Adjusted Reality

“Reality can be beaten with enough imagination.” – Mark Twain

Half Marathon Training, Between Week 8 and 9

If you’ve been following me here this shouldn’t be any surprise, but for the rest of you and for my posterity, here is how last week went.

Monday: weights at home and 4.5 mile run

Check and check.  It was the *perfect* weather just around dusk to be out for a run and I got done just as it was getting dark.  I even actually pushed myself pretty hard because I was feeling so good, and it could have almost qualified as a tempo run.

Tuesday: tempo run and yoga

Check and check.  Since I pushed myself the day before, I wasn’t able to get the awesome pace I had the week before, but I definitely still booked it pretty good!

Wednesday: 4.5 mile run and weights at the gym

Sorta-fail and sorta check.  I had – how shall I say – body problems that morning, and was able to get about 3.7 miles before I gave up.  Close enough – right?  Also, we had an event to go to after work at 6 (which meant no time for the gym), but I made the weights up Saturday morning, at least half-assedly.  Instead of heading to the gym, I watched the end of the biggest loser with my ass planted on the couch and finally felt guilty enough that I got out the weights and did my home strength routine.  But hey, it’s better than nothing, right?

Thursday: 50 mins DDR and yoga

Check and check.  Planned this on a different day because of the event the night before (I needed today to be an easy day).

Friday: 10 mile run

Check!  I made it!  Somehow, running a double digit distance felt more epic than just getting further.  I’m just excited because I told myself that if I could do 10 miles, I could do 13 so I would feel good about signing up for the half.  So I get to sign up this week!

Sunday: Bike trail adventure

Epic fail.  But it was the weather’s fault, not ours.  We were so ready to go, and it was raining off and on.  It was the only time we had carved out to do it, so we had to pass.

Total week 8 mileage 22.7 (running):   (plus 1-2 miles of walking)

Week 9 -almost there.  Please?

Monday: 15k pseudo race

Tuesday: 50 mins DDR + yoga

Wednesday: 5 mile run and weights at the gym

Thursday: 9×400 intervals (warmup on the way to the track, run 9 laps under 2:00 pace, jog a lap in between each, cooldown on the way home)

Friday: 5 mile run and weights at home.

Weekend: Maybe a bike ride.  Or maybe not.  I’m not getting my hopes up this time. 🙂

Things I learned last week:

1.  After doing this run, I have decided that long run days either need to be on a weekend, or I need to take half days to recover after.  I was just *dead* after this.  My body was so physically tired until after lunch my brain barely worked.  I can definitely envision being able to do 3 more miles on the end of this if it was race day, but I imagine I will be worthless for a little while after I finish.

2.  My pace degenerates from a solid 10 minute mile or faster to a 1030 or slower sometime between 7 and 9 miles.  I mean that as in when I run 7 miles total, I can keep that 10 minute pace.  When I’m above that, I seem to run quite a bit slower even if it’s only a *little* more.  My super-unattainable goal for the half is under 2 minutes, but I’m not running the long runs anywhere close to that pace.  I think I’ll be happy under 2:15.

3.  Let me reiterate to folks out there – training for a distance running event is not, I repeat NOT a way to lose weight.  I heard the warnings, I laughed it off and thought I could buck the odds, but your body WILL force you to eat back what you lose when you push it so hard, or you’ll feel weak and super injury prone.  Though I’ve been told I look like I’ve lost a little since I started this, I haven’t seen my low weight of 150.2 for at least a month, I”m hangin’ closer to 152-153.   I decided 3 weeks in that I was going to give my body whatever it needed to do this race, but I am really feeling like a piggie lately.

4.  That being said as well – I am really looking forward now to finishing up the training, doing the race, and moving on to something else for a while.  4 runs per week which are now at least 5 miles each is time consuming, tiring, and just a whole lot of miles.  I just keep telling myself that there’s only 3 weeks really to go (and the last week of taper before the race), and I’m almost there.  I had visions of being super excited to get up to the double digit runs and getting used to them and keep running the distance all the time – yeah, no.  I’m already looking forward to putting together a plan for July which is extremely different!  I think I’d like to pick up the training again in the fall and go for a half marathon here in Austin in January/February, but my body is definitely going to need a break.

5.  Week 7 was sorta rough, but this week I had my head back into it.  I’m glad, because if I had another crappy week where I was just tired all the time and had to drag my butt off the couch to work out kicking and screaming every day, I dunno if I would have continued.  Ok, I would have, because I’m stubborn like that, but I would have been miserable.  I’m glad last week came a little easier – on Monday’s run I actually even pushed myself harder than I planned, just because I felt so good.  That’s a sign that things are thumbs up.

This week is getting both a great (already did my long run!) and rough (stayed up way, way too late having way, way too much fun yesterday and now I am EXHAUSTED and not really in the position to take the day off) start, so we shall see which way the wind blows…

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1 Comment

  1. cat

    Awesome job on that 10 miles run!!! Man I wanna be able to run again, I’ve learned to not push it when something starts to hurt at least!

    I cannot wait to read about your race!

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