Training to Taste: A Wine & Dine 2016 Training Report

[CherieFran]

Hi Cheria! I'm following along but am terrible about commenting. Great job getting some running in this week, always tough with house guests.

Love Musha, he's sooo cute!

Thanks for following along! I've been silently catching up through your training report as well - a lot of pages to go through!

Good luck at Tink weekend!

I love the Hal Higdon plans. I have always run my best races when following one of those.

Awesome! I'm hoping it'll serve me well and keep me focused.

 

[CherieFran]

Week of 5/2 - 5/8​

Got my Hal Higdon training plan off to a great start this week! I managed to get all five days of running in plus a day of cross-training. Even better, I had all my workouts in before Sunday, so got to sleep in on Sunday morning totally guilt free! My training plan for the half doesn't technically start for about 6 more weeks, so I did week 1 of the plan with the intention of doing the first two weeks of the plan on repeat a couple of times to get used to it/figure out paces for the different runs, etc. I will definitely be shuffling around the order of the workouts by day to fit in with my schedule.

Monday: 3 miles/26:18
I did this run on the treadmill at work. Technically this was before I decided to jump into the Hal Higdon plan, so I did the same sort of semi-tempo run that I've been doing for the past few months. Felt pretty good after the minimal running from last week.

Tuesday: 2.65 miles/24:26
My first official speed workout! The plan was for 5 X 400m at 5K pace. I don't run that many 5Ks - the last one I did was about a year ago and wasn't necessarily what I felt was a challenging enough pace for a speed workout. So I decided to use my 5K PR pace (from a PR I set 3+ years ago - I don't think I could run that fast for a 5K tomorrow, but I'd like to get back to that point eventually). I ran .5 miles at 10:00 min/mile for warmup. Then I did 5 rounds of .25 miles (it was easier to do the run in miles rather than meters since I was on a treadmill rather than a track) at 7:50 min/mile with .1 miles at 12:00 min/mile in between each to recover. Finished with another .5 miles at 10:00 min/mile. The workout felt hard, but comfortably hard. I may see if I can push the pace just a little more in the next couple of weeks before I have to start increasing the number of repetitions.

Wednesday: 30 minutes of cross-training
I am notoriously bad about cross-training. I walk my dog several times a day and do a fair bit of walking in general, so I pretend that is cross-training, but I could probably benefit from mixing it up so more. For this workout, I did 10 minutes of walking on the treadmill, 10 minutes on the elliptical, and 10 minutes on the bike. I kept the effort very, very easy. I need to figure out how hard (or not) to push this day. I feel like it should be a "rest" day since I only have one other one each week, but it also feels like I won't get a ton of benefit from the alternate types of workouts if I keep it super easy. Also, doing everything slow and easy is kind of boring (which is why I ended up doing three different machines). Once my apartment building's pool opens up in a few weeks, I may try some swimming as cross-training to mix it up some more.

Thursday: 3 miles/26:36
This was an "easy" run on the treadmill. I need to figure out what the right plan/pace is for an easy run. I did about 75% of the run at about 8:35 with a few minutes of warmup and cool down a bit slower. Looking at it, that pace doesn't seem super easy. It felt pretty easy to do for 2 miles and change, but it wouldn't be an easy pace for a long run.

Friday: 3 miles/26:35
Another day, another "easy" run on the treadmill. I used the same breakdown as Thursday since that seemed to work pretty well.

Saturday: 5 miles/45:28
My long run for the week and my only outdoor workout for the week (Of course, we've had rain the last 12 days in a row, so I haven't missed running outside too much). Thankfully, the weather was really nice during the morning. Mid 50s, no rain, and even some blue sky here and there. I ran on my usual trail along the water. With all the recent rain, there was a coastal flooding advisory for high tide. I chose to run south because I thought that was less likely to be flooded than going north. Luckily my path was clear but I ran about an hour or two before high tide and you could see where the water was likely to overtake the path in spots! Definitely felt like I was racing the tide a little bit!

Wine and Dine planning:
Meanwhile, my ADR window opened on Saturday morning! This trip is: (1) short, (2) my first solo trip, (3) during Food and Wine Festival, so I didn't feel the need to make a ton of ADRs. I only made 2 and might cancel 1. The one ADR I am super excited about is Beaches and Cream. I have never been there before!! I'm going to eat an early dinner there on Friday night before the 10K. Hopefully stuffing myself with grilled cheese, tomato soup, and No Way Jose won't be a mistake (I figured it was safer before the 10K than the half!). I also made an ADR for The Plaza Restaurant for an early dinner on Saturday night. I'm planning to spend a few hours in MK on Saturday. I've been to The Plaza Restaurant but it was years ago. The veggie sandwich on the menu was calling my name. I'm currently booked to stay at POFQ. If that sticks (there's a chance it might change), I might decide to cancel this ADR and just stop at Riverside to pick up a build-your-own pasta bowl instead. I'll see how I'm feeling about it when the time gets closer.

