Kellie’s 5K Challenge – training course

Today I mapped out a route through my neighborhood that appeared to provide me with a 5K training course. One of the issues with South Orange County is that this area is not flat. But the good news is if I can work in a decent time on this undulating course, then I should be even better off if the 5K is flat. Likewise, with the inclines and declines to navigate during training, I will be prepared if the 5K run is situated in a similar course. Being the optimist, training on the a course that has some inclines built should help with the endurance.

So I drove the course and my odometer came in at just over 3.1 miles. Perfect! Most of this route I am on the street, and when I am not, the side-walk meanders from side to side because we are in a nouveau neighbor hood, as we certainly can not have straight sidewalks. The other aspect of Southern California versus the East coast, we do not have hard winters with frost, freeze and snow, thus the sidewalks are really flat, without the sidewalk lifting up or dropping down with each section. The downside is learning to run in Southern California, you cruise over the top of the sidewalk and when you try this on an East coast side-walk, we will catch a toe on a sidewalk edge and tops turvy, ass over teakettle.

So I did my first run (okay jog/walk) on this course and it was not bad, my time was right at 45 minutes. Lots of room for improvement! So it appears that I dropped about 5 minutes from yesterday, which seems like a large improvement in one day. Perhaps it was the new running shorts and running shirt that I bought this afternoon and those fancy logos really provide a powerful boost. Or it maybe that I also purchased another pair of running shoes that seemed to feel better when I was jogging. My first pair was supposed to be some traditional running shoes by Skeetcher, but I think that they still have some of their fancy technology built-in the middle of the shoe to attempt to move you away from heel strikes. The Skeetcher’s feel odd. So let’s give some credit where it is due to the Brooks running shoes.

Only issue is that when I did pick up the pace faster than the light jog, my right knee started to get jabbing pains. Pains I don’t fondly remember from four years ago when I really, really wrenched that knee bad skiing in Vail. That put me on crutches for about four weeks. When I slowed the pace down to a very light jog, the pain subsided. I think that I will be looking for a knee brace now.

Best regards, Doug