Zenaida Arroyo

Can you believe today is my 100th day of my running streak?  I can hardly believe it myself.  No way did I think it would go this long.  How much longer will I keep doing it?  Who knows. 

Monday was the last day in November and I ran 2.67 miles.  I was supposed to do 4 but it was very windy and the wind wore me out.  I did some quick math and knew that I’d met my goal to run more miles than I did in October.  I ended up with 104.71 miles.

The most exciting thing happened on Wednesday.  So for the past 9 weeks I have been training for a 5k.  My goal was to finish it in 33:30.  I’ve had some great workouts and have done much better than expected (i.e., I’ve run 3 miles without stopping and have done many runs with negative splits.) 

My coach had set up my 5k race for Saturday.  Last week on Sunday we talked about it more and while I was excited about it, I was also nervous.  What if I didn’t meet my goal?  I was also worried about the wind.  Well, at that point I couldn’t worry about it too much since there was nothing I could do about it.  I was running 3.10 miles on Saturday no matter what.

Fast forward to Wednesday and I went out for my run.  I was supposed to run a progressive run of 3 miles with the first mile between 11:30-11:45 pace.  I didn’t feel like I was going that “fast” but when I looked at my watch I was running at a 10:30 pace.  It wasn’t cold nor windy.  I kept going and just went with the flow.  I finished my first mile in 10:37.  It was faster than I was supposed to but kept going.  Halfway through the second mile I was in the 10:20s.  I had to make a decision.  Could I keep running at this pace?  Could I run 3.10 miles in 33:30 or faster?  There was only one way to find out.  I kept going.   I finished mile 2 in 10:30.  Mile 3 is when it started to feel hard.  I wanted to stop just for a few seconds.  But I was so close and while I was breathing hard and it was feeling hard, I kept running.  I finished mile 3 in 10:19 which is the fastest mile in this training cycle.  I had programmed my regular 3 mile run in my Garmin with the specified paces, so of course it stopped at the end of mile 3.  I stopped running and then pressed the resume button to run .10 miles.  Finally done!  Finish time is 32:22.  I had met my goal!!!  I was so happy and could not believe it.  By then it was about 8am so I had to quickly get home to shower and get ready for school.  It wasn’t until later in the day that it really hit me what I had done.  My PR is 29:48 from May 2011.  I have never trained for a 5k and while it wasn’t an official PR nor an actual race, I am very pleased with how I did.

So what’s next?  Train for a 10K.  My PR is 1:04:02 from September 2010.  My coach told me my goal will be around 1:05-1:06.  Excited to see how I do!

In the school department, Friday afternoon I found out I got a new student.  She is a transfer from a GE classroom in my school.  You can just imagine how I felt that day.  I was annoyed and frustrated, but mostly angry.  I cannot believe that a District will allow that many students in a classroom.  It may be fine during a regular school year (one year I had 29), but definitely NOT during virtual learning.  There are just so many other things I want to say and write here (I am sure you can imagine), but I will not because, well, it won’t be appropriate.

Saw a cute friend this morning while out on my run.  🙂

Linking up with Kim and Deborah for the Weekly Run Down.

How is it that it is already Sunday and I am going back to work tomorrow?  I worked Monday and Tuesday and then was off the rest of the week.  It was lovely!  My mom was here so it was nice to spend time with her.  I watched a few episodes of The West Wing (I need to hurry up because they won’t be available after December 24th).  Thanks to Janelle’s Holiday Gift Ideas post,  I signed up for a one month free trial of Audibles and am listening to A Promised Land by Barack Obama.  I love Barack’s voice!  So far I am liking it.

We got a little bit of snow this week.  Not a big deal.  Let’s hope we don’t get more of that ugly, white stuff.  I don’t like snow at all.  I hate it. 

It was another good week of running.  I did all of my runs and hit the required paces.  Saturday morning it was cold (for me) and I struggled during my 3 mile run.  I was feeling a bit more tired than usual.  Sunday was a little cold too with some wind.  I ran almost 5 miles.  I did good but the wind wore me out.

Next Saturday is when I will “race” and run my own 5k.  The goal is to finish it in 33:30.  I think it is doable but a part of me is also nervous and scared.  Since I began training for the 5k, the closest I’ve come to that goal was on 11/6 when I finished in 34:24.  Prior to that it was 34:40 on 10/29.

Thanksgiving was very low key.  My mother made pozole and my sister and nephew came over for lunch.  They stayed a few hours and left after 6pm.  It was very different than previous years.  I am sure that’s how it will be for Christmas too.

My goal for November was to run more miles than October (103.71).  As of today I have run 102.03 miles.  I am pleased that I will make that goal.  So far total for this year is 754.45 miles.  In 2019 I finished the year with 730.71 miles.  I had a rocky start to 2020 with running but it has been going so well these past few months.  Excited for 2021!

I had lunch with my students on Tuesday.  Only 5 girls showed up.  I was happy but also a little disappointed because I thought more students would show up.  I mean, it’s not like they had to be somewhere else for lunch.  The girls and I had a good time anyway.  I was thinking that maybe I could have lunch with them on a weekly or bimonthly basis.  Maybe it could be a reward for those that do the assignments, participate, behave in class, etc.  I need to think about it some more.

Linking up with Kim and Deborah for the Weekly Run Down.

How is it that the days/weeks are going by so fast?   Every day it is the same routine.  Get up, drink coffee, go run, and start work.  As much as I am tired of working from home, gosh, I am also saving so much time and money.  

This week I got my new watch.  I thought the paces were off in my 225 so I ordered the 235 from Amazon.  It turns out the paces were correct.  This new watch gives me new features such as race predictors, run indoors, and VO2 Max.  I love the color too.  Not sure how accurate the race predictors are but they gave me hope for some nice PRs next year.

This week I had some easy runs along with a mix of half mile intervals and another progressive run.  Oh and I ran 4.8 miles on Friday for my birthday.  It was actually warm on Friday and I even ran in shorts.  In previous years it’s either been cold or I’ve run in the snow.  My coach left it up to me to do whatever workout I wanted to do.  I just chose to run easy and by feel.  

Today’s 4.5 miles went well.  It wasn’t cold and I did get a little too warm.  These past few days I’ve noticed some tightness in my chest which is mostly likely due to anxiety.  I’ve never had this happen to me.  At least I don’t remember.  Let’s hope I can relax and take it easy this week.

Of course this does not help.

Just want to share these pictures because it makes me smile.  I rarely see them together because Lola cannot stand Mateo.  She is always growling and hissing when he comes near her.

Oh and no school drama.  Whew, what a relief.  I kept reminding my students that we only have school on Monday and Tuesday and then we will be off the rest of the week for Thanksgiving.  They had asked me if one day we could have lunch together.  Isn’t that sweet?  So, that is what we will be doing on Tuesday.  We will have lunch together, watch a movie, and play some games.

That is all for this week. The most exciting things were my new watch and my birthday!

If you have not entered my birthday giveaway, do it right now.   There will be one prize for a $48 gift card to one of the following stores: Zappos, Dunkin’ Donuts, Running Warehouse, Amazon, or Starbucks.

Please use the Rafflecopter below to enter.  This giveaway will run until November 24 at 11:59 pm.  The winner will be selected on November 25th. The giveaway is open to US residents only.  All entries are verified, so please be sure to complete them or a new, random winner will be selected.  GOOD LUCK!!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Linking up with Kim and Deborah for the Weekly Run Down.