Also exciting on Saturday was the monthly area pug meetup at a local dog park. We haven't been able to go for the last couple months, so I was happy the weather held out for this one. Mushu had so much fun running around with about 20 other pugs. He was exhausted on the ride home:

 

[ZellyB]

Great start on your new training plan! Cross-training has always been my nemesis as well, but I've been more faithful about getting in some strength/weight training. We've got a pool as well that is open now and warmed up, so hoping to also work in some swimming.

Mushu looks adorable as usual and there's nothing much cuter than a pug running, so a whole group of them had to have been hilarious!

 

[CherieFran]

Week of 5/9 - 5/15
​

This week's tryout of Week 2 of the Hal Higdon plan went pretty well. Had a few struggles but I think I'm going to like the plan!

Monday: 3 miles/26:36
An "easy" run on the treadmill at work using the same pace as last week. Once I get to my "cruising pace" for the middle 50% of the workout, I'm throwing a towel over the screen and just running for 4 songs or so until I look at it again. Definitely helps with the treadmill boredom not to be waiting for the numbers to tick by.

Tuesday: 3.37 miles/30:00
My first official "tempo" run (done on the treadmill at work). I ran 10 minutes warmup (starting at 10:00 min/mile and gradually increasing to about 9:15 min/mile), 15 minutes building to my max pace (from about 8:30 min/mile to 8:00 min/mile, holding top speed for 3 minutes), and then 5 minutes easy to finish (9:15 back down to 10:00). It's interesting that the overall pace of the workout is basically the same as my "easy" run. Not sure if that's good or bad. It definitely felt like a harder workout, at least for those few minutes at top speed.

Wednesday: 30 minutes cross-training
I had to take Mushu to the vet for his annual checkup/vaccines so that ate into midday workout time. It was raining most of the day but finally broke at the end of the work day so I walked to Trader Joe's and back. It's about 1.4 miles each way, so more than the minimum of 30 minutes for cross-training.

Thursday: 3 miles/25:30
This workout was supposed to be a "pace" workout done at my target half marathon pace. My goal for my September half marathon is sub 1:50 (I PR'd on the same course 2 years ago with 1:52:58). So the pace should be about 8:23. I'd like to train at a target pace more like 8:15-8:20, though, to get some cushion for course crowding, not running tangents, etc. I started this run (on the treadmill at work) at 8:20 pace. About 1.6 miles in, I got a terrible, terrible cramp. I tried to run through it for a minute or two but then just couldn't go on. I slowed down to basically a walk and at the 2 mile mark I hopped off the treadmill to massage it out. I was able to get rid of it after a couple of minutes. Usually, I would have just given up on the workout, but new, committed-to-my-training-plan me got back on and did one more mile. My overall pace for the three miles ended up being 8:30 rather than 8:20 with the slowdown at the end of mile 2 and ramping back up to speed at the start of mile 3, but I'm really proud of myself for getting through the workout!

Friday: Rest day
Went out to lunch with a co-worker for her last day at the office, so a good day for a rest day. Also think I needed it after my "pace" run the day before.

Saturday: 3 miles/26:15
Ran outside for the first time this week! Woohoo! Happily, it wasn't raining in the morning hours, and the weather was pretty close to ideal. I realized that it is much easier to do an "easy" run outside than on the treadmill. The treadmill requires such consciousness and intention with respect to pace (which makes it great for speed, tempo, and pace workouts), but I was able to run much easier by feel outside when I could just let it happen. A super weird thing happened on this run. For some reason in the morning before I went out, I was thinking, "Hmm, I wonder if there's a race in the neighborhood today." (A street around the corner from me is an occasional spot for races as it is wide, straight, and fairly easy to shut down. I know of at least 4 or 5 races that happen there throughout the year). I have absolutely no idea why that thought popped into my head. I strike out on my run and about a third of a mile in I turn the corner and see this:


What?? I swear I had NO IDEA there was a race that day. Runner's instinct? The race hadn't started yet. I had a haircut scheduled shortly, otherwise I would have quit my run then and popped into the building (all the races at this location use the Patent and Trademark Office right next to the start line for their registration/packet pickup/bag check/finish festival, etc. - real bathrooms!!!) to see if they had same-day registration. When I got home I looked it up and found out it was a 5K for a charity related to Iraqi orphans/street children.

