I can't believe how quickly the weeks of training are going by and how well I've been doing. Today I'll finish my week 4 plan with a five-mile run that was on schedule for yesterday. I spend the weekend at the beach so I wasn't too concerned with fitting it in, especially since it was cut-back week and I'm on vacation this week so it's easy to fit it in today.
Week three went well - was two miles short of goal because of shuffling around the Thursday and Friday runs. I still felt that the week was good because I did my 8-mile long run.
Week 3 looked like:
Goal - 19
Tuesday - 3 Easy - Treadmill - Was very easy
Friday - 3 Tempo - Treadmill - Not great but still made it. The 3-miles of tempo pace run was supposed to be flanked by 1 mile easy which I bailed on. I did the elliptical but was not feeling it.
Saturday - 3 Easy - Treadmill - Considering that I'd run my 3-miles of tempo less than 24 hours before I felt great for this run. I even did spin class afterward which also felt great.
Sunday - 8 LONG - West End/Rose Garden - 6:40am! This run was rough at first but once I made it past 3 miles I fell into the groove of things.
Total - 17 miles
Pretty crazy to think that between Friday at 6pm and Sunday at 8 am I ran 14 miles, and did a spinning class... LEGS OF STEEL....
Week 4 is...
Goal - 15
Tuesday - 5 Easy - Treadmill - Was very easy
Thursday - 5 Easy - Treadmill - Another run that went by easy peasy
Did spin class Wednesday night which felt awesome.
My last 5 miles of the week will be today. Then week 5 will pick up tomorrow!
UPDATE: 7/28... 5 MILES on Monday went well
I'm soooooo glad to be on vacation this week and only really have tentative plans. Certain things are on my mind to do and there is a birthday party to go to but I'm really winging it this week. I think a trip to NYC on Friday is very likely but we'll see.
Monday, July 27, 2009
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
The First Three Miles are Definitely the Hardest
Lots of stuff going on in my mind this week. I survived week two of training with every run on its scheduled day! I started keeping a log to note the day, distance, where I ran (treadmill, trail, route) and how it felt for me.
Week Two looked like:
Tuesday - 3 Easy - Treadmill - Felt Good
Thursday - 5 Speed - Treadmill - Felt challenged, but finished strong - pace was 10 min/mi at speed pace (2 x 1 mile), 10:50 min/mi at middle (2 x 1/2 mile), 11:19 min/mi beginning/end (1 mile each)
Friday - 3 Easy - Treadmill - Good run
Sunday - 7 Long - West End/Rose Garden - A few rough spots, some light hills, finished strong
What was consistent in all of them was how much more difficult the first three miles were compared to later miles if I was doing my speedwork or my long run. I think my long run was the best evidence of it - I got to the 2.5 mile point and needed to walk for a tenth of a mile or so, then got to 3.5 miles and felt good moving. Another factor was that I ran it at 7 am which was the most humid time of the day, even though it was the coolest point in the day. Being able to get up and out that early was a big deal for me and showed me that I could do it and am going to have to in order to do this race.
Week three is moving along, although it won't be on the correct schedule but not as bad as week one. Week four is a cutback week which I'm looking forward to. Week five is my vacation week which is strongly beginning to look like a staycation. More on that later, but it will actually be more beneficial for me to be able to have my gym and home routes to get my runs in well.
I've also decided to limit my flip flop wearing to as little as possible because my feet are achy and I don't want to risk making it worse. Can't wait for shoetesting in a couple weeks!
Week Two looked like:
Tuesday - 3 Easy - Treadmill - Felt Good
Thursday - 5 Speed - Treadmill - Felt challenged, but finished strong - pace was 10 min/mi at speed pace (2 x 1 mile), 10:50 min/mi at middle (2 x 1/2 mile), 11:19 min/mi beginning/end (1 mile each)
Friday - 3 Easy - Treadmill - Good run
Sunday - 7 Long - West End/Rose Garden - A few rough spots, some light hills, finished strong
What was consistent in all of them was how much more difficult the first three miles were compared to later miles if I was doing my speedwork or my long run. I think my long run was the best evidence of it - I got to the 2.5 mile point and needed to walk for a tenth of a mile or so, then got to 3.5 miles and felt good moving. Another factor was that I ran it at 7 am which was the most humid time of the day, even though it was the coolest point in the day. Being able to get up and out that early was a big deal for me and showed me that I could do it and am going to have to in order to do this race.
