Monday, May 5, 2014

Run 2014: Weeks 6, 7, & 8


The past couple of weeks got a little busy and I got a little slackerish. And those two facts combine to produce three weeks crammed in one blog post! Before I get to the runs, here's what I mean by 'a little busy'. In the past three weeks we:

celebrated my birthday (April 18th)
threw a housewarming party (April 19th)
I went to PA for four days (April 21st - 24th)
we went to Indy for three (April 25th - 27th)
I spent two full days with the grandparents, aka completely unproductive day (April 28th & May 1st)
celebrated Justin's birthday (April 30th)
hosted Justin's brother, sister-in-law, and two nephews overnight (May 3rd-4th)
and celebrated Mother's Day with Justin's family (May 4th)

I know that for most of the western world this is normal but for us it is extremely, extremely busy. Throw all our cooking and running in on top of all this and you have crazy busy Justin and Jennifer. Suffice to say that neither of us were thrilled and we're very much eagerly anticipating our next weekend.  All that aside, here's a run down of the last three weeks of runs with as much detail as I can remember!


Week 6:
Monday, April 14th: 4.10 miles in 37:07, average pace 9:03
     This was my first alone run of the year. Justin was feeling really crappy and so I went on the prescribed run while he stayed home. I'm pretty proud of how well I maintained the pace on my own. 

Thursday, April 17th: 3.11 miles in 27:08, average pace 8:43
     This must have been a pretty unremarkable run. I can't remember anything specific about it. 

Saturday, April 19th: 5.25 miles in 49:12, average pace 9:22
     This was the first run that was long enough to actually get us out of the neighborhood! We ran up to the closest park and ran a mile around the golf course. It was a definite step up from our normal loops. I can't wait until most of our runs are out on the trails. Those are my favourites.


Week 7:
Monday, April 21st: 3.99 miles in 38:44, average pace 9:42
     This was also a solo run. Except this time I was in PA visiting my grandma. I drove 8 1/2 hours to get to her house on Monday and then went for a run down the mountain, along the creek, and back up a few hours later. It felt great to stretch my legs. And to be able to say that I ran the whole way back up the driveway at the end of four miles. Go me!

Thursday, April 24th: No run
     This was the day that I got back home from Grandma's. I had been hoping to go for a run but my mom was staying the night and we didn't get back home until around supper time. While I could have gotten a run in I decided to skip it and hang out with my mom and Justin instead.

Saturday, April 26th: 6.11 miles in 1:01:32, average pace 10.04
     This run took place down in Indy at my parents house. Yes, I am insane. After being gone for four days to PA, Justin and I loaded up and went down on Friday to visit my family for the weekend. This was a hot but fun run. We set out around 9:30am and it was already close to 70. We ran about 2.5 miles over to a park, a mile through the park, and 2.5 miles back. We carried our 10oz Nathan's Thermal Sprint (no longer made but this is the current model) and I did alright but Justin was low on water by the time we reached the park. It looks like we'll be switching to our Nathan's Racing Vests (Justins & mine) sooner than we thought!


Week 8:
Tuesday, April 29th: 2.80 miles in 25:59, average pace 9:17
     This run got cut short due to a storm front that was blowing in. And then it didn't rain. So that was pointless. On the other hand I had decided to skip wearing my ankle brace and see what happened. That was a not fantastic idea. My ankle hurt a lot. So now I know the ankle brace is important.

Thursday, May 1st: No run
     We just weren't feeling it. We were exhausted and supper took way longer to make than we thought it would. By the time we had eaten I think it was almost 7pm and we just bailed out. We went to bed not long after that.

Saturday, May 3rd: 4:07 miles in 37:36, average pace 9:14
     This was an alright run. I wore my brace so that was okay. It was just hard. It felt like I was putting in a lot of work compared to how fast I was going. I felt alright though. Like I could have run further if needed. I was just really glad that I didn't have to.


Overall thoughts:
     My greater impression for the last few weeks is that the majority of my runs have felt difficult. I'm thinking there's two reasons for this. The first is that I've done a crappy job over the last couple of weeks of actually getting all the run in and also just doing my ankle stretches and exercises on a regular basis. And the second is that we're still aggressively building miles. When you're running single digits the jump from 4 miles to 5 is significant. A jump from 14 to 16 is not as much. That's just the reality of running, your growth is exponential. I do remember this stretch being difficult in 2012 as well.

Looking at all this, I think there are two things I can focus on improving. One, do my stretches and exercises daily. I know they take a full half hour and I know I get bored. Do them anyway. I won't die of boredom and they do help my ankle feel better when I stay on top of them. And two, stop skipping runs. Period. Unless I'm vomiting or something extreme there is no reason that I shouldn't be able to at least get a few miles in every day that I am supposed. Sure maybe I'll be feeling particularly exhausted and I'll only run three miles instead of five. But that's still much more useful than running zero.


Fort4Fitness: 21 weeks
Huff: 33 weeks



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