Also on Saturday, all the EU embassies in DC were having an open house event, so I spent the afternoon exploring that. It meant walking about 6 miles or so and spending 2+ hours standing in lines. By nighttime my legs were screaming at me! I slept in my compression sleeves in hopes that I wouldn't be too sore for my long run the next morning. On the bright side, pretty perfect training for a race weekend at Disney, right? Also, the Embassy of Belgium was giving out the yummiest food and I pigged out big time:


Sunday: 6 miles/55:13
When I woke up, I was still feeling pretty stiff from the day before and was not excited for my run. Fortunately, once I got up and moving and walked the dog, my muscles seemed to warm up and be okay. I did my usual run south on the trail. The temperature was pretty nice (low 50s), and there was a decent amount of sun, but it was really windy with gusts up to 35 mph. At a few points, I felt like I was barely moving through the wind. Overall the run felt pretty good. There were a few moments where I thought a knee was starting to get cranky but it never really developed into big pain. Proud of my negative splits on this run. My first two miles were at 9:22 pace and my last mile was at 8:56 pace.

It has rained something like 86% of the days in May so far. I'm super sick of rain but Mushu is happy that everything is so. green.

 

[DopeyBadger]

Wow, look like everything is going well. Keep up the good work. It's funny, when I do Tempo workouts or Speed workouts between the rest intervals and warm ups my paces almost always end up being the same as my long run for the average of the run. So you're not alone. Not sure if it's a coincidence or some sort of secret plan.

Funny how us runners just have an instinct we know a race is going on somewhere and we're always ready to join in.

 

[roxymama]

Mushu is insanely cute! That tongue sticking out is how I feel after a lot of my runs

I'm with you on the "not a lot of ADR's" during Food & Wine. If we ever go back that time of year I want to basically fill my stomach around the world instead of inside restaurants. You are doing great with your training and your times make me jealous.

 

[ZellyB]

Training looks like it's going really well. All those food items look delicious and you are right that it sounds like the perfect training plan for a Disney race weekend. I always tell myself when we go that I won't walk around so much before the races and I routinely fail at that.

We've been having a lot of rain around here lately too and it's interrupted some of our training runs. We need the rain badly, but I wish it wouldn't rain right when we are planning to run!

 

[CherieFran]

Wow, look like everything is going well. Keep up the good work. It's funny, when I do Tempo workouts or Speed workouts between the rest intervals and warm ups my paces almost always end up being the same as my long run for the average of the run. So you're not alone. Not sure if it's a coincidence or some sort of secret plan.

Thanks for the validation! Glad it's not just me! My legs certainly felt like they had a harder workout so I guess I need to just trust the plan.

I'm with you on the "not a lot of ADR's" during Food & Wine. If we ever go back that time of year I want to basically fill my stomach around the world instead of inside restaurants. You are doing great with your training and your times make me jealous.

Super excited to eat all the things! I think I will definitely be making a list of what I most want to eat since I'll have only one day at Epcot.

It's funny on the pace. Some days I can't believe how far I've come from 6 years ago when I couldn't even run for two minutes straight. And then others days I'll talk to a truly fast runner ("Oh, you are trying to run that 10 miler in under an hour? That's cool.") and feel like a big slow poke. I am pretty psyched that I can even fathom that running under 1:50 for a half might be possible.

I always tell myself when we go that I won't walk around so much before the races and I routinely fail at that.

I know I am going to fail. Especially since it's going to be such a short trip, it'll be really hard to avoid the temptation to do all my favorite things! I'm going to need to set mandatory park curfews for myself before I get down there!

We've been having a lot of rain around here lately too and it's interrupted some of our training runs. We need the rain badly, but I wish it wouldn't rain right when we are planning to run!

We've had rain for 18 of the last 21 days, and it's been running 15-20 degrees cooler than normal. I know I'll probably be missing this cool weather when it's hot and humid in July and August but I can't helped but be bummed that we're losing out on the nicest month of the year!

 

[CherieFran]

Week of 5/16 - 5/22
​

Back to Week 1 again on the Hal Higdon plan. Can't believe I've managed to keep a streak of running 5 times a week intact for a whole three weeks! Next weekend I'll be out of town and not planning to bring running gear, so will break the streak for sure.

Monday: 3 miles/26:29
Ran this sucker on the treadmill at work. Still using these pre-plan weeks to tinker with speed so I moved my "cruising pace" up a whole 0.1 mph since I seem to be running faster on the road. Made my run about 7 seconds shorter than last week.

