Level Up!

Well, it was sort of a level up, anyway. I moved up to a 3/1 walk/run scheme tonight. It wasn't terribly difficult, as far as the cardio goes, but I did find that my muscles seemed really tired, as though I had been doing squats all night instead of running. Weird.

The "sort of" part comes because my running speed was actually a bit slower than the last time I ran (which was actually last Friday - I didn't miss the ENTIRE rest of the week). I don't feel too bad about that, though, because:

a) As mentioned before, I felt less-than-exhausted at the end of the run

b) I purposefully held myself back a bit, since I was increasing my running time by 50%.
Now that I know I can do this, I'll see if I can boost my speed a bit on Wednesday.
One other thing, though. On my last couple of sets, I pushed myself a little bit more, just to see how I'd do. I finished breathing much more heavily, at 2 paces in/2 out. Just for kicks, I measured my heart rate at the end of those sets, and it was about 164-ish. I did the math for the estimated VO2 max, and it comes out to just under 90%, but it didn't feel that difficult. Maybe that's just because I only sustained it for 15-20 seconds at a time, or maybe my VO2 max heart rate is actually higher than the estimated 187. I should see if I can get that tested sometime - probably after I'm actually running for 30 minutes without taking a break. Or at least a full mile without a break. I haven't decided yet.