I officially feel like a runner!

Going into Week 5, Day 3 of C25k I predicted I couldn't complete the 20 minutes of running without any walking breaks.

I had beaten myself up so many times over not being able to do the smaller time increments on a couple occasions that I just knew I wouldn't be able to do 20 minutes. 

So what does one do when they feel overwhelmed? Whine. Over and over. 

I whined to my fake Internet friends. I said, "Friends, I can't do this."

They said, "Yes you can do this!" and 

"(Wo)man imposes her own limitations. Don't set them up for yourself!! You are stronger than you think."

One of my problems is that I quickly lose my breath. A few minutes into a run, I feel like I can't get a deep breath. This was fine when the running portions were only a couple minutes but once it went to 5 minutes and then 8 minutes, I struggled to finish. I felt sick. I wanted to throw up. The side stitches were terrible. 

After some encouragement that I was strong enough, I searched for clues as to why my lungs sucked. Well, not literally sucked since that was my problem. 

I don't know how we ever lived without Dr. Google. Ponder on that for a minute. How often do you google random stuff? 

Anywho, Dr. Google and some running gurus told me that I don't breathe correctly. 31 years later, I figure this out? Thanks a lot, people. Someone should have told me this when I was like 5. You get taught how to tie shoes, walk standing on your feet, and piss in a porcelain bowl, but no one teaches you to breathe. 

Apparently, I breathe with my chest. This is wrong.

I should be breathing with my stomach. I know. You think this is crazy, right? Well it's true. 

Take a deep breath. Did your chest rise or did your stomach pooch out? Go ahead. Do it. I will wait. 

From what I learned, when you run, your breathing should be deep into the stomach. It opens up more lung capacity and brings in more air. You can try to adjust your breathing technique as your sitting or walking and then use it during your next run. 

I was re-energized by my friends' support and by this new information and gave it a try for my first 6 am morning run after a 12 hour night shift. I figured if I was going to do this 20 minutes of running, I should throw a bunch of obstacles in my way to overcome. Go big or go home, right? 

The benefit was that instead of running in 100% humidity in the middle of a 90 degree day, I was able to run when it was 68 degrees with the sun rising around me. 

I also downloaded a new C25k app which is the free version. It's downside is that it doesn't have GPS or break down a review of your times after the run. It just prompts you when to run and walk. Nike+ has a free GPS app that I downloaded as well. You turn it on, turn off the Nike music setting, and start the C25k app. Ready. Set. Run. The music and voice prompts come from the C25k app and your GPS is calculated by Nike+. While I like my other app, I didn't like its GPS ability. I have run the same trail over and over again and some days it would tell me I ran 2.2 miles and the next it was 2.4, but my times and pace were the same. I think it was malfunctioning and just not accurate, so I switched. I can't complain too much since how accurate can it really be for a $2.99 app? Either way, I'm doing the program and kicking my own butt. 

Not only did I complete the workout, I felt wonderful! I could have easily kept running once I got a rhythm with my breathing. It was amazing at the difference between me literally huffing and puffing little short breaths to taking full breaths. Now that I've got this figured out I can concentrate on my pace. Today I did 12:09 per mile, but that is an average that includes run time and walking for a 5 minute warm up and cool down for 5 minutes. That's my one gripe with the new app. The old app separated the walking and running pace. 

But I will take that pace because it means that it gave me my best distance to date of 2.52 miles! I'm soooo close to getting the full 3.1 miles under my belt that I can taste it!