Tuesday: 2.65 miles/24:06
Second attempt at the 5 X 400m speed workout at 5K pace. Ran the same workout from 2 weeks ago and did the same thing as the day before with increasing each phase by 0.1 mph. I may continue to do this for the next couple weeks (as long as it feels okay) until I start the actual training plan and the mileage starts increasing.

Wednesday: 3 miles/26:05
Working from home so ran outside at lunchtime. Exciting news of the day was that my very first InknBurn order arrived!!! I ordered the Paeon sports bra and the Healing Mandala shorts since those were two things I could semi-justify needing more of. Of course, I had to try them out immediately! I love, love, love the shorts! They were just so super comfy and fit perfectly. I liked the sports bra as well but didn't love it the way I loved the shorts. Those shorts are awesome!



Also arriving were the 5 pairs of running shoes that I ordered on Zappos! My non-long run shoes are nearing the end of their life and after going through several pairs in the same style, they have sadly been discontinued and are no longer available! I hate trying to find new shoes. Of the five pairs, I liked three fairly well and decided to keep two pairs. One pair is most similar to what I had been running in and another is more of a "racing"-type shoe that I thought would be interesting to use for speed/tempo/pace runs. I really like rotating between two or three or four pairs of shoes. I think it helps with overuse issues when I'm striking the ground slightly differently in each.

Maybe I should be dressing up as Tinker Bell. Add a cotton ball and these suckers are ready to go!


My sort-of racing-type shoes:


Thursday: 2 miles/17:18
Working from home again today so another chance for an easy run outdoors. Thought I'd give my "Tinker Bell" shoes a break-in run so I decided to run for two miles instead of three. Also, my legs were feeling super tired. While out on my run I was thinking about how it was the fourth day in a row running in this training week with no rest/cross-train day in there and that probably wasn't the best idea. When I got home and looked on the calendar, I realized that it was actually my 6th day of running in a row because I ran both the previous Saturday and Sunday as well. Oops! No wonder my legs were feeling tired! Knowing that, I was glad that I kept this run to two miles. I need to do a better job of managing the days I'm running from week-to-week! Meanwhile, I liked the shoes.

Friday: Rest day
Much needed!

Saturday: 5 miles/45:42
The weather forecast was particularly gross for the day, but I wanted to get my long run in anyway because: (1) if I ran on Sunday, I'd be running 5 days in a row into the next week, (2) I had a Sunday morning errand I wanted to run, (3) Sunday's forecast didn't look a ton better than Saturday, and (4) as we all know, sometimes it rains on race day so good to train in the rain. That being said, I did wait until close to 11 am to run when it seemed like the worst of the downpour situation was letting up. I debated hard on what to wear since it was only mid-50s and wet. I ended up in my rain jacket with a tank underneath but once I got outside it wasn't even raining anymore! By 0.5 miles in, I was seriously overheating in the jacket. I ran my usual route along the water. When it started to sprinkle around 3.5 miles, I was actually glad to cool down a bit. Despite way overdressing, I definitely lucked out on the weather for the day. Could have been much worse!

Sunday: 30 minutes "cross-training"
The schedule called for 30 minutes of cross-training but instead I walked for just under an hour (2.8 miles). This guy in the area has been getting a lot of buzz lately for these small batch bagels that he makes and sells for like 1-2 hours a week at a nearby farmer's market. I love bagels. A lot. (Seriously, I bring an extra duffel bag every time I got to NYC just to bring back bagels). So I've really been wanting to check it out and finally managed to fit it into the schedule. I took the metro/bus over there and walked back. Now I know there's a parking lot and I could have driven, but I accomplished my "cross-training" this way. Does it defeat the purpose if all my cross-training activities involve acquiring food?

The other running-related event of the day was signing up for a 5K race in mid-July. My training plan suggests running a 5K, 10K, and 15K in preparation for the half marathon. But given that my target race is in mid-September there aren't a lot of race options in the middle of summer. I couldn't find a 10K that worked but I did find a 5K that is between the 5K and 10K spots on the plan so I'll flip two weeks around to make that work. The race is at 8:30 pm (it's called the Twilighter 5K), so that will be something new for me. It is put on by a local running store that organizes good events, so I'm sure it'll be a good time. I think the course is pretty flat, but who knows what the weather will have in store then! I'm also eyeing a 10 miler that is conveniently the week of the 15K on my schedule but am waiting to pull the trigger on registration for another week or so.

