Running, Day One

So tonight I started my running training. I'm a pretty sucky runner. Seriously. I played soccer most of my life and never had a problem with running. If I was dribbling a ball I could run a six minute mile. But the thought of running just to run, not to score a goal, not to steal the ball...it's just not appealing to me. I know, I know finishing the race is the drive, the goal...but that doesn't work for me. I restarted Josh's couch to 5k. I think it's a good way to reintroduce me to running again. I have to remind myself that I WANT to do this. If it was just swimming and biking, I really don't think I would have a problem at all...but for some reason, I just canNOT get into the running. Maybe I need someone to hold a Snickers bar in front of me to chase. Or maybe I just need to buy a soccer ball and dribble it everytime I run. Or maybe I just need to suck it up and realize that part of the Tri is a run and just DO IT! We'll see how it all goes!

Swimming...

We recently joined the YMCA. One of the reasons is because Josh gets a pretty good deal though work and another reason is because we need a place to practice swimming. Never in my life have I claimed to be a good swimmer. I can basically keep myself from drowning and that's about it. Today we decided to go to the Y and let the boys swim. Josh worked out for a bit while I played in the pool with the boys. After a while, Josh joined us and then told me to go swim laps for 10 mins. Um...yeah...no. I was TOTALLY embarrassed to swim laps! I know that there is never going to be a time when I am the ONLY person in the pool, but still I didn't want to do it. So Josh went first. While he was gone I was thinking about the fact that I would NEED to practice if I ever expect to swim in the Tri. So when he got back, I asked if there was an extra lane open, he said there was. I mustered up all my courage and walked over to the lap pool and got started. Now in high school I took a swim class. I specifically remember them teaching us how to freestyle swim properly. So as I am swimming, I go to put my face in the water and I realize that I have completely forgotten how to breathe while swimming. I know you are supposed to take a breath to the side and then put your face back down, but all that I managed to do was inhale some water! So the rest of my laps I swam with my face out of the water, which looks somewhat silly and is much less productive. Now my new goal is to remember how to swim the RIGHT way! This is going to be a process. In the end, I swam 100 meters freestyle (sort of) and 50 meters backstroke. Yeah, that is LESS than half of the total distance I have to swim and when I got out of the pool my legs were JELLY! I keep telling myself that I am going to get better, I just have to stick with it...but my postive self talk is somewhat faltering. I'm hoping that once I see some improvement that will help me to stay positive and want to keep trying harder!

Dream of a Tri...

Last night I had a funny dream. My dream included my best friends, Becky, Erin and Katie along with myself. We had entered a team triathlon, but it was different. Each of us had to complete the whole triathlon, one after another, then our combined times would be our total time. Katie went first, then Erin, then me and Becky finished up for us. We were all cheering and screaming for Becky because she was only a couple seconds behind the leader. Somehow Becky kicked it into high gear and blew right passed the leader! We had won the whole thing!! We all got medals and then we got a huge trophy. We were being interviewed by the news and I said "Wow, this is like a dream!" Shortly after that, I woke up and realized it WAS a dream. It was pretty awesome though because it got me pumped to think that maybe I could actually do this! YAY for inspiring dreams! :-)