Thursday, May 1, 2008

Pilates kicked my butt! ...and other thoughts

I did my first pilates class ever yesterday, and I am quite sore today. When Jonathan asked what pilates was last night, I said "yoga on crack." If anyone else has a better way to describe it, please do share. The past week or so has not been all that great for my 10k training routine. My excuses were sickness (wah, wah, wah), packing the wrong kit on Monday (I packed for yoga, and then I got the the Y late, so I missed yoga, and running in yoga pants just does not work...trust me), and generally feeling blase about running. As the beginning of May loomed and with it the MLK Memorial 10k on May 26th, I felt the need to get back into the running groove. Since Wednesday is "2 mile run and strength" according to my training schedule, I decided to try pilates at the Y. The average age of the pilates participants was, ohhh...50. And they all kicked my butt...totally. The little Asian woman next to me asked me at the end if it had been too hard. A little miffed, I said, "Oh no, it felt great! Today was my first class." Another lady told me that she and her husband have come every week for two years, and she explained that yesterday's class was exceptionally difficult. Thanks 'second lady' for bringing my self esteem back up! After a quick drink and a change into running shorts, I ran two miles on the treadmill. At 11:00 minute miles - that's the fastest I have ever run two miles. I don't know if it was that my body was really loose after pilates or that my lungs and legs are now conditioned more, but it felt really good! I wasn't even super tired afterwards. I still do have trouble mentally getting through it, though. With about 10 minutes left to go, I got myself through by saying to myself in my head "10 minutes, 10 minutes.....9 minutes, 9 minutes..." etc. until I finished. At about 6 minutes left, I tried to think about what I was going to make for dinner and my to-do list for Friday, but I just couldn't do it. If any other runners are reading this, please give me advice on what to think about while running! I need to get past counting down minutes so that I can eventually run longer distances. Becky and I will attempt a 4-mile run on Friday afternoon. I have never run 4 miles before, ever. Even the 'journeys' I did as a 7th and 8th grader during track season were probably only three miles or so. I am hoping that if I can make it through 4 miles, 6 won't be too difficult. Hah! We'll see how that goes : ) I received an email from the St. Jude Memphis Half Marathon today reporting that registration has officially opened - that was motivation enough to get my butt in gear so I can run 13 miles come December.

In other thoughts, today is the National Day of Prayer. My prayer life is pretty pathetic, as in short prayers throughout the day as I think of things and prayers before meals. When Jonathan and I were dating, we prayed regularly for and with one another. We asked God to pour his blessings on our relationship and to guide us daily. After we got married, we stopped praying together like that. I have been thinking that I am spending so much time planning out my running training, but I am not devoting one-tenth that much effort to my spiritual training. I'm not trying to turn this into a 'good works' thing, but rather that I know that to be spiritually healthy I need to pray and eat up God's word much like I am training my body to be physically healthy. The temple needs to be clean on the inside and out.

Those are my thoughts : ) Thanks for your time!

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