After babysitting on Sunday night, I had gotten to bed much later than usual, so when Monday morning came around I had no intention of getting up and running. The weekend had been pretty non-stop, so I wasn’t too concerned about taking a rest day to start the week. My rest days have been pretty fluid lately, not on a set day, but I usually take 1-2 a week. And this week, Monday just felt like the right time.
I texted Mike on Monday night to see if he would be up for a track day on Tuesday morning, and he was on board. Dad agreed to join as well, and Tuesday morning we all met at the track. Dad walked laps while Mike and I warmed up together, but the meat of our workouts were going to be different today. Mike was planning to get in a few maintenance miles, while I needed to get speedwork done. It was going to be a high-mileage week if everything went according to plan, and I was excited to get moving.
Once again, I had three mile repeats to do, with a goal pace of 7:30. Since I am following the Hanson’s marathon method, this would be my last “speed” workout, as after this week track days switch to being “strength” days, and the repeats get longer but the paces get slower. Since I have done this workout a few times lately, I knew it would be hard, but I also knew I was capable. When I took off for the first repeat Mike ran along for about a lap, and then I was on my own. The first repeat clocked in at 7:36, which I was happy with. I was even happier though when it was time for some recovery, and guzzled some water down. Two more repeats, which came in at 7:30 and 7:33, and then the hard stuff was behind me. I said goodbye to Mike, and Dad biked along as I ran back to the apartment.
That night Sophie and I headed in the gym to get in some strength training, since I know that with the traveling that I have coming up soon it will fall off of my list of priorities for a few weeks. We spent about an hour lifting, focusing on arms and core strength.
I toyed around with my schedule for the rest of the week, debating if I wanted to get my tempo run in on Wednesday or Thursday, knowing that I was planning on doing a long run on Saturday rather than Sunday. Ultimately it was raining when I woke up on Wednesday, so I thought maybe I could run after work, but alas- thunderstorms. So Mike and I once again made plans to meet up at the track on Thursday morning - it’s definitely gotten me through many training miles this time around. As usual, my run to the track was my warmup, and I picked up the pace once I started laps. Mike got there a moment before me, and was nice enough to bring me a water bottle, since I had ran to the track, but he drove.
We dropped the pace down into the high 8 range, trying to stay between 8:35-8:50. Mike ran the first three miles with me before heading home, and I had another 4 to get through solo. I stopped every mile and a half or so to take in some water, and as I got into the later miles I had to talk myself out of stopping more frequently. The last mile was by far the hardest, and I was so relieved when it was through. Then it was only a cooldown as I ran home, and the tempo run was done. Ten miles total, 7 of those at tempo pace. I had struggled so much with that 7th mile, and was disheartened when I realized I should have done 8 that day. I was disappointed when I realized I messed up the duration, but at least I had gotten some sort of tempo run in for the week.
Plus, I was relieved on Friday morning when I woke up and only had to do an easy run, after the previous two runs being quality work.
I started my run heading towards my parents house, and Dad met up with me along the way on his bike we rad by the pool, weaved around the town, and slowly passed away the miles. I learned during this run that my arm had apparently chafed during my run the day before, and it definitely lead to some strange arm positions, which Dad found highly amusing. Eventually we got back to my parents house, and Dad ended his bike ride, but I opted to run back to the apartment solo to amass a total of 6 miles.
That night I started to pack for my upcoming trip to Vancouver and Alaska, since I don’t have the ability to do laundry in my apartment. Even though I had a week left before the trip would start, I wanted to make sure all of the clothes that I wanted to bring along were clean.
Another reason for keeping things light on Friday night was my plan for Saturday morning: a 16 mile long run. Since I would be out of town for two weekends I wanted to get in a good, long run before I left. Dad and Mom agreed to bike along with my run, and the three of us headed to our usual spot - the Jones Beach boardwalk. We got out around 8 A.M., and the weather was warm, but not scorching. There was even a nice breeze. My goal for this run was to keep an average pace between 9-9:20. At first the paces were coming easy, and I had to remind myself to slow down so that I wouldn’t burn out early in the run. I switched off between chatting with my parents and listening to music, and things felt good until around mile 13, when the pace started to become a bit of a struggle. I had some time banked from faster, earlier, miles, so I didn’t stress to much, and just tried to keep pushing myself. I had managed to make it to fourteen miles without any stops at all, and was hopeful that I would make it non-stop to mile 16 - but then I went to take a sip of water and somehow managed to choke on it a little bit, and had to stop and sputter after the mishap. Whoops. At least I managed to pause my Garmin.
Miles 15 an 16 went off without any other eventful mishaps, and I even managed to speed up a little bit. The one mistake - well, we were about a mile from the car at mile 16. I had some level of awareness that this would happen, but was okay with getting an extra mile in. I did drop the pace down to a cool down though, and just kept moving forward. The car was parked right near one of the food courts on the boardwalk, so when I finished up the 17th mile I headed in, really hoping they would have an Icee and a pretzel - but alas, they did not, so I settled for some Dippin-dots, and they were basically the greatest thing ever. Even with the slower last mile averaged in, I still managed a 9:16 pace for the long run, and I was really pleased with that.
The spirit of long runs would continue on Sunday, as my schedule told me to run 10 easy, and 10 was the distance that Mike needed to get done for his long run! Since he was heading to a board game expo that day, we opted to stay local, running around where we live rather than heading somewhere more scenic. Mike ran to my apartment from his house, starting two miles ahead of me, and we started our loops. We stopped for fuel at the apartment one time, and for water at my parents, before heading towards Mike’s house - the miles always fly by when we get to run together. I ran home and my watch buzzed indicating I had hit 10 miles - meaning a total of 27 for the weekend, and just over 50 for a week.
I was tired, but felt great, after a solid week of training. The next two weeks would be lower mileage, the first so that I would be ready to race the seawheeze half, and the second because I would be cruising to Alaska, but I felt really confident in all of the work I had put in so far.