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Monday, February 22, 2016

Lesson Learned...I think. Run "Easy" Runs EASY

Last week was difficult.  I was SO tired all week.  I went to bed around 8 PM the majority of the nights and still had a hard time getting up in the morning.  During every run, I felt like a slug. Nothing felt fluid or natural.   Even though I got 9 hours of sleep on Friday night, I still took a 2 hour nap on Saturday.  Tired. Tired. Tired.

Here were my workouts:

Tuesday:  1.6 mi warm up.  2 miles at 6:55, 0.5 jog rest, 2 miles at 6:45-6:50, 0.5 mile jog rest, 2 miles at 6:38-43, 0.5 mi jog rest. 1.6 mi cool down

Did this on the treadmill and got through it, although it was HARD.

Wednesday:  4 miles easy, 8 strides

I ended up taking this as a rest day because Tuesday night's workout wore me out.

Thursday: off

I did the 4 miles on Thursday.  Felt ok, but still was huffing it.  7:53 average pace.

Friday: 4 miles easy, 6 strides.

I did this Friday morning and it was nice and warm.  Still felt hard.  7:37 average pace.

Saturday: 15 miles as 4 miles easy warm up, 3 miles at 7:10-7:20, 1 mile easy, 3 miles 7:10-7:20, 1 mile easy, 3 miles 7:10-7:20.

I woke up and did this right away in the morning.  I don't love running right away in the morning, particularly for long runs, but last week went well and it makes it easier on the fam if I do it in the morning so I was off. The amazing thing is that it was 41 degrees at 6:15 in the morning! In February! In Wisconsin!  I almost fell on my ass right out of the driveway because although it was 41 degrees, there were some slick spots of ice.  Thankfully, I stayed upright and didn't encounter any more ice slicks for the rest of the run.

I felt like the first "easy" 4 miles was still really hard.  NOT exactly the way I wanted to be feeling with 15 miles on the docket and 9 of them "hard".

I got through this workout but stopped so much. They were quick stops, but stops nonetheless. I was out of my Nuun too early, i was warmer than I wanted to be, yadda yadda.  I was running sets of "fast" 3 miles too fast (first set average pace was 6:58, next two sets average pace was 7:06) but not really being able to calibrate.  UGH.  I got back and I was so tired.

Luckily, I got away with taking a 2 hour nap on Saturday afternoon while my son napped because my husband and daughter wanted to do some birthday shopping.

I emailed my weekly log to EH (my coach) and included how tired I was.

He told me I have to back off on my easy days.  Make the easy days easy.  How many times have I read that in a blog post, magazine article, etc?  I mean that is so basic.  You, my dear two readers, probably picked up on that immediately.

I so struggle with running "slow".  Blame it on my competitive type-A personality.  However, that is my goal for next week.  SLOW down on the easy parts.  I have a tough month ahead of me and I will not get through it by continuing to run my ass off.

8 weeks until Boston!

Heard on the Run
1.  Finished "Regular Mother Runners Doing the Olympic Trials Part 2 podcast from last week. I had to finish the last interview, with Andrea Duke, and it was great.  LOVE her.

2. This American Life podcast, I Thought I Knew You (Episode #578).  I listened to the first two acts of this podcast on Tuesday.  It really wasn't doing it for me on the treadmill so I switched to music to finish out the workout.  I think it is because Donald Trump incites me.  I couldn't really get past this bias while listening to Act 1.

I started my long run (Saturday) with the final two acts of this and liked them better.  I really enjoyed the story about the teacher (Act 3).

3. Running On Om, Episode #179 Ask Lauren Fleshman on the Role of Gender, Body Image and Motherhood on Running.
This was my first Running On Om ("ROO") podcast that I have listened to and it is the only thing that got me through my long run.  I admire Lauren Fleshman, love her writing (REALLY want to go to her running and writing retreat this fall!) so I started it thinking I was going to like it. And I did. She touched on so many relevant topics for me in a very honest way.  I definitely will be listening to more of these podcasts.

I have so many thoughts going through my head - I am going to try to crank out a few more posts than usual this week. Stay tuned!


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