Week 4, Day 2 and a shopping spree!

As I planned, yesterday was Week 4 Day 2 and I used the distance option on the treadmill (i.e. run for 1/2 mile rather than 5 minutes). The reason I switch back and forth is so that I'm not unprepared either way when it comes to race time...which is a 5K on March 13th, by the way. More coming on my race schedule for this year in another post. In the past, I have trained by mileage, assuming that if I could run 2 miles I could run 3 (or 5). It worked, but I was sucking wind a bit because I was running for a much longer time period than I was used to. I also don't want to train solely on time, because I'm quite slow and I wouldn't be prepared for the distance.

Anyway, enough technical talk. In honor of making it through 4 successful weeks of my new running program (this is a huge deal for me), I decided to reward myself with a few new items. Most exciting, new sneakers! I rock the Brooks Glycerin 8, which are a bit pricy but totally worth it. I went to a running store last spring and took the time to have my instep, gait, arch, etc looked at. Turned out I was totally normal and average, but the sneakers were awesome so I'm glad I went! This time around I got the same model, different color (I have purple ones now). Here they are...pretty snazzy, yeah?

Then I decided to treat myself to some compression socks to see if they'll help with my shin/calf pain. They are SUPER sexy. Probably going to wear them to bed because they're just that sexy. (It's the arrow, I'm pretty sure of it.)

 

I also decided to make some smart reflective purchases, because I tend to run when it's dark out and I also tend to wear dark colors (duh, I'm fat). So I got some reflective arm bands and a reflective wrist pouch thingy. I got to thinking that if I were to get hit by a car or collapse or pass out or something, no one would know who I am! So the wrist pouch is to put a little note in with my name and who to call in case of an emergency.
 

 

So now I'm waiting for my new presents to arrive, and pondering how I'm going to come up with the arm space required to hold my iPod holder, watch, arm bands and wrist bands. I'm starting to look quite ridiculous...