Last night a wave of freezing cold rain rolled in. I slept poorly because my windows kept rattling. I dragged myself out of bed to go to the race this morning. It was still raining pretty hard and the streets were flooded. Only about 8 people showed up at the bar for this race. It was a little 2 mile fun run and party at a local bar. The race seemed perfect for me because I can't quite run a full 5k yet. Anyway noone wanted to run in the rain (the weather really was quite nasty), so we all did a lap around the bar and took a picture in front of the finish line sign. Then they gave us breakfast sandwiches and cocktails.

The irony is not lost on me. I wanted to shape up and start running again so I signed up for a race. Then I end up eating greasy food and drinking. It was a fun morning though, so I can't complain. Also the money went to support the charities of a local couple running the NYC marathon tomorrow. I wished them luck and they seemed to appreciate us showing up. I thought it was funny that they were drinking cocktails at the bar the day before the marathon. They were like "I put the training in, it's all done at this point".

I intended to re-do W6D3 tonight but only got threw 1.5 miles. It was a very chilly and windy night and I failed to dress warmly enough. I also needed to stop and tie my shoe around 0.5 miles. My calves tightened up a lot and I lost steam.

Anyway, I put myself on a very strict 2 week whole foods vegan diet. I need to move the scale. I plan to keep running but my progress may stall a bit, which I am alright with.

Sooo.... I haven't been running for 3 days. Yesterday I went to visit my sister who lives in another city and the whole day was spent traveling and hanging out with her. That was a somewhat valid excuse, but today my excuse is that I have a headache, the weather is terrible (rain, 99% humidity, 50ºF) and I'm really tired from traveling yesterday, which shouldn't really stop me. Tomorrow I'm finishing C25k no matter what, even if there's a hurricane and I've broken both my legs, I can't keep a longer break than 4 days or else I'm risking losing the progress I've made.

Beachy160, thank you! I love your new picture! I need to find myself a new one and I should probably get a ticker as well. I agree with dressing being hard this time of year, I have the option of either being really cold for the first third of the program or being a human fountain of sweat in the last third! I'm not a huge fan of those options, but I usually opt for cold first and comfortable later.

Good job completing week 4 and being half way through the program! You go girl! I've noticed some days are just harder than others for no apparent reason, and I'm sure you'll kick week 5's butt! I'm sorry about the calf/shin issues, I hope that's going to get better when you get back to your usual running schedule. Week 5 was seriously intimidating to me, but it turned out to be the most fun week up until that point when I did it because I noticed it was a lot more fun to just run without thinking about stopping. The whole program starts feeling a lot shorter at that point too, because there aren't a lot of intervals.

Good luck avoiding the bad carbs and alcohol! I have a much easier time avoiding alcohol and a harder time avoiding bad carbs. Teach me how you do it!

Scarlett, I agree with Beachy: at least you were ready and did everything you could. I also agree with her that it sounds like my kind of race! I also think it is pretty funny they were drinking the day before the marathon. I drink maybe 2 times a year, but I already managed to make the mistake of drinking just a few drinks (I get drunk really easily) and the run the next day was a lot harder! Then again, they are probably more seasoned than I am.

We have one more thing in common for two weeks. I'm a vegan! Although I'm not strictly whole foods, because then I couldn't get all those tasty bad carbs!

Have a great week everyone!

hello all! Need to get caught up, did my jog Sunday, did 31, I am the tortoise slow and steady. Glad to see you're still at, I can really feel it in my abs, must have something to do with the breathing, I guess. Ok I have some reading to do here.

Going to try and get out today, might be the last nice day for awhile!

Best to all

I completed W7D1 tonight. I went out around 5:30pm and the sky was already pitch black. The shorter days make running more difficult. I decided to complete the run by time and jogged around a local well lit park. After barely running 1.5 miles on Sunday, I could have gone longer than 25 min tonight. I felt really great running. I find it amazing how much the progress varies from day to day.

