It's race week! I had some really good weeks leading into my taper which make me excited!
Week 15
I had to do two-mile repeats and the first ten mile tempo run this week. I've come to think of week 15 in the Hanson's program as the very last hard week because it is the longest mileage week of the plan. It was windy outside and my tempo sucked big time. I had no gas and managed a 6:47 average. I was totally bummed about this and really not able to reframe one bad workout in the context of MONTHS of workouts. I had a rest day after the failed tempo and decided that I needed to focus on my external environment a bit on my runs because I was getting way too in my head so I created a hashtag - #FridayRunJoy - on Instagram and it made for a good run. I ran a mile longer than intended because I was having a lot of fun AND my hamstring didn't bother me at all.
Oh yes. The hamstring is still doing it's thing, although it comes and goes more often than anything.
I had my last 16 mile run during week 15 and it went really well. I felt relaxed and decided on my race day fueling strategy - Maurten 100 gels and Tailwind.
I also had my LONGEST MILEAGE WEEK ever. In my life. 66.4 miles for the win!!!!
Week 16
This week was 1.5 mile repeats and it was one of those idyllic workouts where you just feel on and flying. I finished all of my repeats ahead of the scheduled pace and didn't feel completely gassed at the end either. After that workout I was excited to face the 10-mile tempo again.
And again. FAIL. We had some snow and sleet this week which caused me to shuffle some workouts around so I did my tempo run on a Saturday and it was just a mental bomb. I may have cried during it out of frustration. I ended up even worse off than week 15 - 6:48 average and several stops. ARGH.
The hamstring was sore this week, which I was expecting after the previous week. I ended the week with 53.2 miles, which was slightly under what the plan called for (56 miles).
Week 17
I watched the Boston Marathon this week and felt so inspired. After bombing at Boston in 2016, I was ready to be done with that course for a while but I'm kind of starting to get the itch to go back. We will see.
Anyways, I channeled all of that run love into my final strength workout of the plan - six 1-mile repeats. I wanted to really focus on staying relaxed and running with effort but not killing myself and I definitely succeeded and still ended up ahead of pace for most of them.
So that left the last ten mile tempo. The weather was amazing the morning I set off. Nice and cool and for whatever reason I felt relaxed. I did really well with this tempo and ended up with a 6:31 average and a negative split over the ten miles.
After that ten mile tempo, I was officially in taper mode. I celebrated by getting a deep tissue massage with felt great. I mean...afterwards, i felt great. There were a few moments during where it didn't feel so great, ha ha ha. I ended week 17 with 54.56 miles, two sick kids and a sore throat myself.
Yep. I'm sick. I'm hoping it all clears before Saturday morning!
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