boston training: week 3

i wish i could say this weeks training was all rainbows and butterflies... well, id say 75% of it was pretty darn good. the other 25%, not so much. the plague hit this house hard. awful, awful, awful. nothing worse than watching your child when theyre sick, and then not feeling good yourself (and ty too...) it just wasnt fun. still isnt (im still sick, hens boogers are out of control, ty isnt sleeping well... will we ever feel normal again?!). today i am opening windows, disinfecting EVERYTHING, and getting this damn sickness the F out of this house! and please dont come back!

i didnt hit all my runs or paces this week, but im not worried one bit. my body needed the rest and recovery to get rid of this crap and ill come back next week strong. still 12 weeks to go, one or two runs isnt gonna ruin me.

on sunday i ran a 10k right here in my town (literally a quarter mile from my house). it was the first annual robert burns 10k, put on by a few crow members! the turnout was fantastic and the weather wasnt terrible... chilly (low 20s with real feel in the low teens with wind), but the roads were dry for the most part and we didnt get any of the snow that the rest of the east coast got (thank god!) so that helped.

i had no idea what to expect out of this race due to the fact that i knew i wasnt in racing shape and also hadnt run much outside (let alone run fast outside). the prize for 1st female was $300, but i knew there was a woman coming who averages in the high 6s for her 10k pace, so i decided to use this as my marathon pace run and get a good quality outdoor run in for the week. i warmed up for 2 miles on the treadmill and did 1 mile at MP (since my run was 10 with 7 @ mp), and then ran up to the race.

of course when the gun went off the competitive side in me was lit and with a downhill start my paces were reading in the low 7s. whoooooooa, back it off. there had also been a few women to pass me right at the beginning so i tried to just settle into a comfortable 730ish pace and see how i felt.

overall i actually felt pretty good. i kept having to clear out my nose and felt like i was going to hack up a lung, but it really didnt hinder me much. it was good that i knew the course because i knew what was coming (hills, ugh) and didnt push my pace too hard in the first 3 miles. right at the 3 mile mark there was a steep quarter mile hill. there was a girl up ahead of me and i felt i could pass her, but waited a little bit so as not to waste too much energy (i did that last spring and paid dearly for it at the end). shortly after passing her i saw sarah cheering up ahead and she screamed at me that i was 3rd female. what?! no way. fuuuuuuck. i mean cool, but that meant that i had to keep that girl from passing me back haha. time to turn it up i guess. sarah was also hoping that i would win her something... all i wanted was a donut!

mile 4 to 5 was downhill and my time showed (7:10. oops). but i had definitely gained a good lead on the girl i had passed so that helped me mentally. when i got to the mile 5 sign i was happily surprised because for some reason i thought i still had 2 miles left to go and now realized i only had 1! i dont know how that happens but whatever, i was psyched. sadly the last mile is basically an uphill climb, but i didnt stop and pushed along (thinking i might throw up. cool). 

as i came around the corner to the finish i could hear the bagpiper playing (so awesome!) and pushed it to the finish. 3rd female, yay! i stood there with sarah for a minute thinking i was going to throw up and then cheering for people coming in. eventually i realized that i hadnt left the finish chute and still had my bib tag. whoops. i was worried that i was going to screw everything up but the timer came and told me it was fine and he had recorded me. didnt want to lose my chance to win donuts! (this whole 21 day fix thing had me craving donuts bad, if you couldnt tell).

i felt this was a very well executed 10k, other than the random 7:10 mile thrown in there, and i felt great (only 1 minute off my 10k PR). i ran a cool down after to get 10 miles in for the day then headed inside for awards and donuts! they really had donuts! it was amazing. (actually i ate a banana and then had the race directors and a few friends over to the house where i had bought holy donuts and we drank beers and whiskey and had moose stew and a kale & sweet potato salad. but anyway, donuts. yup).

barf.

seriously. dont do that in mile 5, yucky.

so overall the week ended up about 6 miles short but i was happy with the marathon pace/10k run. my 4x1200s werent spectacular... didnt come close to what my 5k paces should be, but i did that on purpose because i didnt feel i needed to burn myself out when i wasnt feeling good to start with. hoping to get outside more this week since the weather will be up in the 40s (heat wave!). sadly sarah and i had zero runs together. boooooooo.

week 3

4x1200- (goal pace: 5:12-5:20) 5:37,5:32, 5:33, 5:29- knew i wasnt 100% because of my cold. i went out conservatively (knowing the last time i did speedwork i went out too fast and bonked) and pushed it when i could

7 @ MP- (goal pace: 7:49-8:01) ran 1st MP mile on the TM- 7:59, then raced the 10k race- 7:30, 7:38, 7:38, 7:42, 7:10. 7:33. shouldnt be racing a lot during this training program, but i am glad i went out and did it.

long run- nope. oh well.

and in other super awesome news... hoka released their odyssey 2s earlier than i had thought! one of the hoka guys had told me at a race expo in the fall that they werent going to release them until boston expo (well thats not helpful). but recently the odyssey 1s went on sale and there have been limited colors and sizes... and then one day, up popped this gem! of course i will (hopefully) be wearing hot pink shoes for boston! im nervous about the tongue change (whhhhyyyyyy) but we'll see. i have more days to try them out than there is left until the actual race, so ill give them a shot. 

week 3 done... 82 days!