Training?... Not So Much

>> Saturday, September 17, 2011

My new job and my new little man have been taking a lot of time lately. Compare my training from the last 5 weeks LAST YEAR to the last 5 weeks THIS YEAR:

Mid Aug - Mid Sept 2010



Mid Aug - Mid Sept 2011


Look especially at those last 3 weeks. It's been nothing but some quick, crammed strength work (I've been known to quick do some of my leg exercises in my office) and a bunch of runs. Nothing else.

Let's look at the total numbers from this 5-week block of time:

2010: Run 133.08 miles
2011: Run 96.58 miles

2010: Swam 29,780 yards
2011: Swam 2,040 yards

2010: 95.79 miles (plus a trainer workout)
2011: 64.05 miles

The biggest difference is the swimming. Last year, Coach Jen had me doing a lot of swimming on active recovery days, and I think she was also using those swims to build / keep up my endurance. My swimming yardage is down so much this year for 2 reasons: (1) I don't like swimming, so if no one is telling me to swim, I won't; and (2) I usually swim in the early AM, but the early AM is my time with Cranky Hank.


There ARE 2 bright spots in my training compared to last year, but they both don't mean a whole lot.

1. Last year, I "logged" about 9 hours of walking the entire year. This August alone, I logged 13 hrs 21 mins walking Henry! While that doesn't do much for my training, I think it does help my weak heel and butt - the extra easy walking builds up some strength in those areas.

2. Last year I had 4 hrs 21 mins of strength / core-work over these 5 weeks, and this year I have 8 hrs 49 mins of strength / core-work! The Y is close to where I teach, so if I have 30 minutes to spare between a meeting and class, I sometimes go quick bang out a core session. That doesn't help my running TOO much, but it DOES help a little.


So here's why my new job has been keeping me from training. Our darkroom at CVA has just moved. Over the summer, we totally re-worked a space to make some great labs. We (meaning non-contractors) FINALLY got into the space 8 days ago on Friday. I've been working in the labs ever since to make it ready for students this upcoming week because they are ready to process film and make enlargements.

One week ago, the B&W darkroom had no enlargers in it, and it was stacked floor-to-ceiling with boxes that I needed to be unpacked and I needed to find / make a new home for them:


I couldn't even get to within 10 feet of that
far wall because there was so much stuff!

After putting in close to 70 hours in the darkroom since last Friday NOT INCLUDING TEACHING MY CLASSES or working on files at home (really!!), the darkroom looked like this last night:


One of my work-study students doing a final scrub of the sinks
(notice some enlargers put in along the back wall with coverings over them)


A peek into the cleaned-out enlarger carrols before the enlargers were put in

(If these photo things get you a little excited, then we could probably be friends. Also, keep an eye on my Photo Blog for a whole lot of photos that will be going up shortly!)

So if I were one to make excuses, this darkroom work would be my excuse for my lack of training lately. :)

Back with some notes on recent training runs shortly! Happy weekend, everyone!

5 comments:

Kat 6:40 PM, September 17, 2011  

Yup, this gets me excited - guess we can be friends!

I taught photography to grades 7 & 8 for three years - two years as an after school program for at-risk kids and one year as an elective. I really enjoyed it!

Kate 9:04 PM, September 17, 2011  

Ooooo! Yes~ Very excited. I miss my time in the dark room.

Rina 11:06 PM, September 18, 2011  

Hi, Steve, I found your blog recently and just wanted to say "hello." I don't normally comment on many blogs, but I was excited to find out that you are also a photographer, which is a passion of mine. I'm only recently coming into the running arena, about 8 months ago, at 250lbs, I started on a weight loss journey that has taken me through an 80lb loss since the birth of my last child (my sixth) and my first 10k run, a few days ago. My dream is to someday run a marathon, and I've been reading a lot of blogs for inspiration and have really enjoyed yours!

Old She dragon 8:15 AM, September 19, 2011  

Wow very nice.
I worked in a photoprinters for 10 years and remember those metal sinks very well. And the pong of hypo too:)
We had one enormous dark room and several small ones .In the big one it was usually the wall that held the print (with magnets) and the enlargers were on the floor ,set on rails. Developing was done using a machine or if it was small enough,it would go though the dev,fix and washes by hand.
Now ,mostly things are digital (I do digital retouching on archive files).

Carolina John 2:29 PM, September 19, 2011  

That's a mighty fine darkroom you got there Steve. Mighty fine.

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