The last couple of weeks, I've been waiting, monitoring every itch and sneeze. It is time.
Ragweed, ugh. What a horrible plant. Excuse my while I attempt to claw out my eyes to get some relief from the itching, my god, the ITCHING.
(Really, thanks to the miracles of modern medicine, it's mostly under control. Bless you Big Pharma and your assorted side effect free antihistamines. I just wish when you say 24 hours on the box that it actually meant 24 hours, and not the 12-15 hours of relief I actually get)
Monday: Fourth day in a row where I didn't get up an ungodly hour to run! Weird. My glute, which caused me problems at Midsummer, felt OK, but my shins were really sore (I blame the boardwalk. I'm blaming everything on that boardwalk from now on). I rolled my legs out a few times in my lab at work, which helped a lot. I did not, however, think to roll my hips (FORESHADOWING!).
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| What? Doesn't everyone keep a travel sized foam roller next to their computer? |
Monday night I went to a TRX class, where I got to play DJ. Fun for me, not sure how much everyone else appreciated my selections, but I did go heavy on the motivating pop music. For the record, TRX burpees are ridiculously hard.
Tuesday: 10k with 6k at tempo pace. Glad I got this out of the way early in the morning - I felt good when I woke up and during the run, but by the time I got to work and walked my kid across campus for her summer camp, I was feeling the after effects of that TRX class. So very very sore. Tara learned some evil new tricks at the CanFitPro conference, clearly!
The tempo was all over the place. I was thinking 5:20/km, and ended up with 5:35 (deliberately eased into it), 5:07 (oops), 5:12, 5:26, 5:20 (there it is), 5:10 (what?). I wanted to do the 6k continuous but poor planning had me at a stoplight after the first 2k, then back at the same stoplight 2k later. So it turned more into 3 sets of 2km. Whatever.
Wednesday: Easy 12k stupidly early. There were an unusual number of cop cars driving around, which I thought was a bit strange. I found out later they were looking for an elderly man who hadn't shown up to a BBQ the night before. Wish one of them had told me what was up, I'd have kept an eye out! He was found, thankfully.
The tempo was all over the place. I was thinking 5:20/km, and ended up with 5:35 (deliberately eased into it), 5:07 (oops), 5:12, 5:26, 5:20 (there it is), 5:10 (what?). I wanted to do the 6k continuous but poor planning had me at a stoplight after the first 2k, then back at the same stoplight 2k later. So it turned more into 3 sets of 2km. Whatever.
Wednesday: Easy 12k stupidly early. There were an unusual number of cop cars driving around, which I thought was a bit strange. I found out later they were looking for an elderly man who hadn't shown up to a BBQ the night before. Wish one of them had told me what was up, I'd have kept an eye out! He was found, thankfully.
Serious delayed onset muscle soreness from the TRX and possibly the tempo, so I kept the pace on this one very slow.
Thursday: Hmmm, I'm short on pictures this week. What can I say, now that it's dark out when I run, all my pictures look like this:
Annnnyway, I met Patty at the swanky Catholic high school track (no tripping hazards or holes! It's fancy!) to run some intervals. 2k warmup, 4 x 1k repeats, cool down. No idea on the splits because my watch was being insane - I started it in the wrong mode, then switched it to the right one without restarting the session, and I think that made it have a little hissy fit and refuse to record my intervals. They felt hard, so good enough.
I was supposed to do TRX Thursday night. But so very very tired and so very very comfortable sitting in my chair. Eventually I forced myself to do the short DVD Patty loaned me (which I should probably return to her at some point), which I have to say, is a pretty decent workout for a runner in 25 minutes. Certainly the leg exercises are tougher than you might think you'd be able to do without weights - one legged squats leave me so sore, no matter how often I do them.
Friday: Yay for rest days!
Saturday: Patty is the 2:15 pacer (doing 10&1s) for the Oakville half, and wanted to test run the course. So Amy and I decided to be her pace group and joined her. It's a very pleasant course. Lots of shade, which gives it an edge on the Milton Half, IMO, if I was going to rank the local fall half marathons. Milton, however, has a much better parking situation, which can be a pretty important aspect of a race! It was nice to get a feel for the course - although I'm running the 10k instead of the half, the 10k runs along a portion of the half route. Plus I talked Amy into running the 10k too, and we should hopefully be able to pace each other to a fast finish. Assuming I don't manage to trip her at some point to improve my age group placing. Watch your back, Amy!
