I haven't ran since Sat, I think I might have increased mileage too quickly, but don't really know how since I am following a schedule... I was supposed to weigh in yesterday but didn't feel like doing that since I hadn't ran. Today I hopped on the scale and I was down to 223 from 225 on Sunday.

Hi Gerl, yup just do something, even if it is "exteme house keeping". I have fallen in love with the rowing machine. I never used one before, but yeah, it will kick your butt.. in a really good way. I am glad you are finding encouragmenet in this thread. That's what we are all here for. Keep it up!

And what's wrong with a little boasting from time to time :D. You certainly deserve it. That seems to be one of the biggest differences between men and women. Guys have no problem puffing out the chest and parading around like a peacock. Whereas we just don't want to offend anyone :rolleyes:. But I get it when you mention losing friends... they wouldn't get it. So boast away woman, we're listening.

You definitely earn you BIDIA award today.

Hey Urban, published training schedules are pretty idealistic, I have found. They are created based on a perfect world and some "idealized" athelete. But you gotta go with what you got. So it is quite likely you have overtrained a bit. Rest up and back off a little. No point in getting discouraged and bummed out. Personnally, I have never been able to follow any schedule to a tee - not even my own. Something always comes up and I am often a little too optimistic in my progress.

Went to the Box this morning and just rolled out after the warm up. The coach showed me how to use one of the baseballs to tackle a shoulder problem and wow - it was a miracle!

hit the gym today with my new preworkout drink. had my best workout of the year. arms/shoulders day. keeping with my trend for the week i lowered reps and did heavier weights. suprised myself with how much i was able to push myself today. i too didnt want to go to the gym today, must be something about the time of year. glad i made the right choice to go!

As Pam said, most likely you're overtrained a bit. Rest up but before you ditch the schedule, there are other factors to consider.

Sleep patterns
Work stress
Home stress
Recent illness
Suboptimal diet

These are just some factors that affect recovery.

To agree with Pam, schedules are an "ideal" but should not be written in stone. They're a starting point but each athlete needs to find what works for them.

Here is my weekly mileage chart since I started running (hasn't been very long)

http://i1041.photobucket.com/albums/...at122249AM.png

As you can see around the holidays I slacked and cut back mileage. then jumped right back into it with higher mileage for three weeks. Next week is supposed to be my cut back week, but since I already took this week off I'm not sure if I should do a slow ease back into a mid 20's mpw or what? My schedule has 4 days at 4 miles and 1 day at 5 putting next weeks mileage at 21.

I only walked today as I couldn't do anything today as I over did it on the rowing machine, I need those big metal handles you find in handicapped washrooms.

Pam, the only time I've done extreme housekeeping is when the MIL says she's coming for a visit. I actually had my heart rate monitor on at the time of the call and my heart rate was at 155 for about 10 minutes. I might invite her over more often. I am interested in your shoulder exercise, can you explain it?



Breethe, congrats on "your best workout of the year"

Urban, you increased your mileage too fast. First ten weeks you averaged 10 miles per week then doubled that over the last three.

Go back to 12 miles a week and work on increasing by no more than 10% per week with a fallback week every fourth week.

12
13.2
14.5
12
16
17.6
19.3
12
and so on
Focus most of your increases on your long run and a midweek run, save the other runs for recovery.

Pam – Good Luck this weekend – I’ll be rooting for you and the Patriots!

Breethe000 – you get a BIDIA award too (But I Did It Anyway!) – glad it went well – it almost always is worth it!

Urban Mule – your chart is impressive to behold, thanks for sharing the training experience with us, and HC thanks for your wisdom!

Crazigerl, overdoing it is normal, but, to be avoided, once in a while, I enjoy overdoing it! And your description of extreme housekeeping sounds like something I would do!

Spinning today, a strength ride, felt pretty good, followed up with core work – someone had the decline bench set up in a weird configuration on top of another bench, it looked scary to move, and the guy who was doing sets involving it looked scary to approach, so I used a stability ball instead. Maybe the next muscle group I should work on is assertiveness!

Abby

On the to do list for today are snow shoveling, a half hour walk to pick up stuff from the store, and 25 minutes on step apparatus.

Will report back later how it went!

I was afraid that's what happened