Treadmill Workout

I was out of town this weekend visiting my daughter at college for “Parents Weekend”. I hadn’t planned on getting any workouts in, so I didn’t bring any workout clothes (or shoes).

However, I had two hours to kill on Saturday morning in the hotel. They had a fitness room, so I put on my pajama shorts, some socks, and a t-shirt and headed down to check it out. Luckily, noone else was in there. I would have been embarrassed to have anyone see me working out in my PJ’s!

They had a treadmill. I’ve actually never run on a treadmill before, so despite my stocking feet, I hopped on. I set it for a pace of 10 and warmed up. The pace felt a little hard.

After about 5 minutes, I pushed the pace down to 9. That felt really hard. I was breathing heavy and starting to sweat. I decided to try and keep it up for 15 minutes. The really cool thing was that as I ran, I kept trying to figure out ways to make that pace feel easier. I think it did feel easier as I experimented with my stride. I’ve tried that sort of thing before, while running on the road. And, on the road, I think I ended up just slowing down to make the pace feel easier! But on the treadmill, there is no slowing down as the belt keeps moving under your feet at exactly a pace of 9.

I was really having fun with this, so I went another 15 minutes. This time, I would set the pace down to 8 for a minute. Then down to 7 for a minute. Then back up to 9 until I felt comfortable. I repeated that until the second 15 minutes was up.

After that was done, my feet hurt so I stopped. I now have more blisters on my feet from running without shoes! Well worth it, tho, as I have discovered the incredible value of a treadmill workout. I need to get one!

Hmmmm…I spent some time yesterday researching treadmills. Basically the cheap ones are no good for intense running workouts. They aren’t sturdy enough, and some only go up to 6 mph (I can already run at 6mph). Most models go up to 10 mph, which would be fine for ‘practicing the pace’, but would limit speed workouts. Only a few go up to 12 mph. Most articles I read say you really need to spend $1500 to get a good one. I’ll check craigslist for good deals every once in a while, but otherwise will have to put this on my ‘wish list’.

My research indicated that the following two treadmills are best value for home users:

Sole F80 Treadmill & Sole F85 Treadmill

Here are some good links on Treadmill reviews:

http://www.the-fitness-motivator.com/treadmill-buying-tips.html
http://www.the-fitness-motivator.com/treadmill-running.html
http://www.treadmill-ratings-reviews.com/articles/articles.htm
http://www.treadmill-ratings-reviews.com/info/tread_features.htm