November 10, 2007

The Hills Are Alive...With the Sound of Panting

I'm back in the running routine. I do miss our flat roads around our old neighborhoods, but I'm getting used to running around here. Unfortunately, though, what goes down must come up, and I can't run much of anywhere without starting by going DOWN hill, which means I end by coming UP hill!! The good news is that I'm getting conditioned, slowly but surely. It was a great day when I realized I ran about a mile and a half uphill without stopping once--the first time I ran that route I stopped at least 3-4 times!

Last Saturday I did a 10-mile run, the second time I've gone that far. Ted and the kids picked me up at Smoothie King--I treated myself to a nice smoothie for breakfast. I finished in 1:45:10, which means my average time per mile was 10:31. Not bad, if I do say so myself! I was pleased to note that a hill I had run on occasion closer to our old house was a piece of cake after running the hills around this area! I'm hoping this conditioning will help me run the half-marathon in a few weeks.

Next Saturday I'll be running a 10K race, so I did a 10K run around here just to check out my time. I've only run one other race in my whole life, and that was a 10K about a year and a half ago with Sarah. It started out going uphill and was a pretty tough course, plus it was a very windy day. As I had only run 6 miles one other time previously, I wasn't expecting much. When the day of the race dawned and I was having stomach issues, I figured I'd be lucky to even finish. My time was a few seconds under an hour and fifteen minutes. My time today was 1:05:15. Woohoo! And that's even with running hills. I think the course may actually be flat, but I'm not too familiar with that area of town, so we'll see.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Honey,

You are a "winner" when it comes to all those runs and uphill to boot!! We'll be rooting for you as you do your marathon running!
Wish we could be there to cheer you on along the way! But we will be seeing you in a matter of weeks to spend Christmas with you all.
Can hardly wait!

Love you soooooooooo much,
Mom

Joy said...

WOW - very impressive! Amy and I were walking while she was here and we both mentioned that we are very impressed with you and your running! That's great!

Anonymous said...

Way to go Beverly! You know running (or walking) hills is good for helping guard against osteoporosis.

Beverly said...

Wow, I didn't know that, Ski! Another great reason for me to keep going and not quit...I told Ted that I didn't want to have to build up my stamina again, so that alone is good motivation to stay consistent. :-)