It was ever-so-slightly cooler outside last night, but I just couldn’t get myself out into the sun at 6:00. I hit the dreadmill instead…and it actually wasn’t so bad. This was the first time I’ve run on the treadmills at Gilruth, and they’re much nicer than the two at my apartment complex. It felt like running on a cushion!
I ran a fairly easy pace, but upped the difficulty by doing the hill program, which got as high as 4.5% grade. Tough! 30 minutes at 5.3 mph, plus the 5 minute progressively slowing cooldown, and I ran right around 3 miles in 35 minutes. I think the hill program was part of what made the treadmill more bearable — it gave me some variety. I was also able to watch TV, of course, even though there was nothing good on.
I’m happy to discover that the treadmill at Gilruth is bearable, since I’m going to be doing more running this summer as part of the tri training program than I have in summers past. We’ll top out at 8 miles by the end of August, which should put me in nice position to continue upping the mileage for this fall’s races, including the new Striders-managed Half Marathon (formerly 20K) at the end of October! I am feeling really positive about this training program, even though we haven’t started. I really need a schedule, and some motivation, to get back on track.
In my annoyance with the gym t.v.’s and my likely continued 3 day per week use of hte gym for the remainder of the summer I’ve been giving some serious thought to getting a new iPod. I mean, you could download some Daily Show episodes or something to your iPod and watch them instead of the crap they have on the tv’s at the Gilruth.
A good treadmill really does make running on them a lot more bearable. SAC had nice treadmills with individual TVs at Tech so I never minded going there.