All posts by Lauren @ mostly i run

About Lauren @ mostly i run

Wife. Web Developer. Kitty Momma. Runner. Singer. Triathlete. Shoe Collector. Blogger.

core challenge: week 1 day 2

core challenge

I took a day off from running today since I have a race tomorrow.  It’s a low-key 10 miler hosted by my running club. I’m not planning on racing all that hard, but my knees have been a little cranky lately.

The day off was a good thing!

I couldn’t, however, take a day off from the Core Challenge. Had to get this week’s second workout in!

This time, I took to the Internet to come up with a new workout. I found a few quick core videos on SparkPeople.   I started with a 15-Minute Abs Workout which was pretty good. Once I started I learned I was a bit sore from my first workout but I still wanted to keep going.

I followed that up with a 5-Minute Beginner Ab Workout with Ball — I was glad to put my neglected stability ball to use.  I finished with a 5-Minute Core Workout with Ball.

Both ball workouts were pretty fun. I’m definitely going to use it more often!

core challenge: week 1 day 1

core challenge, i like to run.

I couldn’t resist. I signed up even before I saw the cute logo.

Laura at Box, Run, Eat decided to create a Core Challenge for the next month. In keeping with the challenge, I will be adding core workouts twice a week until the beginning of May.

The timing was good for this. I just finished the EA Sports Active “More Workouts” 6-week challenge (uh… in 11 weeks), so I was ready to add something different to my routine.

After tonight’s run (4.5 miles — it was another hot and sticky day. But no hills!), I decided to see how long I could hold a plank. I do yoga regularly and am used to the plank position, but I never tried to hold one for a really long time!

Our core challenge hostess recently held a plank for over three and a half minutes. I had no idea what I could do, so I just set a timer on my phone and went for it. Of course my phone goes to sleep after about a minute and a half so I did lift an arm and shift a little to turn it back on … twice. I did manage to stay up for 3:30 before giving up. I think I could have gone longer, but my socks were slipping. Next time no socks, and a better timer!

After that, I returned to my familiar friend, “More Workouts.” Yes I have completed all of the full-body challenge workouts, but they also have separate standalone workouts that I hadn’t tried yet. I selected the ab workout — on hard. This may have been a mistake, but I just finished the whole challenge on hard!

I skipped the warmup since I had just run, so it was 15 minutes of ab work. We did a few sets of the game’s four ab exercises.

  1. Leg lifts (15)
  2. Reverse crunches (15)
  3. Crunches with punches (16)
  4. Curl ups (16)
  5. Leg lifts (20)
  6. Reverse crunches (20)
  7. Crunches with punches (20)
  8. Curl ups (20)
  9. Leg lifts (20)
  10. Reverse crunches (20)
  11. Crunches with punches (20)
  12. Curl ups (20)

By that last set, there was a lot less ‘up’ in my curl ups!

I’ve got a vacation coming up (that actually might make finishing this challenge a bit difficult), but hopefully it will help me get ready to spend a week in a bikini!

It’s not to late to sign up for the core challenge … just visit Laura and let her know you’re joining us!

hazy, hot and hilly

i like to run.

It’s hard to believe I bailed on last week’s hill workout because it was cold (44F) and raining. Today’s temperature was about 50 degrees warmer!

When I joined up with the group at 6:30 this evening, the thermometer in my car said it was 94 degrees. Where did spring go?

My time for each 200-meter hill is supposed to be 63 seconds, but I’ve been running them considerably faster. I knew I was going to have to slow down this week.

  1. 59
  2. 61
  3. 61
  4. 62
  5. 65
  6. 61
  7. 63
  8. 60
  9. 59

Considering the conditions? Not too bad!

It actually didn’t feel as horrible as I expected. There was a bit of a breeze on the bridge, and it isn’t too humid … yet.

That doesn’t mean it was easy. I was feeling pretty beat up on our run back to the store. It felt like I had gone much farther than 5.25 miles.

Two more weeks of hills are on the schedule (10 and 12), and then we  hit the track. I’m kind of looking forward to it!

weekly winners: mobile edition

weekly winners

weekly winners banner

March 28 – April 3, 2010

I was walking back to my car after brunch today through a unique little street in town. It’s very short, and a dead end only used for parking by the few residents here. All of the homes are row homes, and their porches or tiny yards face this little street.

It leads to a lot where I usually park, so I walk through it often. And this guy is usually sitting on one of the decks. When I make eye contact he meowed and walked up to me. I gave him a few pets and snapped a few photos.

orange kitty

orange kitty

Also seen on that little street:
keep out

Later in the afternoon, we attended a birthday party for our neighbors’ son. He sure enjoyed his cupcake!

first birthday

All of the above photos were taken with my phone. Not the best quality but it does a pretty good job. I had no excuses for forgetting my camera at the birthday party since we live two doors down!

Visit Lotus to check out more Weekly Winners!

uphill on the treadmill

i like to run.

Tuesday nights are hill repeats with my running store race team. I got changed before leaving the office as usual. Rain was in the forecast, but it was dry and overcast as I left the office.

But the drops started falling on my 20-mile commute. By the time I made it home, it was really coming down. With wind gusts and a chilly 44 degrees, I just wasn’t feeling it. I was going to attempt to run my scheduled eight hills on the treadmill.

Phew. That was tough!

I didn’t do the math to figure out what I should be doing since the treadmill is so different.  After a slow warm-up mile, I cranked the incline as high as it’d go (my low-end treadmill doesn’t give me an incline percentage), and set the speed to 7.0 mph, around an 8:30 pace. (the treadmill only gives me mph, too).

This is slower than my splits have been lately. I should be a little over an 8-minute pace, but I’ve been hitting them around 7:45. Still, I figured it was a good starting point. Since we’re doing 200-meter hill repeats, I decided I’d run .13 uphill, with .12 recovery.

That first uphill was really hard!  Also, it was way too fast, about 52 seconds. I have no idea how that is possible. Maybe I messed up the timer?

I decided to make the remaining seven hills a little easier. I still kept the incline up at or close to the top (it’s hard to tell), but dropped the speed down to 6.5, which should be a little over a 9-minute pace. It sure felt faster on that incline!

I unfortunately have no idea what the rest of my splits are. I was trying out a lap timer on my phone, and it wasn’t really working for me. When I restarted for the second hill it didn’t start a new lap, and then my phone kept going to sleep. Next time (oh, I hope there will NOT be a next time), I’ll just use my Garmin for the time!

For the last hill, I kicked it up to 6.8. But I had to drop it down to 6.6 halfway through. It wasn’t just that the speed was tough on my tired legs. With the incline, I felt a little like I might go flying off the treadmill!

How did I ever make it through that first one?

I finished my hills, and ran a cool-down mile with no incline. That was all I had in me tonight, for a total of four miles.

What a workout!