Wallace Family

I have continued to focus heavily on running the past few months.  I have reached several personal milestones, including having run 55 miles in one week (I did this last week).  I had previously run 50 miles in a week one time, a few weeks ago, but before that I don’t think I had ever even run 40 miles in a single week before. 

What I am most pleased about this milestone though is that I did it without injuring myself or even feeling like I needed to take any time off to recover.  After each long run I perform, I feel basically good to go the next day, which is very much in contrast to how my body used to react to my long runs or when I tried to run a large amount of miles in a single week.  I owe this to the fact that I have started to run using a heart rate monitor and each time I go running I have a specific purpose in terms of what type of workout I am trying to achieve. 

I have finally taken the time to read up on how to take running to a little bit more of a technical and sophisticated level.  I hate to say it, but for the past few years all of my Triathlon training has been all about just going out and running/biking x amount of miles.  A lot of the time and energy I’ve spent in the past years could have been utilized much more wisely if I were paying attention to how hard my body was working and by using something like a heart rate monitor. 

Now that I use a HRM, for the majority of my workouts I am not trying to run hard or fast, and I can make sure I am not exerting too much effort or wearing myself out too much by keeping an eye on what my heart rate is.  It is really such a simple tool but enhances training so much and will let me take my running to a new level.  Of course there are workouts where I purposely train really hard or do a certain amount of miles at my desired marathon pace as well.  All these different types of workouts – with the ‘easy’ runs where I keep my heart rate low – combine to make a weekly routine, reaching a number of miles I don’t think I could have ever done before.  What’s got me the most excited is that by running my ‘long runs’ at an ‘easy’ pace, I am fortifying my cardiovascular system and as time goes on my ‘easy’ pace will gradually become faster and faster all on its own as my cardiovascular system improves and gets stronger.  The goal is that eventually you’ll be able to run very far and very long – say, a marathon – at an ‘easy’ pace that is actually much faster than previous races, but that your body has acclimatized to and is now your new normal easy pace.    

A couple weeks ago I officially received my teaching certification in World and U.S. History.  I have actually been teaching these classes for a year and a half already but it was sort of on an interim license.  I held a teaching endorsement in a related field so the Idaho State Department of Education didn’t make me go back to school and take any additional classes or anything like that, I basically just needed to pass the World and U.S. History Praxis exam and get observed teaching a few times.  I studied really hard for quite a long time, basically studying the history of the world and the entire history of the U.S. to be prepared for this exam.  The test was no joke, I had to really think hard about the questions and rely on what I knew about certain civilizations to help me shed light on other topics I didn’t know the answer to in order to make sure I got a good score.  Luckily, my hard work paid off and I not only passed the exam last year, but am now – finally! – an officially certified History teacher.