I'll leave with a flashback of when Mushu and Mickey first met and became best friends:

 

[Slogger]

Hello @CherieFran. Following along and enjoying your reports and progress.

Live about 70 miles south of DC and can totally relate to the weather you have experienced including the crazy windy first weekend in April,
and all this rain for the past month. I went out early yesterday and got the downpour you were lucky to avoid. Might need to build an Ark if it keeps up, lol.

Also started a training plan that coincidentally started the beginning of this month and involves running 5 days a week. Congrats on getting through the first 3 weeks! 5 days is a commitment compared to the 3 or 4 that I was used to.

Love Mushu....so cute. Glad the kennel cough recovery process went quickly and he was able to get back to socializing with other dogs!

Looks like you have so many great places to run near DC. Is the trail you run by the Potomac close to the GW Parkway? Have seen many runners on the path and it looks so peaceful and serene next to the river.

Best of luck with your training and travels.

 

[ZellyB]

Welcome to the INKnBurn club! I'm completely obsessed lately and my pocketbook is showing the wear and tear of it. But, I really do love their stuff and I get so many complements when I wear it.

That's a lot of running days in a row there. No wonder your legs were tired. Glad you got a rest day in there.

And throwing in puppy Mushu pictures is the best!!! So cute!!!!

 

[PracticallyPerfectPoppins]

I'm prepping for the Lumiere's Challenge, so I will be stalking this!

 

[CherieFran]

Hello @CherieFran. Following along and enjoying your reports and progress.

Yay!

Also started a training plan that coincidentally started the beginning of this month and involves running 5 days a week. Congrats on getting through the first 3 weeks! 5 days is a commitment compared to the 3 or 4 that I was used to.

Good luck with your training plan as well! Oddly enough, I think I've found one benefit to running 5 days over 3 or 4 is that I know that I won't have that many off days so I'm less tempted to skip a day and tell myself I'll get it in later in the week since there's just not that much room to do that. So I am more likely to get the 5 in than the 3 or 4. Strange logic maybe, but it seems to be working.

Looks like you have so many great places to run near DC. Is the trail you run by the Potomac close to the GW Parkway? Have seen many runners on the path and it looks so peaceful and serene next to the river.

Yep, you know exactly where I am running! It's a great trail although sometimes I freak myself out if I go further down by Mount Vernon because it gets very quiet.

Welcome to the INKnBurn club! I'm completely obsessed lately and my pocketbook is showing the wear and tear of it

I am going to have to be very careful for sure!

I'm prepping for the Lumiere's Challenge, so I will be stalking this!

I'm so excited for Lumiere's Challenge even though it is still so far away!!

 

[CherieFran]

Week of 5/23 - 5/29
​

I knew going into this week that I was only going to get 4 days of running in, so I did Week 2 of my plan minus the "long run".

Monday: 3 miles/26:29
My standard treadmill "easy run." Nothing too exciting here except that I wore what will be my new "long run" shoes to break them in. I've been through four or five pairs of the Asics Nimbus at this point and have been really happy with them, so decided there was no need to fix what wasn't broken. These are technically not the newest model because I was able to get the second newest model for 25% off, so figured it made sense to save a little.


Tuesday: 3 miles/24:40
I headed outside for my "pace" run this week and wore my new "speed work" shoes for the first time. I was really happy with the way the shoes felt. And I definitely think I need to try and do these pace runs outside whenever possible rather than just rely on the autopilot of the treadmill. It is supposed to be done at my target half marathon pace (which is about 8:15-8:20). I started out way too fast, and it took me about 1/3 of a mile to figure out what that pace actually felt like, so overall the run was at 8:13 pace. It was comfortably hard, and I felt pretty good about it overall.

Wednesday: 3 miles/26:01
Was able to get this run done outside as well after work. It was pretty toasty warm out, and my legs felt pretty tired for the first mile (probably from the pace run), but overall it was a good, uneventful run.

Thursday: 3.4 miles/30:00
30 minutes tempo run on the treadmill. Did 10 minutes of easy running warm-up, 15 minutes as progressively faster speeds building up to a max of 8:00 min/mile for 3 minutes, then 5 minutes of easy running cool down. One advantage to speed and tempo workouts is that the warm-up and cool down are built into the plan so I actually do them. For easy runs, I usually don't do more than about 2 minutes on either end which is probably not a great habit.

Friday, Saturday, Sunday: Rest (?) days
No running while I was out of town for my college reunion. I was hoping I'd come back with well-rested legs but I ended up walking like 6 miles each day (including up and down some big hills) and spent most of the time on my feet, so I came home pretty wiped out. I'll pretend that it was one giant cross-training session and that it offset all the eating and drinking that I did over the weekend.

