Episode 23 - Wips, Ease and Increasing Mileage

Episode 23 – 9/25/17 Knitting and running in 30 minutes or less

Topics this week include FO, Wips, Out and About, On the Run

FO

Itty Bitty Kitty Preemie Hat test knit from Sarah Jordan, aka Knit Wit.  To fit 2-3lb baby hat worked in Berroco Comfort Sock

Wips

Emerald Deep by Romi Hill – finished charts B & C, started chart D.  Finished that Irish-style lace section I mentioned.  It was lots of fun but you have to place close attention because it’s knit lace on both sides – no rest rows.  Gift for my cousin’s wife for Christmas in Prism Delicato Layers in Kale colorway

Another Itty Bitty Kitty preemie hat, the same test knit pattern in the Maldvies colorway of Berroco comfort sock

Lillesand cowl by Monika Eckhert, working on this in some deep stash, Cascade Yarn’s Sateen in a burgundy-red color and Rozetti Yarns Soft Payette in white with a few sequins for sparkle here and there – got a few more rows done on this cowl for my aunt for Christmas

Hitchiker by Martina Behm in Ito Yarn’s Kinu, 100% silk – still plugging away at this a few rows a week.  It’s my purse knitting

Knitted Knocker in Cascade Ultra Pima – literally just cast this on waiting for my toddler to fall asleep so I can record this show – visit their website at www.knittedknockers.org

Knitting Talk

Fit and Ease

Ease - how much extra room (or lack thereof) do you want in your garment? 

An inch or so of ease will be a fitted garment but the material will not stretch to fit you.  Negative ease, where the material is actually less around than your body, will give you a very fitted garment where the material itself is stretching to fit around your body – think a typical sock.

2-3 inches of you will give you a comfortable fit without feeling fitted. 4 inches or so and we’re getting more into loose-fitting cardigans and approaching boyfriend sweater territory.  Some of the huge boxy sweaters out there these days may have as much as 8 inches of ease to give you that boxy effect.

Out and About

Rhinebeck!  I’m headed to Rhinebeck for the day via the bus from Webs.  Gonna be a long day – I have a grad school reunion at the MFA in Boston the night before then I have to leave my house around 5-5:30am to drive to Webs.

I cannot wait!  The artichoke line was waaaay too long by the time I found it so I hope to grab one of those earlier in the day.  I’ll be at the podcaster meetup, of course, and probably at the Ravelry meetup too.  I’m also hoping to locate the bag check this year – missed it last year, but I’ll have a big ‘ol day pack with me for the bus and car ride.  On the plus side, with a minimum of 4 hours on the bus I should get a bit of knitting done that day!

On the Run

After walking to school for 3 weeks today I started a Galloway-style run-walk-run on the way home and it felt good.  Rolled out my quads, IT bands and solias muscles, which have been cranky with the sudden mileage increase, but they felt OK too.  Will try again in a couple of days.

Mileage Increases – keep it low, keep it slow

As I mentioned last week, I broke one of the cardinal rules of running by suddenly drastically increasing my mileage by walking my son to kindergarten.  That’s an additional 3 miles or so per day for me.  Now, we mitigated this by not walking every single day – we’re averaging about 3 days a week and some days we only walk one way and not the other.   But this is a huge faux pas and something even us veteran runners forget.

If you’re new to running, an important rule to remember is to keep your mileage increases small, no more than 10% increase per week.  This is super important because most injuries are directly linked to increasing intensity or duration of exercise too much too soon.

Now, let’s unpack this statement – this does not mean you should increase your mileage by 10% every week – on the contrary if you look into the data, most folks should be increasing your mileage by a MAXIMUM of 5-10% every OTHER week.  You should also be incorporating rest weeks where you run less than your baseline, or average weekly miles.  The reason for all this is your body needs time to adjust to the changes your asking of it.

Particularly when starting out, don’t plan on increasing mileage or speed any time soon.  Listen to your body.  Take more rest weeks if you need it, or put mile increases off till next week if your body is feeling off.  The whole point is to start running or increase running without injury and that means giving yourself time to adapt.  If you have existing injuries, then you REALLY need to take it slow.  Thinking of starting a couch-to-5k program?  You can plan on repeating the 1st week 3 times to give your chronic issues time to adapt slowly.  Or something I did when I did my marathon training I took the marathon training plan and slowed it down by adding more rest weeks because I knew my body and knew that I had to be careful of asking too much of it too soon.

To sum up – take it slow and stay injury free.