Me: 1, Pavlov: 0

As anyone who has taken Psychology 101 knows, Pavlov was able to condition dogs by ringing a bell when he fed them.  After a short period, the dogs would begin to salivate merely at sound of a bell and thus conditioning.  I too found myself conditioned.  However, I was conditioned to reach for my iPod on my way out the door before every run.  I, however, have fought my conditioning and beat it down.  I went for a run today and was miles away from the house before I realized that I didn’t have my iPod with me.  It felt freeing.

It’s been almost a week with out my iPod and I can’t believe how much I was missing, the trees are greener (well, actually browner) and the sky is bluer (well, it would be if it wasn’t so overcast).  I feel more connected to the running process with my mind open and free.  Jennie asked me the other day what I think about on my runs and I found it hard to explain.  I told her it was almost like dreaming.  My mind bounces around from subject to subject and then when I get home, I can’t remember any of it.  There are times when I am thinking about how my arms are swinging and others were I am focused on my foot falls and still others were my mind completely wanders away from running and to the abstract.

Anyways, enough rambling on about the zen of running iPod-free and on to the rest of my week.

Monday

Monday was a typical swim & run day.  I did 2500 yards in the pool and felt extremely sluggish the entire way.  I just couldn’t get into a groove.  I felt like I was sinking the entire time and couldn’t find good positioning for the life of me.  I wanted to quit earlier, but made myself keep going.  I felt somewhat better using the pull buoy; at least I didn’t feel like I was sinking at that point.

That afternoon, I went on a 6 mile run.  Towards the end of my run, my stomach started to act up.  This hasn’t happened in a couple weeks, but unpleasant nonetheless.  I decided to push through the pain rather than walk.  I have found that despite the feeling, when I get home, it never – how can I put this delicately -  comes to fruition.  I was able to make it the final mile back home without being forces to find a emergency bush; very thankful for that.  It gives me some encouragement that I don’t need to worry about it so much and to just HTFU.

Tuesday

Yesterday, I did 90 minutes on the trainer.  I had hoped to bike outside because the weather was decent, not great, but nice enough to ride outside.  Unfortunately, I got caught up in work and by the time I could break away it was 4:30.  By that time, it would be getting dark within in a half hour.  So, on the trainer it was.  I caught up on some back episodes of This Old House which made the time go by fairly quickly. 

Wednesday (Today)

Today was another swim/run day.  My swim went much better than Monday.  I did a series of 200 yard intervals with some drills totaling 2500 yards. It was busy at the pool today, so I shared a lane the entire time.  At least I shared it with another good swimmer, so it wasn’t too bad.  Then, later in the day, I went out on a 5-6 mile run and ended up doing 8 miles.  It was one of those days where I just felt great the entire way.  I comfortably held an 8 minute pace with the final mile at 7:22.

So far, it has been a great start to the week.  Hopefully the rest of week follows suit.