Meanwhile, Mushu was nice enough to model the souvenir that I brought back for him:

 

[CherieFran]

Week of 5/30 - 6/5​

Back to 5 days of running in the week. The theme of this week (and I guess probably all weeks for the next few months) was definitely humidity! Only semi-exciting running happening of the week was that I signed up for a 10 miler in August. It happened to be the same week as my training plan calls for a 15K race (do those even exist?) so it worked out well. The race is in Annapolis which is about 45 minutes from me, so I'll get up super duper early and drive there on race morning. It's the 41st running of this particular race so should be a good event. I ran a half marathon on a similar course in Annapolis a few years ago. The course was beautiful but very hilly. It'll also probably be hot so don't think I'll be planning on setting any records, but will be nice to get a longer race in before my target half.

Monday: 3 miles/28:29
Wow, this run felt terrible! Took advantage of the day off to run outside in the morning but man, it was rough. My legs felt like lead in the beginning. Just after the two mile point, while I was waiting for a traffic light to change, I suddenly got hit with a (thankfully very brief) wave of dizziness. For a split second, I started planning where I was going to sit down. Luckily it passed quickly and after a minute or two of walking I was able to run slowly the rest of the way. I'm assuming I was adjusting to the higher humidity as well as suffering from the lack of sleep and hydration over the weekend. I usually drink a ton of water but being out of town for three days definitely put me behind.

Tuesday: 2.65 miles/24:00
My 5 X 400m speed workout on the treadmill with a half mile warm up and cool down. Kept the pace the same as last time and felt good about it.

Wednesday: 3 miles/26:15
Took this run back outside. It was still super humid but I was properly hydrated this time so didn't feel too terrible.

Thursday: 30 minutes cross-training
Did 10 minutes on the elliptical, 10 minutes walking on the treadmill, and 10 minutes on the bike. I still haven't figured out the right level of effort for this workout. I didn't break a sweat until the last couple minutes on the bike but my quads felt like the got a major workout on the elliptical portion. I don't really know the appropriate resistance versus speed to target for the elliptical. I could definitely push harder but not sure that I should.

Friday: 3 miles/26:30
Boring treadmill run. Same old, same old.

Saturday: Rest Day
Woohoo! Mushu had his monthly pug meetup where he taught a puppy what's what at the dog park. These two had a blast together:


Sunday: 5 miles/45:44
Another humid day for my weekly long run. On the plus side, it didn't rain and it was mostly overcast so at least I didn't have the sun beating down on me. I decided to run north instead of south since it had been a little while since I had done that. The north route is tough in the summer since there's not much shade. Also, the river tends to flood at high tide when there has been any recent rain. Which apparently there has:

Fortunately the trail was passible and the run was uneventful. Still loving my InknBurn shorts so much!

 

[ZellyB]

We've had a lot of rain and humidity around these parts too. Yuck! It's too early for this much humidity. Glad the trail was clear even it looks like other areas got flooded out.

 

[CherieFran]

Week of 6/6 - 6/12
​

I feel like my training journal, and my training, has gotten super repetitive and not very interesting. Happily, this is the last week of the pre-training-plan portion of my training plan. Next week I start "Week 1" of the 12 week plan (Higdon Intermediate 2) officially and for the final time. I'll do Weeks 1 and 2, then hit pause on the plan for two weeks while I vacation (and also do some running hopefully but maintenance, not trying to stick to the training plan) and then pick back up on Week 3. Looking forward to having races in July, August, September to make things more interesting!

Monday: Rest
Weird to start out my week with a rest day, but it made the most sense in the schedule. It just makes me nervous to "use up" my rest day at the start since if something doesn't go according to plan later in the week, I may have trouble getting all the runs in. Perils of running 5 days a week. Luckily it wasn't a problem this week.

Tuesday: 3.4 miles/30:00
Tempo run on the treadmill. Felt pretty good. Sticking with the same paces until the runs start getting a little longer in a few weeks.

Wednesday: 3 miles/26:10
Ran this one outside in the morning before working from home. The weather was pretty nice - not too hot, not too humid.

