Taking my own advice

Week 4 is over - I missed not only Thursday's, but Saturday & Sunday's work outs on top of it! That puts me up to missing 7 out of 12 workouts in the last 2 weeks.

After being the girl that only missed 1 run and 1 cross-training day for the whole of the NCRC Running program last July-September (5 days/week)...it's really tough to see that life is finally catching up to me.

I keep telling C:
"Don't be so hard on herself, you can eat more than 1700 calories, you can gain a few pounds, you can miss a few workouts. Just don't let it derail your whole program...realize you're going to have these moments, days, or weeks. Just pick up and start again with renewed zeal."

OK, not that eliquent, but you know where I'm going with this...and it's OH SO HARD to take my own advice! Here we go - it's the beginning of week 5.
I'm going to work that much harder to lose the 3 lbs I gained over the past 2 weeks...I AM going to get my excitement for working out back! Tonight! :-)

Week 3 + Snow = Messing up my training!!

My training plan was screwed up a bit by the snow this past week (missed a 3 mile run, bike/run brick, and 1200m swim). Oh well, can't dwell on that too much! And I know I shouldn't try to "make it up" because I could cause more harm than good, but I really really want to try!

My personal & work schedule is making it so that I have to improvise and double up some nights...cycling class and then a swim are my favorites so far. I really need to try cycle class and then a run. I know that would be MUCH harder (and not half as relaxing), but it's just sooo hard to run on those stupid treadmills!

Speaking of which, I was invited by a friend of mine, "C" to go work out with her at her gym last night! We had a nice time talking and people watching - all while the treadmill tried (in multiple attempts) to kill me.

Reminder to self: don't put it on a program if you don't know what it's going to do. I'm warming up at an easy level 3.4, swift walk...next thing I know, it's jumped straight to 6.8!! WTF, mate?!? This happens a couple of times, and while I should've just canceled the program and started a manual one, I reeeally wanted to know how many calories I'd burned, etc. without trying to remember anything.

I also was able to check out my HR to see where I was at my peak running (180), when I felt good and was working pretty hard (165 or 170) and when I was relaxed and cooling down (140). I know that I should probably just get a HR monitor, but I don't want to spend the money and I have NO CLUE which ones are accurate, etc.


Of course, I would LOVE to have one with the great GPS, water proof, the whole 9, but these things are like $400!! Waaay out of my price range!

Garmin Forerunner 310XT ->

Does anyone have suggestions for a good HR monitor that's on the cheaper (but accurate) scale?