Back in the Saddle Again (Yay!)

Week of March 13-19, 2017

Mileage: 54.2 (yay, back in the 50s!), with a fartlek (yay, back to workouts!), a double (yay, back to 2-a-days!), a set of strides, a fast finish long run (yay, back to long runs!), a bootcamp, and a solo strength workout (yay, back to strength!) - inching back towards my pre-marathon schedule!  I am not sure if you noticed, but my overall feeling about this is yay!

Motivation for the week part 1:  The BMO Phoenix-Mesa Marathon dropped this video on my Facebook on Thursday!  I completely forgot that they were doing videos in addition to professional pictures, and although I dislike nearly all photos and videos ever taken of me running (actually, ever taken of me, period), I loved seeing the finishing clock, and my smile at the end wasn't the worst either.  I also got some dying finishing photos from the Big 12 12K, a few of which I added to this post.

Motivation part 2 -- but is there another 12K, on a different course, before I turn 37?!

Monday - Bootcamp (45 min.) with an elliptical warm-up (35 min.).  I didn't go to bootcamp for 3 weeks (1 taper week, 2 recovery weeks), but I still remembered how to do everything and was thankful this was was a lighter leg day.  I did some strength work last week, which I am sure helped, but this workout was the first time I did squats and lunges since February 17!

Tuesday - 9.1 miles, with 2 warm-up, a fartlek workout of 2 x 4', 3', 2', 1' with recoveries equal to the next push (5.59 miles total covered at 6:27 average), 1.51 cool-down.  Winter was back with vengeance for this one, with a blustery wind, 'feels like' 20*, and pitch darkness (thanks a lot, Daylight Savings Time!).  I decided to embrace all of this, although I blame running against the wind for my one push that was not quite sub-6:00 (thanks a lot, 6:01 pace!).  My legs weren't fresh for this one (thanks a lot hilly 12K!), but I didn't feel bad either.  Any day I get to go out there and run hard is a wonderful blessing!   

Embrace the conditions you're given!

Wednesday - 12.3 miles total, with 9 miles base pace (7:08) in the morning with Missy, and a 3.3 mile shake out (7:32) at lunch.  I told my coach I wanted to go all in for an OTQ marathon in the fall, and my base pace range is now 7:10-8:00 -- down from 7:30-8:30, although it's been inching down unofficially for awhile.  This change is based on my recent race times and my marathon goal, and my marathon goal pace running is also now 6:17, oy!  I've been doing my base runs around 7:15 recently, but something about it being "official" makes it intimidating.  Missy and I both felt relaxed and like we were running much slower than we were, which we credited to there being no wind for once.  My second run was a nice return to RUNCH!

Thursday - 7 miles base pace with 6 x strides in the last mile (7:05) with Missy, Danielle, and Amy R.  Missy and Danielle did a fartlek workout, and were ahead of me once they started it, so my pace ended up being a little quick on a few miles (6:5X) due to running behind them...something about having people in front of me makes me want to chase!  I did a 45 minute strength workout on Thursday evening in lieu of my usual Friday morning strength bootcamp, because I had time to kill in town between work and an OMRR board meeting; this worked out nicely because after getting to bed later than usual on Thursday night, I slept later than usual on Friday morning.

Friday - 3.5 mile shake out (7:30) and drills.  Happy St. Pats!  I was a tad sore from Thursday's strength work.

Saturday -15 mile long run (7:03) that was 10 steady, 4 progressive fast finish (7:01, 6:47, 6:31, 6:07), 1 cool-down.  The weather was beautiful and I ran with Amy P. for the first 11 (she had a steady run scheduled while I had the fast finish miles, but the first fast finish mile wasn't much of a drop so she stuck with me for it).  It was wonderful to be back to long runs, which are my favorite!  On the final mile I was aiming for 6:17, so was quite happy with the 6:07, especially since the final 0.3 was up incline into my neighborhood (the bane of every fast finish run I finish at my mailbox).  6:07 felt like work but not like death, so that was also nice!  I was pretty sore from Thursday's strength workout on this run, but it never seems to bother my running.  We then spent a family day in Branson!

Sunday - 7.1 miles base pace (7:21) with Missy, followed by 9 hours at Silver Dollar City - the latter was 100 times more tiring than the former!  I was also still sore from strength work...clearly I lost some of my capacity for lunges and one-legged squats in those 3 weeks I didn't do leg strength!

9 hours at SDC is more tiring than a marathon, or at least I trained better for the latter

I think I can consider myself pretty much fully recovered from my marathon now (3 weeks later) -- in case you missed it, yay!

Did anyone run any fun St. Pat's races this week or last weekend?  I want to run one sometime in order to wear these socks!  I wore them to work instead; but who am I kidding, I wear them year-round!