Naturally we encountered a running group right as we hit a 1 minute walk break. I resisted the urge to tell them that normally we don't walk (like anyone cares).
I was thinking the run might feel super easy, with the slower than usual pace and the walk breaks, but man, I do not like 10&1s very much. I spend way too much time anticipating the walk breaks and then the breaks themselves seem way too short. My legs were every bit as tired at the end as they are when we run a more typical 5:50/km ish pace. Patty was happy because we got the pace pretty much bang on right, so yay to good pacing.
Sunday: Supposed to do an 8k recovery run, but my left hip was pretty sore Saturday afternoon. Sitting at a desk all week leaves my hips really tight, and every so often after a long run I'll have hip issues. I've really been slacking on using my foam roller - when I do preventative rolling a few times a week I'm a lot less likely to have issues.
My hip felt a lot better when I got up Sunday morning, so I really really really wanted to sneak in at least an easy 5k, but there was still some tightness and a touch of pain so I forced myself to sit my ass down and rest it. One missed 8k run is not a big deal in the larger scheme of things, and I'd rather have a healthy hip.
I did some foam rolling and my favourite yoga video to round out the week. It is unbelievable how much better my hip helped after the rolling. Why can't I manage to do that regularly?
Weekly summary: 52.2 km run in 5:19:46, 2 TRX workouts, and some yoga time. I wanted to hit 60k this week, but it is what it is. I'm pretty happy with how consistently I've been doing TRX over the summer; having straps at home means I really have no excuse not to get in at least some basic strength and core work a couple of times a week to support my running.
Thursday: Hmmm, I'm short on pictures this week. What can I say, now that it's dark out when I run, all my pictures look like this:
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| So pretty! |
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| Post early morning run recovery. Chocolate milk on the left, Cola Nuun on the right. I drink the Nuun entirely for the hit of caffeine. |
Friday: Yay for rest days!
Saturday: Patty is the 2:15 pacer (doing 10&1s) for the Oakville half, and wanted to test run the course. So Amy and I decided to be her pace group and joined her. It's a very pleasant course. Lots of shade, which gives it an edge on the Milton Half, IMO, if I was going to rank the local fall half marathons. Milton, however, has a much better parking situation, which can be a pretty important aspect of a race! It was nice to get a feel for the course - although I'm running the 10k instead of the half, the 10k runs along a portion of the half route. Plus I talked Amy into running the 10k too, and we should hopefully be able to pace each other to a fast finish. Assuming I don't manage to trip her at some point to improve my age group placing. Watch your back, Amy!
Naturally we encountered a running group right as we hit a 1 minute walk break. I resisted the urge to tell them that normally we don't walk (like anyone cares).
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| Purdy picture because I got to the meeting spot early and wandered down to the lake to see the sunrise. |
Sunday: Supposed to do an 8k recovery run, but my left hip was pretty sore Saturday afternoon. Sitting at a desk all week leaves my hips really tight, and every so often after a long run I'll have hip issues. I've really been slacking on using my foam roller - when I do preventative rolling a few times a week I'm a lot less likely to have issues.
My hip felt a lot better when I got up Sunday morning, so I really really really wanted to sneak in at least an easy 5k, but there was still some tightness and a touch of pain so I forced myself to sit my ass down and rest it. One missed 8k run is not a big deal in the larger scheme of things, and I'd rather have a healthy hip.
I did some foam rolling and my favourite yoga video to round out the week. It is unbelievable how much better my hip helped after the rolling. Why can't I manage to do that regularly?
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| Cousin It impression because I couldn't find a hair elastic. Where do hair elastics go, anyway? Every couple of months I buy like a hundred of them and they all gradually disappear. |
Weekly summary: 52.2 km run in 5:19:46, 2 TRX workouts, and some yoga time. I wanted to hit 60k this week, but it is what it is. I'm pretty happy with how consistently I've been doing TRX over the summer; having straps at home means I really have no excuse not to get in at least some basic strength and core work a couple of times a week to support my running.
I don't recognize you with your hair down and your face covered with hair.
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