First day of marathon training and a truly green monster...

Night shift really kicks my bootay!  I work 3 - 12 hour shifts so I pretty much prize sleep over computer time. I really wanted to blog about my first day of marathon training and my first official run outside.  It was on Monday and  it was pretty darn fun.  I know not every run will feel like this and I'll probably be writing about how difficult it is becomming but forget that for a momment.  I FELT GREAT!!

Here's a little pic from my phone.  This is what I saw when I started my run and the view when I finished.  Southeast Alaska has been unseasonably warm right now so I totally took advantage of the opportunity and ran outside.  All I can say is, why haven't I been doing this all along?!

Overall my first run outside was pretty positive. The day was beautiful.  I admit I was having doubts and my "morning" (I was awake at 2p...I work at 6:30p) wasn't going so smoothly.  I couldn't find my arm band for my iPhone, I worried about what to eat prior to running, I wasn't sure what to wear to not look too dorky and then my running play list dissapeared off my phone and my garmin was overwhelming me at the momment.  Why I let all of this get to me....I'm still not sure.  That being said, I suited up and did a quick warm up on the eliptical and then headed out.  I think what excited me the most was that I am actually at a point where I can run for 3 miles and not stop.  I felt like a runner for the first time.  Not that putting in all the hours on the treadmill isn't running but it felt pretty darn cool to be out there, bundled up in the cold weather and going for a run.  So, as you can see from my dailymile widget, I'm sure as heck not a fast runner, in fact I'm sure speed walkers are faster than me but I was out there.  I'm just giddy right now and pretty darn proud of myself. 

Me after my first outside run....red faced and still smiling!

The whole day after felt awesome on top of it.  Everything was better, even my dang Green Monster was actually GREEN!!!  No swamp water for me!  The only thing I've noticed is that I sure do feel my knees a lot more when I ran outside vs. running indoors on a treadmill.  We have an indoor track here and I was thinking of running on that when the weather is truly yuck and seeing how that feels vs the treadmill vs outside.