Couch 2 5k–Week 8

I discovered an error this week that I have been making.  Fortunately it is an error in my favor.  First though here is what I ran this week…

Day 1	Day 2	Day 3
20 minutes	21 minutes	22 minutes

As you can see, I was able to add 1 minute per day as was my plan.  I was thinking as I was running on Day 2 (Wednesday) that I do not really want to be a runner.  In fact for most of my running days over the past 2 weeks there are about 10 minutes when I think this.  They are usually from around the 8 minute mark until about 3 minutes to go.  For the rest of the week, I am happy with running and my progress thus far.  Obviously I pushed through those 10 minute sessions and did not quit.  I am happy to report that I did not feel that way on Day 3 (Friday) of this week.  Maybe I might just turn into a runner after all.

Now as for my error. 

Above is a picture of my running route for the past 2 weeks.  This is the edition we currently live in and I have only ran it the past 2 weeks.  Previous to that I headed out (to Hudson Crossing) and ran along the bike path.  There is a lot more foot traffic (and paw traffic) so it is a little distracting since I have Nina (my Doberman) with me when I am running.  She does pretty well, it is the other dogs that typically do not.  Due to this issue I decided to keep my running along the path you see above.  Well there was one more thing, sprinklers.  The bike path has some very big sprinklers that water the grass along the way.  These things must shoot 30 feet and they really cause Nina to freak out.  Running is hard enough without having to drag a 70 lbs. dog who has her paws dug in to avoid the sprinklers.  Anyway, I changed my running route.

I think I have mentioned before that the entire Couch 2 5k plan is based on a 10 minute mile (6 mph) when jogging.  When the plan says run 1/2 mile it always added “or 5 minutes”.  Since there was no way to gauge how far I was running, I stuck with measuring my running by the amount of time that I ran.  I kept in the back of my mind that I was running 6 mph and did the math accordingly.  When I ran for 17 minutes then I assumed that I ran 1.7 miles.  To back that math up, I can run the above pictured path in about 6 minutes (slightly less than 6 minutes actually).  When we first moved into the neighborhood I think we drove around it once and it measured 0.6 miles.  This made sense in my head as if I was running 0.6 miles in 6 minutes then I was running a 10 minute mile (just like the Couch 2 5k plan assumes).  There is only one problem, the above route is actually 0.7 miles (according to Google maps).

All this time I thought I was failing the Couch 2 5k pace based on timing when if I had just based it on distance I would have realized that I was really on pace.  The goal is to run a 5k by the end of week 9.  At the rate I am going I will be running 25 minutes on Day 3 (Friday) of next week.  If I run the above route in 5:40 (what I ran it in on Friday of this week) then I am running at a pace that will see me finish a 5k in 25 minutes and 8 seconds.  So, I am right on pace.  Ever since I discovered this yesterday afternoon I have been on a sort of runner’s high.  I will actually hit the 5k mark right on time.

Just to be sure, I drove 3 laps around the neighborhood and can confirm that it is just over 0.7 miles (the odometer hit 2.1 about 50 feet before I completed my last lap).  This correction has made me thing I might be a runner after all.

Jon