So, we’re all tired from yesterday’s and yesterday evening’s activities. Just after writing this entry, I’m hitting the sack. Indigestion kept me awake last night, so I got almost no sleep. Today was a bit of a difficult stretch (pun not intended) for me and I was glad to come home, change, and knock out that 5K. Melissa put her’s to rest this morning at the mall. I’m going to give her a ‘Fanny Pack’ for Valentine’s Day so that she can fit in better with her fellow mall walkers. Shh.
I forgot to mention that while we were out, Walker and I saw one of his Elementary School Teachers: Ms. Comfort. She couldn’t believe that he was 21. It was great seeing her. Honestly, Salk Elementary had the finest group of teachers that I’ve ever known. And I’m not kidding. They were the best. It’s almost as if we individually chose each one for our kids. We and our children were very blessed to have them.
The 5K was good. Today, I decided to walk in the opposite direction to change things up a bit. A few days ago I thought, “I need to go the opposite way to balance out the curves, bumps, and angles.” I don’t want to favor one side of my body over the other, so I went the other way around.
This might have been an error on my part because I got shin splints again because now the right to left angles have been left to right angles, and now the upward inclines are now downward, and I think you get the picture. I started to sound like Willy Wonka with that explanation when he described all the different directions that the Wonkavator could go.
So, I’m dealing with a bit of calf and shin muscle pain. Yes, I stretched but there was enough difference in the paths I took to make it hurt a bit. To relieve the pain, I jog. It helps. I’m finding that I can jog for longer bits now. Initially, I could only jog for maybe 100 paces, but now I can jog the length of an entire block–downhill of course, but still jog.
I think the trick to lessening the possibility of pain is to change up my route more often. I originally changed it daily because I hate repetition. I don’t know if that’s a flaw or a feature, but it is a fact. Sometimes I’ll change my path just before or even during a walk. I used to do the same thing when I mowed our yard. I mowed it different every single time. I’m beginning to think it’s a flaw. I’m not going to dwell on it, but I will note it for future research. Yeah, I’ll get right on that. In the future.
My advice for today is that you should vary your workouts. Change the time of day, change your pace, change your direction, change enough from day to day so that your body doesn’t have time to become accustomed to a routine. Anyone in the physical fitness business will tell you that your body adapts quickly to routines, which actually lowers the effectiveness of your exercise. How about that for some trivia? So, now I’m thinking that the changing my course thing is a positive move rather than a bad thing. Thank you stream of consciousness. I appreciate you.
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5K a Day 2017 