Fall 2013 training week 15: 1 week to go

TAPER!!!!! Time to fret about whether I've trained enough, check the long term forecast repeatedly, and try and figure out what I'm going to wear for the actual race.

Monday: Rest day. I might have done yoga, but now I can't remember. My troublesome hip was a bit cranky after the trail race/long run back to back combo, so lots of foam rolling and stretching throughout the week.

Tuesday: Lunch run. Easy 7.8k. Not much to say about it really. It was a run.

Used my new gym bag from the Run for the Toad. That was exciting.

 Wednesday: Early morning tempo. No complaints (yes, I am running out of things to say). 2k warmup, 4k at HM pace, cooldown. Splits were 5:19, 5:16, 5:21, 5:19. So pretty much right on.

 Another yoga video in the evening. La dee dah.

Thursday: Can you tell I'm getting eager to just get to the race already? Easy 8k early in the morning. It was dark.

I spent much of the week reading surgical journals for work. Surgical articles sometimes include pictures. I deserved a donut after some of what I saw.

The weird pain in my glute I got at Midsummer showed up again while I was sitting in a meeting, and I had a flash of recognition - sciatica. Damn it. I remember it from the first time I was pregnant. Made an appointment with my physiotherapist for next week to see if there's anything she can do to help. At the moment it only hurts when I'm sitting for a long time and is fine if I stand or run, so at least there's that. Since I mostly work at a computer all day, though, it's not exactly a great development. Maybe I can talk them into a standing desk!

Friday: Rest day. Took my kids apple picking and made a bunch of thanksgiving themed cupcakes.

Saturday: long run with my husband! A first for us. Usually running together isn't an option because for some reason they frown on people leaving small children unsupervised. My brother was supposed to join us too but he got to clean puke out of his car instead when my niece got carsick. You can laugh at him, we did!

Heading out. Perfect morning for a run.

We ran to a rail trail and did a straightforward 13k out and back with a few stops for nutrition and such.  Unfortunately the leaves were about a week past peaking so it was a little less colourful than I'd been hoping, but we still had a great time. 

Couldn't get a good picture of the cows. There were a lot of cows.

 Tried out my planned outfit for scotia, and it worked out well. 

Haven't fully settled on the shirt yet, but the skirt is a winner.

Of course that afternoon was the big family turkey dinner, yay!

Mmm, carbs with gravy.

Sunday: Easy 10k. The plan had been 15 Saturday and 8 Sunday, but my husband had never run more than 12, and I didn't want to push him too far on Saturday. So I cut that one to 13k, and made up the missed mileage Sunday. 

You can't see in the picture that I'm completely soaked from the rain. It stopped when I was about 5 minutes from home, naturally.

One week until the race now. The training is essentially over - some easy runs this week just to keep moving, maybe a few km at race pace just to lock in the feeling, but the hard work is done! I'll do a pre-race post later this week once I'm in full on rest/carb loading mode.

Weekly stats: 48.8k run in 4:50:12. A couple of yoga sessions and lots of time with the foam roller. Race day is almost here!!