Thursday: 3 miles/27:56
A rough run on the treadmill at work. I started into the run, and as I ramped up the pace towards my cruising speed, it just felt so hard! I probably could have just gritted my way through it, but I had a little talk with myself and reminded me that this was supposed to be an "easy" run and that the most important thing was to get the miles in, not get them in at a particular pace! Once I shut down my competitive side, I eased up the speed until it actually felt more like an easy run. In the end, the run wasn't really that far off my pace. I need to remember that the important thing is to get the miles in and not be so obsessed maintaining an exact pace, especially if it's supposed to be an easy run! In retrospect, I think the problem was the snack that I had about an hour or so before my run. I bought a (super delicious) spinach artichoke pastry from a new bakery in my work neighborhood. It ended up being much more filling that I anticipated, so I think it was still sitting there, weighing my down when it came time to run.

Friday: 30 minutes cross-training
I was going to do a round of elliptical/bike/treadmill in the gym, but the weather was so, so nice (it's like spring came back to visit for a day or two) that I really just wanted to be outside. So instead I took a half hour walk at lunchtime. It wasn't really much of a workout but getting to enjoy the weather was worth it.

Saturday: 3 miles/24:42
Pace run on the schedule this week. This is the first time I've actually done the pace run and the long run as they are written on the training plan - that is, on back-to-back days. I wasn't sure if or how that would impact Sunday's run. Completed this run (outside before it got too beastly hot) at an average pace of 8:14 versus my target of 8:15-8:20, so feeling pretty good about it. It felt hard but not like I was running at 100% (which is good since I am hoping to run 10 more miles at about this pace come September)!

Sunday: 6 miles/54:52
Very much a summer run - 79 degrees and humid at 7 am. On the positive side, there were some high clouds that helped blunt the force of the sun for the first four miles, so that definitely helped. I was worried that Saturday's pace run would make my legs super tired, but once I was warmed up after a mile or so I felt pretty good. I like to try to "kick" the last quarter mile or so to practice finishing strong on tired legs. So I ran the first mile at 9:25 and the last at 8:49. Definitely happy with that!
Meanwhile, I was having a weird pain in my calf. I noticed it when walking the dog before my run. It's very odd. There is one specific spot in my right upper calf that is painful. It's a really contained area. I could draw a circle about the size of a quarter around it. I don't know if it's a knot or what. It also only hurts when walking. I didn't feel it at all while running. So the most painful parts of my long run were actually the one minute walk breaks that I take after every mile. I'm going to do some extra massage and foam rolling and stretching of that area and hopefully will work it out. If anyone has any thoughts or suggestions, I am all ears!

All this summer heat has Mushu rocking some serious tongue action:

 

[CherieFran]

Week of 6/13 - 6/19
​

Finally officially at Week 1 of my training plan! 12* weeks until my goal race - the Navy-Air Force half marathon!
*Actually 13 weeks because I'm planning to pause the plan for vacation next month.

Monday: 3 miles/26:28
Easy miles on the treadmill at work at a pace about 30-35 seconds slower than goal race pace.

Tuesday: 2.65 miles/24:01
Speed work day on the treadmill. 0.5 miles warmup at 9:50 pace. 5 X 0.25 miles at 7:42 pace with 0.1 miles at 11:32 pace in between. 0.5 miles cool-down at 9:50 pace.

Wednesday: Rest day

Thursday: 3 miles/26:28
Another set of easy miles on the treadmill. I noticed that my right knee was bugging me a bit. I had big problems with this knee about 4 years ago that took months to recover from, and it's never really been the same. I've been managing it pretty well the past few years (taping it for long runs, etc.) and haven't had really any pain in the last year or so. Super frustrating that it's suddenly bugging *just* as I am kicking off a training plan. I've been on cruise control for 6 or 7 weeks with steady mileage and no real increase in distance or effort recently so no idea what is causing the problem. I'm icing and doing some extra PT stuff and hoping it doesn't get worse.

Friday: Rest day
I was planning on another easy run but in deference to the stupid right knee, I decided to take the day off instead.

Saturday: 5 miles/48:18
I really didn't want to skip this run altogether so I decided to give it a shot and see how the knee felt. Instead of my normal run-a-mile/walk-a-minute, I decided to do 4:1 intervals to give my knee a little extra break. The knee was a little achy for the first few minutes of the run but then the pain faded away. After that, the only time it hurt was when I'd switch back to running from a walk interval. It would hurt for 2 or 3 strides and then be fine. I tried hard not to push and skipped any sort of attempt to kick faster at the end of the run. I think I came away from it all pretty unscathed. The knee isn't hurting at all otherwise, although it is doing some extra popping and creaking.

Sunday: 3 miles/27:52
I decided that things seemed okay enough to try and make up the run I skipped on Friday. I concentrated hard on keeping the effort very easy. The knee seemed okay until just after mile 2. It started to hurt just a bit so I slowed down my pace (it had creeped up some over the course of the first two miles) and that seemed to be enough to make the pain stop. So right now I am hopeful that I'll be able to continue to get miles in by making adjustments to my pace as needed to keep the pain at bay.

