Tired legs

I've covered a lot of distance today. I blame the girls at work, who are enthusiastically running a "Biggest Winner" competition. They have all sorts of health challenges that you can meet to gain points - eat 10 pieces of fruit in a week, walk 10000 steps a day, etc. They are also organising fun activities. Today, we were put into teams and encouraged to walk around the building twice. There's a 1.4 km walking track around my workplace, which is in the middle of a paddock.

Now, even I can do the maths - 1.4 km x 2 = 2.8 km, which isn't a lot of distance. It is, however, 2.8 km on top of the distance I already planned to cover. I did an interval run this morning, and repeated it this evening. That was another 6.3 km all up. My pedometer is reading almost 28000 steps! No wonder my legs are tired.

I really enjoyed both interval runs. I find I run much better in the morning than in the evening though. The run itself involved 15 mins of intervals of 6 / 9.5 km/h, followed by 5 mins at 9 km/h and 5 mins at 6 km/h before a short cool down and stretching. I then did Body Jam, which I love. Unfortunately the class is going to be cancelled in a few weeks.

I didn't realise I hadn't blogged last night, because I was busy reading other people's blogs. I managed to get through my overdue weights session on Wednesday by splitting it in half. I couldn't see any other way to manage it this week, so I did the first part in the morning and finished it off in the evening. Because of that, I spent a little bit of extra time on my abs exercises. Leanne told me how to make one of the exercises harder .. and it was a lot harder! I also managed two sets of 10 reps on the rolldowns. That's the first time I've managed to persevere through the two sets.

Squash was a lot of fun. I played four games and managed to win two of them. The court seemed really small last night. I don't know if it's because I'm finding it so easy to get around it or because I feel bigger because I have more muscle. I'm definitely not bigger. I've lost a little more weight and my clothes are continuing to feel looser.

I'm having the strangest experience at the moment. When I catch sight of myself in the mirror, I feel like I'm looking at a stranger. At first I thought it was my new hairstyle, but it's not all that different. I finally realised that it's my neckline. I think my neck is thinner. It's quite disconcerting to be having trouble recognising myself.

I got my team t-shirt for the Relay for Life today. It's much better than last year's, thank goodness. It's also two sizes smaller and it's loose on me. **huge grin**

I'm really looking forward to all the running I'm doing on the weekend. I've been working hard to be fit enough to manage to run one of my legs of the Relay for Life. I've grown in confidence lately so, not only do I expect to run both legs, I also think I'll be able to run on Sunday as well. I originally planned to walk because I didn't think I was fit enough to run two days in a row, but I've realised that I'm much fitter than I give myself credit for.

I had great fun chatting with people at the gym tonight. To think I used to go and hardly speak to anyone. It's a much friendlier place than it used to be. I hope this spirit of camaraderie continues after the fitness challenge is over.

Oh, I forgot to mention how my team did in the 'walk around the building' at work. I wasn't that keen on participating, because I always get a lot of exercise on Thursdays. I had this plan to walk with whoever was the slowest member of our team and have a nice relaxing time. The first part of the plan was a success - I was with the slowest member of the team. The relaxing part didn't come to fruition. My team members lead the way around the building, so there was I, keeping up with them. I wish I had longer legs! Still, it was fun and we managed to win the challenge comfortably.