I started my strict whole foods vegan diet on Sunday and have stuck to it perfectly so far. I’m going to try and keep it up through Friday the 21st. I really need to drop some pounds; I can barely zip up my winter coat. Then on the 22nd I signed up for a big local Thanksgiving 5 mile run with over 1000 runners/walkers. I will definitely need to walk some of it but I plan to indulge at the after party.

Beachy great job pushing though W4D3

RunningWild Good luck with graduating!!! Also I’m not vegan, I’m just on a vegan diet at the moment. I don’t eat a lot of meat though and believe the vegan diet is much healthier.

hello all!

Got 31 minutes in last night, just before dark, I'm still doing the 5 minutes warm up and walk after. I'm getting in a little over 2 miles jogging, that's why I don't like to call it running

Great job Scarlett on the vegan diet and the running. Last night I felt sore and didn't think I could do it, but kept telling myself I did it a couple times already, then I kind of broke through and felt like "no problem".

Best to all

Life decided to test if I was serious about what I said yesterday. It didn't break my legs, but it decided I needed to start a new job on my final day of C25k. I wasn't excited about running 30 minutes before getting to work but I did it! I finished C25k! I decided to get a new avatar to celebrate, but like with your avatar Beachy, the only similarity is the hair.

My new job consists of sitting in front of my computer 8 hours a day (I work from home), so it's not really exhausting, but I haven't worked for a year and a half and had really gotten used to being lazy.

kelijpa, I'm glad to see you're still running! I jogged 2.2 miles in my 30 minutes, so we seem to have about the same pace; slow and steady wins the race! I'll be working on speed for now until I get closer to the actual 3.1 miles you're supposed to be able to do in half an hour.

Scarlett, WTG on W7D1! I'm also still amazed by how the progress varies and there's really no good indicator to determine how well a run is going to go. Some days I feel really excited about going for a run and end up really beat up by the time I'm done, and some days I feel like I'd rather just go back to bed and end up having a great run instead. Great job staying on plan, you definitely deserve to lose some pounds as active as you've been! I hope the weather is nicer to you on your Thanksgiving event than it was during the previous event.

Beachy160, I like your hair! I actually get lots of protein from tofu and nuts, but I'm addicted to soda so I get my fair share of bad carbs too! Unfortunately almost all of them are vegan. At least I've been able to keep them to weekends only, but I need to stop drinking them completely.

I don't think I could've completed the program by distance, and I don't usually pay any attention at all to the distance I travel just the time I spend jogging. I read through this entire thread while I did the first few weeks of C25k, which is why I only started posting by week 4 or something. It's really what inspired me to keep going the first few weeks, and especially AwShucks who was the first in this thread to run W5D3! Her posts really inspired me and reassured me I should at least give it my best. You can read her post here:

2014 - C25K - We're all runners! - Page 2 - There are some other week 5 ladies around those same pages if you need further motivation. It's of course a lot more important to listen if your body says stop than it is to finish some run! At least then you can try again when you feel more ready, and I don't consider it cheating to stay healthy.

I'm so sorry you've had such a rough week. I hope things get better for you!

Congrats Running on the new job and on finishing C25K!!!

I’m supposed to get called about scheduling an interview for a job I really want soon (actually waiting for the phone call is stressing me out ). We really would be twinnies if this works out and I start a new job as well Hopefully you’ll still hang around the thread until the rest of us graduate.

Beachy you’re making great progress!!!

After 2 days off I tried W7D2. I barely got through 15 min. The very windy/nasty weather probably contributed to my struggles. The good news is today is day 6 of my strict vegan diet and I lost 7 pounds so far. I checked off another sig box. I stayed perfectly on plan. I needed this after a bad week with the drinking and Halloween candy. In the past, I remember strict dieting really took the wind out of my sails with regards to running. Therefore, this isn’t surprising. I’m just trying to do what I can on the running trail and stick to my diet.

I've been completely without motivation again, and haven't run since Wednesday. I need to get back on track tomorrow before it's too late!

Beachy, congratulations on the 20 minutes!!! You go girl! I've seen all the Rocky movies so I know what you're talking about. You did an amazing job on W5D3!!

