Week 10: September 11
Total Mileage planned: 36
Mileage complete: 40.9
This was a high mileage week for me, with some quality workouts. At the beginning of the week I was riding the high of Sunday's run - now don't get me wrong, I was sore from it; but it had just gone so well that it set a good tone for the week. Monday consisted of a restful morning, and then an Orange theory class with Kasey after work. It was a power day which meant plenty of all outs and a TON of rowing; we totaled over 2000 yds by the end of class.
The alarm went off Tuesday morning and 6 am had arrived WAY too early. I pulled on my running gear and headed to Kasey's house for our run. I totaled 4 miles and it seemed like my legs got heavier with every step. So we kept it easy on a familiar route, and the 4 miles slipped by. After work I had my first swim class that was not a tryout, and it was much more enjoyable than the previous session. I did not feel the need to push quite as hard as I had the first night, so I got through the class with a more comfortable effort level. The class focused on back stroke, which is also much better for me from a breathing standpoint.
On Wednesday I was pleasantly surprised to not be insanely sore from swimming, as was the case after the tryout, so I made plans to meet Kasey and Sophie, my brothers girlfriend, to do a track workout. When I got out of work we headed to the track only to find that there was a game going on, so we opted to just do a few miles on the roads. This was Sophie's last run since she was staying with us last winter, but she rocked it! She doesn't know it yet, but my cousin Jen and I are actively trying to t̶r̶i̶c̶k̶ convince her to join us for the Light Side Half in Disney next April. After the run we headed out for dinner, as it was Tom's 21st birthday, and you gotta make time for events such as that, even when you're training for a marathon.
I woke up feeling good Thursday morning, but was greeted with a wall of humidity when I stepped outside. I guess I was starting to take the pseudo fall we have been having for granted! I headed to Kasey's house and we got in a few easy miles together, then I decided to challenge myself for my last solo mile, and managed to get the pace down to an 8:20, which is fast for me. I spent the rest of my day mentally preparing myself for the swim class I was heading to that night. While I really do enjoy the class so far it is a huge challenge for me and is very outside of my comfort zone, so I get a little anxious for it throughout the day as the time to jump into the pool approaches. Thursdays class turned out to be much harder than Tuesdays had been, with an emphasis on drills related to breaststroke. We worked on rotating our bodies correctly, breathing, and putting all of the necessary movement together. EXHAUSTING!!! When I got home I happily went to bed early.
Then finally came Friday, dear, sweet, Friday. One thing that I learned this training cycle is that I love doing track workouts on Friday mornings, it gets me excited for the day and the potential of the weekend. Track workouts also tend to give me the biggest sense of accomplishment, so that alone is a great note to start the day with. Dad wasn't feeling well, so I was flying solo for this one. I headed out into the neighborhood to get my two mile warm-up done, and to talk myself into being okay with heading to the track alone solo - I don't particularly like running alone ever since an incident in May when I had some creep flash and then follow me while running, so I was not thrilled to be in one place (the track) alone, for so long. But I reminded myself that there would be plenty of people around, as the track is at a school and I was running as students were heading to class. I got down to business when I got to the track. My training schedule called for 400/800/1600/800/1600, with some recovery between each, all done between a 7:45 - 8:00 min/mi. The run home was my cool-down. A hard workout, but I got it done. Just like the day before humidity had decided to come out to play, so that was a bummer. Where is my fall weather!?
Saturday I had planned to take a rest day, but Jennie asked if I wanted to join her for a few miles, so we headed to the boardwalk at the beach for three miles. It was warm, but the wind was kickin to cool us down. We had fun, chatting and joking around, and before I knew it the three miles were over.
The last run I had planned for the week was a race - the New York Road Runner's 18 mile marathon tune-up. This race consists of three loops of central park, which has a lot more elevation gain than I usually find in my day to day runs (at home, I get about 12 ft of elevation on average, and at the tune up I totaled 942 ft). Overall, the long run went well - Check back later this week for a write up of this event!
Another week closer to the NY marathon, it is going to be here in no time!
Even with this race approaching, I am already looking at future runs - what races do you have on your radar for this spring? How are you going to prepare for it?