Back To The Lab Again...

So not only is March I <3 To Run's "Run A Mile A Day" challenge, but Shaun T. from Insanity also issued his birthday challenge. Starting on March 4th, we could all begin Insanity with him, starting with the fit test. If you took a picture with the date written on a piece of paper while holding the Insanity DVDs and submitted it, you would be entered in the contest to be the lucky winner of a personal visit/workout with Shaun T. and his "Shaunterage" after the 60 days are up. I'd love the opportunity to workout with him, so I threw my hat in the ring.

I wouldn't mind him knocking on my door for a workout!

That means along with running at least a mile a day and training for the half marathon on May 5th, I'm also doing Insanity 6 days a week. It's been 9 months since I worked on this program. So far I have not broken myself, but I can see it being a possibility. I'm not a spring chicken. Middle aged, that's me, so I'm not pushing as hard or digging as deep as I can when doing the program, but I'm feeling my muscles work and I'm sweating buckets and I'm improving every day, even if it's only been 7 workouts. That program works fast. It's no lie when he says you can get up to a year's results in 60 days. I've only ever done the first month, so I wouldn't know, but I know that one month improved my running speed, so I'm going to see this through. March will be easy since I'm not working and there's nothing else for me to do!

The running challenge is already a third of the way through, praise be to God! LOL. 28 miles already run for the month!! Today I ran 4.18 miles in 40 minutes, taking the first mile to warm up and then running the next two at 6.5 mph and playing around with the speed the last mile or so. Speaking of playing around, yesterday I went for a run with Charlie. We couldn't go to the wildlife refuge trails since they close at 4 pm and I was too busy farting around with that cursed game Candy Crush on Facebook to get my ass in gear any earlier! Oh! I just realized I never told you about the running trails! We have a refuge not even a mile away from the house that we've only been to for a walk once in the 20+ years we've lived in this house. Last week we decided to give it a try and it was TOUGH navigating the sticks and pine cones, etc. but it was a lot of fun and something we plan to do again.

Not exactly the safest place to run alone, though, in case of injury!

ANYWAY, so instead of going to the trail, we went to the track. I was just not that into it when we got out of the car. I forgot my iPod and running at least 3 miles at the track, 12 long laps, was going to be b-o-r-i-n-g without music. To add insult to injury, my Garmin was dead before we even left the house and I didn't have my headband or my mittens to keep warm, either. I already had it in my mind that this run was going to SUCK. As we walked onto the track for a walking warm-up lap, I came up with the brilliant idea to run sprints. Now, I run intervals on the treadmill, where I push myself for 1/4 to 1/2 of a mile at 7.0, but I never full out sprint, so this was new for both of us. The plan was to run full speed on the straightaways and jog around the curves. What started out as a run I dreaded like going to the OB/GYN (still have to make that appointment!) turned out to be a blast! I was cracking up at what the image of myself running full tilt must have looked like! Then having Charlie next to me, like we were racing, made it even more fun. We were fast! Of course I have no hard proof of this, but just take my word for it. All I had was my cell phone to judge time and we lost track of how many laps we did, so there's only my guestimation. We'll have to revisit this run WITH a working Garmin to put it in the record books!

Any of you working on specific fitness goals this month? Anybody out there joining me in my misery?