I'm doing well, just being lazy again and not finding any motivation to run, but that's not really an excuse. As for my hair, I was actually blonde as a kid but then it turned dark brown, so there's that. The jury's still out on whether I'm nuts. Your posts always make me laugh out loud, so my neighbors probably already think I am.

Scarlett, 7 pounds, amazing!! I hope you get that call for the interview soon, and that you get the job too! Good luck! I'll definitely stick around, but finding motivation to run after graduating has been hard. I need to give myself a good kick in the butt tomorrow and get back out there! I'm not going to challenge life again, I don't need more obstacles.

You're all doing so great! I'm happy to see I'm the only one who's been slacking around here.

I ran for 15 min today. I got my heart rate up and broke a sweat. I'm on day 8 of 20 with this vegan diet. It's been a struggle to stay on it. I've been craving meat like crazy, chicken wings, pulled pork, hot dogs, etc. I really need to drop some weight. I feel uncomfortable at this weight and don't want to feel insecure over the Holidays. I'd love to be in ONEderland by Christmas. The running is sort of a catch 22. The calorie deficit drains my energy for running but I know I will be able to run much easier being 10-15 pounds lighter.

Beachy: I've seen the Rocky movies too. I went to college in PA with a bunch of people from Philly. Needless to say I know people who saw Rocky 6 in the Theater. Congrats on the 20 min run!!!!

Running: Glad you're sticking around!

I managed to run 30 minutes today, even with the 5 day break. I got really light headed by the end and felt like I might pass out, but I only had about two minutes left to run so I decided to keep going.

Scarlett, thanks! I agree with Beachy, you're doing a really great job running while sticking to your plan! I also see you've checked off another box in your signature, way to go!

Beachy160, thank you! I'm going to try to stick to three days a week like I did originally (Monday, Wednesday and Friday), but if that doesn't work out I can always go for the "Masters Degree" like you said. I "ran" 3.6 km or 2.25 miles today so I actually improved a bit, it may be because I picked a completely new route on a whim and it was much more interesting with some new scenery. The weather was also OK-ish at 40ºF and 90% humidity, so that probably helped too.

Good luck with W6D1 tomorrow, Beachy! Hope everyone has a great week!

rebelle thank you and welcome to the C25k thread! You're quite far along already, congratulations on completing the last day of intervals and good luck with W6D3!

I completed another 30 minute run today, I actually only" ran" 2.1 miles today because the weather was horrible. I woke up and saw the sun shining through the window behind the curtains and thought it would be an excellent day to run, but when I looked outside I noticed there was a pretty thick mist from the humidity. It was 39 degrees and 100% humidity and I was sweating like crazy, but at least I didn't get lightheaded this time.

Today I completed another 30 minute run, I managed to "run" 2.2 miles again today because the weather was a bit better. I chose a really terrible route though, with the first half being downhill and the second half of course all uphill! I'm also considering ditching the C25k app and slowly adding some distance instead, maybe 2.5 miles until I can do that in 30 minutes, which is probably a year from now.

rebelle, WTG on W7D1!!! I, too, associate humidity with hot weather. I guess we're not cut out to be meteorologists! I'm taking it easy during the weekend as planned and running again on Monday, I think I'm going to try the 2.5 mile route I mapped out earlier. This should be interesting, I think I'll like going for distance instead of worrying about time. I'll know exactly when I get to stop, and that's when I get to the finish line.

Hi all,

Just wanted to check in and say I didn't give it up yet
Yesterday I jogged for 40 and managed to continue on up the hill, I told myself if this is the last time I get outside , so I pushed it and even though I'm so slow, I did it!

hope everyone is doing well, I'll read up and get caught up.

eit to add:
RunningWild on completing the program, not sure if you're still using the zenlabs C25k app, I did notice that I have to leave it open or it doesn't update, I saw you posted about it not updating during a call.

I use runkeeper now, she "talks" every 5 minutes, so that works for me, you can set it to tell you distance and pace as well, sometimes I turn that off and just listen for the time, like if I'm walking and listening to a podcast.

best to all