Training recap for the week:
Overall, it's hard to describe the week in one word. I think that often we default to, "It was good," and overall it was. Mentally and emotionally, it was a really challenging week. I felt really tired at work this week. Doing my normal things felt difficult (massage, personal training, and by the end of the week interacting with people in general). I can attribute this to a few things:
Mental and emotional stress, which you could read about here.
Massage is physically demanding, there is no way around that. And sometimes it just feels harder than other times, especially if your headspace is struggling.
My strength workouts were a little too much after the fast 10k and 10 miler over the weekend last week. My body likes to run slow and long, not short and fast. I was reminded of this.
Workout Recap:
Monday: Legs. My hamstrings were really sore from our runs, so I modified this workout a lot. I was able to do squats fine, 155lbsx5 reps for 4 sets. But everything else needed to be adjusted.
Tuesday: Recovery Day. I did extra yoga and went for a leisurely walk. Then later on between clients, I decided to tact on a shoulder workout for fun (this was a bad idea).
Wednesday: 4 mile easy run. My hamstring was still recovering from the weekend, but after this run felt a LOT better!
Thursday: The weather was crappy. It was cold, dark, and raining. We opted to trade our 60-minute tempo run for a treadmill session. There are two of us and 1 treadmill so we had a little fun alternating intervals with Kettlebell swings! We both enjoyed this workout a lot! In the evening we took Nora rock climbing. At this point in the week, my upper body and lower back were feeling really fatigued from work and I was dreading rock climbing. Then sleeping was uncomfortable. I did a lot of yoga, cupping, foam rolling and using my theragun in the following days.
Friday: I did my usual gym workout which included heavy deadlifts. It was too much. Saturday I woke up and could feel every muscle in my back between the pull-ups and deadlifts.
Saturday: 6 mile very slow recovery run and Advil. By bedtime, I felt great! I did very little the rest of the day which helped.
Sunday: I woke up feeling good, physically. Emotionally I was tired. Stressed. I didn't really want to run. We had plans to go to Echo to run 18 miles. The first bit of the run I had no desire to do it, but couldn't find a reason not to. I realized by mile 6 that this was going to be an exercise in mental toughness. This cue really resonated with me, I had told myself I wanted to be mentally tougher prior to my next race (hints to the two ice baths I took this week). So I ran on. Suddenly at 15 miles, I felt GREAT. I had been letting Sam pace us, and he was beginning to struggle. So I took the lead and finished 4 more miles. It was a great run for me because I could feel my fitness improving after the last 2 weeks of challenging runs. I could have easily run 5+ more miles. We finished faster than our 30K 2 weeks ago with nearly the same elevation.
Nutrition Recap:
I felt really good about my nutrition during my 19 mile run. During races I almost never feel hungry and find I eat very little. During my first 50K I didn't eat anything which was not the plan, but what happened. During our 30K a couple weeks ago I ate very little. But I find while training I try to be much more deliberate with my fueling strategy. Today I ate more than I ever have! I also ate more carbs the day before and ate every 3 miles during our run. I was hungry and I listened well. I made a few new recipes this week which were all really tasty and aided in my efforts to add more carbs to my pre-run meals.
In the coming week, I plan to adjust my strength training workouts to accommodate my hip/lower back discomfort. Hopefully, work doesn't kick my butt so much. We have one more long run of 20 miles next Sunday, then I have surgery on the 6th and then taper for our marathon. So this week will be full, and next week will have a lot of recovery built in!
Below is a chart from Training Peaks showing my fitness steadily improving as planned. A tool I use while programming workouts for my endurance clients as well. The blue line indicates my training stress score which I want to see steadily increase.
I likely won't post so much every week for the next 25 weeks, but thanks for following!
