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03 March 2012

Week 9: 30 miles

Just when I was saying marathon training was amazing... week 9 happened. I only ran 4 times this week. The first two of them were good, the last two were... well, they were better than not running, but that's about it.

It's important to point out that I have nothing serious to complain about: I'm not injured, I'm relapse-free and mostly symptom-free. I'm officially halfway done with my training. But for some reason my mood about things has tanked. I'm not really sure exactly what it is; probably a combination of hormones (or lack thereof) and a cold that I thought I kicked but has come back to visit. 

I don't usually examine every run in the weekly recap, but when things don't go well, I like to write about it in gory detail. And apparently in reverse order.

Saturday.
Today's long run was 15 miles, and thanks to a winning combination of rain, snow, slush and ice, I ran all 15 miles on the treadmill. Running has never felt so sad. During this whole training cycle, I think I've done one or two treadmill runs. It just ain't my thing. I tried to distract myself with an Ice Loves Coco marathon, but the tv stopped working around mile 4 and I finished the run with Pandora and my own reflection in the broken tv screen. It just didn't feel good. For the rest of the day I've been sitting in bed, watching tv with Maple. I feel like the lamest mother and wife. I haven't cooked or cleaned or done anything fun. I also have a bit of brain fog or disorientation - one of my hard-to-describe MS symptoms.

Thursday.
On Thursday we had a slush-storm and I ran 4 miles in my Yaktrax, in the grossest conditions I've ever run in. It was like running in mud or soft sand. Every time I thought I was putting my foot down on solid ground (well, with a layer of slush on top), it went down down down into a cold puddle that rose up over my shoe. I ran in the middle of the road to avoid the worst icy patches, dodging my way around cars and fearing for my safety. I was incredulous that I averaged 10:32 on this run, considering the conditions.

Wednesday.
This run was amazing. I did my "marathon pace" run on Wednesday - a 7-miler. I usually aim for 9:00 pace for these runs, which is really more like a tempo run for me but I like trying it. I hit 8:52 this week! That felt great. After the half marathon on Sunday and this run on Wednesday, I was on top of the world.

Tuesday
One of my two shorter runs this week was a nice recovery run with the girls from work. The Tuesday 4-miler has become a regular thing and it's so nice to run with those ladies. They are both significantly more athletic than I am, but we all stay together and I really enjoy their company.

It was a solid week of training.

Pace range for this week: 8:52 to 10:32
Temperature range: 30 - 41 degrees

Details for Week 9 (Feb 29 - Mar 4):
Monday: off
Tuesday: 4 miles
Wednesday: 7 miles (pace/tempo)
Thursday: 4 miles
Friday: off
Saturday: 15 miles
Sunday: off

2 comments

  1. Great week of running! It will be nice when the snowy part of the season is past us!

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  2. Man, the slush - for me it was Friday's 4-miler, in the rain-on-top-of-snow with a full-body hosing from a passing car.

    But let's not lose sight of The Willpower & Fortitude 15 Mile Race you just conquered. That's an impressive workout, dreadmill or not.

    There must be some mid-point angst common to marathon trainers, b/c I was feeling a weird mix of AWESOME and ARGH after yesterday's 14-miler. It's sobering to think that I just ran a personal distance record, but I still have three training runs longer than that to do.

    Also, the word on the street is that down moods are a sign of overtraining. I also know it's nearly impossible to convince any runner they're overtraining ;) But if you can work some easy stuff in over the next week or two, maybe that would help.

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