It's taken 8 months of strength training and limiting myself to 4 x 30 minute runs per week when injury pain would allow to actually start on the Foundation Program. I suppose I could have started sooner but each time I tried to push myself during that period with hill sprints or strides I'd experience another injury flare up and knew that something just wasn't right with my technique. I wanted to start when I knew that I'd be able to see it through.
I still have some lingering foot niggles but nothing that's actually getting worse with running.
When I did the 2 tests I was surprised to see that I wasn't off the chart in terms of speed (8.10 for the one mile test) but nearly for heart rate, just snuck in at the 150 average for the 20 minute test.
Now I'm 2 weeks into the Foundation program and really enjoying it. Love the variety and the challenge of it.
The long day 6 run feels kind of odd and a bit like prancing. I find myself speeding up every time I see another runner, no matter how fast they're going! But even after 2 weeks I can already see that I've improved slightly week on week - lower average HR, higher average pace, average cadence better and stride length about the same all while adding another 15 minutes in length.
I'm curious to see what kind of runner I can become with good run form and a solid training program. Feels good to be excited by running again!
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