but when Andy’s new run aligned with mild temperatures (in the 40s), I couldn’t resist. We covered 2-ish miles at a very easy pace, and it felt so good! My hamstring wasn’t completely silent afterwards, but I think it will be OK after a day off.

A huge thank you to Deborah and Kim for hosting the Weekly Run Down link up.

Did you have President’s Day off?