And so it begins...

On Saturday morning I went to the gym. It had been so long since I last went that I was surprised my card still worked. They have new equipment... hmm. I forgot my mp3 player for the first time ever in my (recent) history of gym going - I almost gave up and went home when I realised this! I also forgot my heart rate monitor strap. Luckily this wasn't one of those dreams where I'd forgotten my clothes too so I ran... for a minute... and then walked.

I appear to have once again proved the theory that sitting on your sofa eating cakes doesn't improve your cardio-vascular fitness. I am, still, and yet again, hideously unfit. I managed one minute's running in every five minute period. This is even worse than the schedule for week one of my running programme... unless you count the three weeks of walking that you're supposed to do - how humiliating!

I originally set out with the intention of following a new beginner's running plan - one widely advocated - of running for 30 seconds and then walking until recovered. About half-way through my warm up I realised that this wasn't going to be an especially easy programme to do on the treadmill so I decided to go with my old 10 week running programme again - see link in sidebar somewhere. It's currently very very hard to imagine that I will be able to run for 30 minutes in 10 weeks time.

I did it though. I managed to endure the treadmill walk of shame surrounded by those who make running look like a walk in the park. I keep trying to convince myself that what matters is not how fast you're going but how hard you're trying... I'm not convinced.

By the way - I ran at 7 and walked at 5 throughout (except for the first minute where I optimistically ran at 7.5) - my footpod seems to go a little nuts sometimes - like minute 20?