Sunday, April 24, 2016

A More Positive Week in Review!

When my running isn't going well - particularly when I'm injured - my attitude and feelings about EVERYTHING seem to go downhill!  This is something I'm aware of and try to work on, but there has to be something to those endorphins!  As a behavior analyst, I would call running an establishing operation for a "positive attitude" and not running an establishing operation for a "negative attitude" (of course those terms would need to be operationally defined, but you see what I am getting at!).

This week was a lot better.  I ended up taking 12 days off for a cranky tendon, and it seemed like forever, but relative to the 5 weeks I had to take off earlier this year it was quick!   My missing week in review post from last week is because it was all cross-training!

Total miles:  33.3 (I did not plan that!)

Monday -  swam laps for 45 minutes with some intervals - I wanted an easy/no impact day before trying a run on Tuesday

Tuesday - 4 miles, with Garmin splits of 7:44, 6:38, 6:33, 6:31.  I did not plan to run 3 of these miles at tempo-ish pace, and it wasn't a smart thing to do on my first run back, but my Garmin was being funky at the beginning of the run (the first mile was probably about 30 seconds faster than it recorded, so around 7:15).  I thought I was running around 7:30 pace at the beginning, which is my standard base pace that I "fall" into, but when I looked at my watch it read 8:38 pace.  I almost started crying about my base pace getting 1 minute slower with my time off, and I sped up.  When my watch beeped at the mile, I knew it was long since I was on a course I run a lot, and then at 1.2 miles my pace was 6:40ish since I had sped up, so I decided to run one faster mile, which turned into 2, which turned in to 3.  It was nice though!  After this run I jumped on the spin bike for 18.5 miles.

Wednesday - 5 miles base pace (7:13 average for all), with my final mile in 6:38 (trying to gauge my half pace since I am registered for one on May 1), then HIIT bootcamp.

Thursday - Cross-training craziness: spin bike 20 miles and elliptical 30 minutes a.m., and 45 minute lap swim at noon because I was off work for adoption day (and my daughter went to school after the hearing because she is working towards a perfect attendance award)!  Adoption day photos here.

Friday - 14 miles base pace (7:16 average), with my final two miles in 6:45 and 6:25.  I was super pleased with how this went!  I set out to run 12 miles at 7:30-7:45 pace, figuring that if I couldn't do that pain-free I shouldn't race on May 1 even though I'd already paid.  This was just a play-it-by-ear kind of run, and I even carried my phone (which I never do) in case my tendon got cranky,and I was prepared to stop at any time.  Mid-way I knew that 12 miles wouldn't be a problem, and after my first 9 miles around 7:30 pace I dropped miles 10-12 to 7:10ish before dropping the final 2 miles into the 6:00s.  I could have definitely run farther, but 14 was as many as I could run and still get to work on time!  And that was probably good anyway because there was no need to run more.  I had quite a runner's high from this run all day!

14 mile splits

Saturday - 10.3 miles total -- 6.2 miles (7:21 pace) pacing Jon on his tempo for 5 miles, then ran 1 mile harder (6:18).  I was a good pacer and every mile with Jon got a tad faster - starting at 7:38 and finishing at 7:24.  Then I did 40 minutes of strength work in the morning.  In the evening, I went out with Albani for her 1 mile run (she runs them in 11-12 minutes, and I usually don't count them in my mileage but I did this week since my mileage was so low!).  Then I ended up running a 5K shake-out (8:04 pace) after running with her since I was in running gear anyway! She, on the other hand, ran in a dress!

She did not learn to train in dresses/skirts from me!

Sunday - road bike for 19 miles.

Tomorrow I am going to try a tempo to gauge where I'm for the Prairie Fire half, then short and easy runs before the race.  I am not expecting anything great for this race with how inconsistent my training has been, but this week was good enough to show me that my time shouldn't be horrible!  Worst case scenario, I ran a 1:35 half in my Friday long run not pushing until the final 2 miles, so even if I crap out and run that it's not the absolute end of the world.  We will just see what happens, and I am thankful just to be able to run it for sure!!

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