Mississauga Marathon training: week 6, Chilly half week!

If this isn't the last week of ultra-cold temperatures, I may have to throw an epic tantrum.

Monday: TRX class in the evening. It turns out when you don't go to TRX for a few weeks, it gets REALLY REALLY HARD. That's so unfair.

Tuesday: Easy run at lunch. Core was so sore from TRX the night before. Stupid planks and mountain climbers. As soon as I started running my left achilles/calf felt really tight, so I took things slow and cut it a bit short (6.5k instead of 8k). Also it was stupid cold again, and I am just so over that.

Wednesday: Still super cold! Screw you, weather! 8k easy at lunch. Achilles the same. Just stiff enough to make me worried about it. A few minutes doing calf stretches and then using the foam roller I keep in my office seemed to sort it out after the run and make it feel pretty close to normal.

Also, made the decision to go for 1:50 at the Chilly half, because that's a smart thing to do when you aren't very confident, have done a grand total of one tempo run, and your leg is acting weird. Nicole pretty much decided for me, and since I tend to run well when other people tell me what to do, why the hell not. My theory was, even if I flamed out spectacularly, my time would still be reasonably decent.

Thursday: Skipped running in favour of a visit to the physiotherapist. Hey, look at me being all sensible and shit. After a tentative diagnosis of calf muscle strain, massage, ultrasound, and application of KT tape, the problem area felt fantastic. Physio gave me permission to run the Chilly half if I took Friday and Saturday as rest days first, and promised to come back after the race so she can see how things are healing. Also she wants me to do some rehab exercises to work on muscle imbalances in my hips.

Sexxxy KT tape job. Can't believe they didn't offer me a choice of colours! Black, so boring.

Did my first round of PT mandated therapy exercises in the evening. Clamshells are really not the most attractive exercise.

Friday: Still really cold out. There's a joke about Frozen* to be made here but I'm far too cold to think of it. Just the walk from my car to the office I thought I was going to get frostbite on my face. This winter sucks.

*I can't get that song out of my head. You know the one. Let it go, let it go...

Fitness wise, rest, as ordered. Let's call it a taper, that's mentally much more manageable than 'resting due to injury'. I picked up a new pair of my usual shoe, since I suspect part of the calf problem was wearing old shoes for too many runs.

And of course the traditional Friday pre-race burrito the size of my head. Yum.

Saturday: Rest Taper, as ordered. Did my PT exercises. Sam and I both agree that one of the best things about a race weekend is spending Saturday morning in your pajamas like the regular people do, instead of getting up at the crack 'o early and running 20+ km in the dark and cold. The normals might be on to something with this.

The Hello Kitty bathrobe is optional. Shut up, I'm totally cool.

Also, March 1st! February stats ended up being 210.5 km run, for my first 200+ month since September. Really glad I made it over 200k before I took the days off for my calf issue.

Sunday: Chilly half! Race report to come. Spoiler: I need to update my PB list in the sidebar...

Weekly total: 36.1 km run, 1 physical therapy visit.

Originally this was going to be a cut week, but it ended up being a bigger cutback than I'd planned (I missed about 12k of planned running). Probably for the best - obviously I'd much rather take a few days now to heal up a potential trouble spot, then possibly have bigger issues during the peak training weeks. I'll be doing weekly/biweekly visits to my PT for the next little while to keep everything running smoothly. The good news is my calf felt fine during the Chilly half, so hopefully that problem is taken care of.

Now, hopefully, back to increasing mileage, and on to the next race, Around the Bay.