Couch to 5k. (153.6)

I will never deny that I'm naturally a pretty lazy person, but I've always secretly liked exercising when I force myself to do it regularly. Anything outdoors is my favorite, particularly if it allows me to listen to music at the same time and doesn't require a lot of concentration, so this program is essentially perfect for me - listen to the music, wait for the podcast to tell me when to start and stop, and enjoy the scenery.

This will be the third time I start C25K, and I'm planning on making it the first time I finish it. The first time I started it was years ago, when I still lived in Pennsylvania, and I stopped after the first day because it was harder than I expected. The second time was last year in Minnesota, and I stopped at week four or five because I found out I was pregnant. This time will require a little more planning than either of those times - I can only do it when my husband is here to watch the baby, and since I'm breastfeeding, I have to make sure that the kid is fed before I leave and that I'm home before he needs more food. Still, it's doable.

I actually did the first two days last week, and they went a lot better than I expected. I had no pain at my c-section incision, and I actually seemed to have retained a little bit of the fitness I gained last time. The previous two times I started, my lungs and heart were absolutely raging by the end of each 60-second interval (how embarrassing is that?). This time I wasn't even breathing hard until the sixth or seventh interval. It surprised the hell out of me, honestly. I did seem to feel it a lot more in my muscles than I ever did before, though. I'm not sure if that's because I barely moved from the couch while I was pregnant or because my neighborhood is jam-packed with hills, but by the last interval it felt like I had a pair of the proverbial concrete galoshes. Beats feeling like my heart is going to smash through my sternum, though, so if I traded a little muscle for some cardiovascular fitness over the last nine months, I'm okay with that.

Anyway, I'm restarting the first week today because I'd like to go to a new venue and I want to be able to track progress evenly. Running (well, walking with energetic bursts of slow-motion jogging, really) around my neighborhood is terribly convenient and all, but it's full of steep hills (not great for starting out) and I have to run on pavement, which isn't fun. Plus gangs of shifty-looking hoodlums tend to congregate on the corners in the evening when I run, and that's slightly nerve-wracking. Tonight I'm planning on going on base (husband is in the Navy, so I get access to cool military stuff) and using one of the tracks there. It's flat and dirt, so it'll be nicer to run on, and frankly I'd sooner feel self-conscious in front of doofy Army recruits with cool hats than sketchy thugs in ill-fitting jeans.