Week three is moving along, although it won't be on the correct schedule but not as bad as week one. Week four is a cutback week which I'm looking forward to. Week five is my vacation week which is strongly beginning to look like a staycation. More on that later, but it will actually be more beneficial for me to be able to have my gym and home routes to get my runs in well.
I've also decided to limit my flip flop wearing to as little as possible because my feet are achy and I don't want to risk making it worse. Can't wait for shoetesting in a couple weeks!
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Back in Training - 11 weeks and counting
I am the world's worst blogger. And since I have no one reading these I don't feel so bad. My last post was in October so I could do a big recap of everything from the last 10 months or so but why bother. 1/2 Marathon, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's, 3 Grand Slams, Memorial Day, 4th of July, Easter have all passed - woohoo....
No, the big thing I have on my mind is that I'm back in training. This will be my first time doing the Philadelphia Distance Run and I'm really excited for it. I thought about it last year but really wasn't interested in doing it because of the grueling training during the summer. But the end of last year I decided that I really needed to do it - physically and mentally. I made the decision that this would be my only 1/2 for this year so watching the runners during the Lehigh Valley Half and not being among them was a bit depressing, but now I'm focused and looking forward to PDR, just 11 weeks away.
I started my training this week. My schedule was supposed to be Tues 2 - Thurs 5 (Tempo for 3) - Fri 2 - Sun 6 for a total of 15 miles. What it turned out to be was Mon 2.5 - Wed 3.2 (5K for LVRR Summer Series - pitiful but still did the miles) - Sat 5 (Tempo for 3) - Sun 6 (Yay!) for a total of 17.5 miles. I'm in awe, and a bit achey. I'm mad at myself for waiting until Saturday for the tempo run - I told myself that since I raced on Wednesday doing a tempo run on Thursday was too much, but then I didn't account for the slug I was on Friday because I had 1 (or 2) too many beers on Thursday night. So I pushed myself to do it Saturday and it was my best run of the week, even better than a lot of recent runs. But then doing my 6 today I was definitely feeling a bit overwhelmed. I could have settled at 5 or 5 1/2 today, especially because the loop I ran was exactly 5 1/2 but when I got to that starting point after looping, I felt I needed to prove to myself that 6 could be done and I needed to do it.
Tomorrow is a rest day, thankfully, and the run schedule should be pretty good to follow on the right days. Looking at Tues 2 - Thurs 5 (speed for 3) - Fri 2 - Sun 7 for a total of 16 miles. The only day I'll struggle with is Sunday and I'll just have to be up early for it. I'm going to CitiField for a Mets game and I think it's at 1.
So I've got one week down, 11 to go. This should be great!
No, the big thing I have on my mind is that I'm back in training. This will be my first time doing the Philadelphia Distance Run and I'm really excited for it. I thought about it last year but really wasn't interested in doing it because of the grueling training during the summer. But the end of last year I decided that I really needed to do it - physically and mentally. I made the decision that this would be my only 1/2 for this year so watching the runners during the Lehigh Valley Half and not being among them was a bit depressing, but now I'm focused and looking forward to PDR, just 11 weeks away.
I started my training this week. My schedule was supposed to be Tues 2 - Thurs 5 (Tempo for 3) - Fri 2 - Sun 6 for a total of 15 miles. What it turned out to be was Mon 2.5 - Wed 3.2 (5K for LVRR Summer Series - pitiful but still did the miles) - Sat 5 (Tempo for 3) - Sun 6 (Yay!) for a total of 17.5 miles. I'm in awe, and a bit achey. I'm mad at myself for waiting until Saturday for the tempo run - I told myself that since I raced on Wednesday doing a tempo run on Thursday was too much, but then I didn't account for the slug I was on Friday because I had 1 (or 2) too many beers on Thursday night. So I pushed myself to do it Saturday and it was my best run of the week, even better than a lot of recent runs. But then doing my 6 today I was definitely feeling a bit overwhelmed. I could have settled at 5 or 5 1/2 today, especially because the loop I ran was exactly 5 1/2 but when I got to that starting point after looping, I felt I needed to prove to myself that 6 could be done and I needed to do it.
Tomorrow is a rest day, thankfully, and the run schedule should be pretty good to follow on the right days. Looking at Tues 2 - Thurs 5 (speed for 3) - Fri 2 - Sun 7 for a total of 16 miles. The only day I'll struggle with is Sunday and I'll just have to be up early for it. I'm going to CitiField for a Mets game and I think it's at 1.
So I've got one week down, 11 to go. This should be great!
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