Another Mushu-tongue-in-the-grass pic, because why not:

 

[CherieFran]

Week of 6/20 - 6/26
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Official Week 2 of the half marathon training plan! Meanwhile, I'm putting a pause on the training plan for the next two weeks while I cruise to Alaska! I'm still planning on running but mostly just some easy runs (I have a goal to run 4 times during the 10 days I am gone). My knee seems to be stable. It's definitely not 100% but doesn't seem to be getting worse, so cautiously optimistic.

Monday: 3 miles/26:32
Started the week with an easy run on the treadmill at work. Started just slightly slower than normal but the knee seemed to be pretty okay so then sped it up to my regular pace for most of the run.

Tuesday: 3 miles/24:43
Did my pace run outside before work. I was a little nervous about whether I should even attempt a pace run with the knee this week, so I told myself that I would turn it into an easy run at the first sign of trouble. Didn't have any issues, though. Overall, completed the run at 8:14 average pace versus my target of 8:15-8:20.

Wednesday: 40 minute walk
It was too nice a day to motivate myself to cross-train on machines in the gym, so I took a nice, long lunchtime walk at work instead.

Thursday: 3.4 miles/30:00
30 minutes tempo run. 10 minute warm-up at paces from 9:50 to 9:14. 15 minutes tempo at paces from 8:27 to 8:00. Then 5 minute cool-down at the same paces as the warm-up.

Friday: 3 miles/26:30
Easy run on the treadmill. Nothing too exciting here.

Saturday: 6 miles/55:35
My long run this week was a little weird. I had plans starting early enough in the day that I couldn't get my run in beforehand (Well, I could have, but I didn't want to get up at 5 am on a Saturday!). I also didn't want to wait until Sunday to do this run because I was planning on running Monday through Thursday before leaving on vacation and didn't want to run 5 days in a row. Anyway, what this all ended up meaning is that I did my run at 3:30 in the afternoon! In theory, I could have waited until later in the evening, but I was worried that I would lose my motivation if I didn't get it done as soon as I got home. It was in the mid-80s with not a cloud in the sky so felt pretty toasty but not totally brutal. The first few miles went well but by mid-way through the 4th mile I was starting to feel pretty wiped out. I ended up switching to 3:1 intervals for the last two miles which I think was definitely a good move. Overall, I was really happy with my pace, especially considering the time of day/weather.

Sunday: Rest
Woohoo! Spent a lot of the day on the move but spending the evening chilling with this dude:

 

[CherieFran]

Week of 6/27 - 7/3
Week of 7/4 - 7/10
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Man, picking back up with real life after 10 days of vacation is rough. I purposely didn't plan to continue with my training program while I was gone as I knew that wouldn't be an achievable goal. Instead, my goal was to run 4 times in 4 days before I went on vacation and 4 times during the 10 days of vacation. How did it go? Spoiler alert: Not well.

Monday (6/27): 3 miles/26:29
Boring "easy" run on the treadmill at work

Tuesday: 3 miles/26:29
Same as yesterday!

Wednesday: 3 miles/26:17
Ran outside before work at home. Temps weren't terrible but it was sunny and humid. My legs felt heavy for the first mile but improved for miles two and three.

Thursday: 2.65 miles/24:08
Speed work day! Ran on the treadmill with same paces/distances from two weeks ago: 0.5 miles warmup at 9:50 pace. 5 X 0.25 miles at 7:42 pace with 0.1 miles at 11:32 pace in between. 0.5 miles cool-down at 9:50 pace.

Friday: 0 miles/Travel Day
Worked almost a full day then flew 6 hours from DC to Seattle! Vacation time!!

Saturday: 3 miles/26:32
Starting vacation on the right track. Ran on the (very nice) treadmill at the (very nice) hotel gym. I would have loved to try to run outside (although the Seattle hills maybe would have killed me) but the extra accessories required for an outdoor run didn't make the packing cut.

Sunday: 0 miles/Cruise Time!
Boarded a cruise to Alaska! Woohoo!

Monday: 3 miles/26:39
So nobody warned me how hard running on a treadmill at sea would be! This was an entire sea day. The ocean wasn't terribly rough (though our waiter at dinner told us later it was the roughest it had been in the last three weeks) but you could definitely feel a good bit of movement. The gym was packed at about 7:30 am but luckily someone got off the treadmill just as I walked over so I snagged it. This was probably the hardest "easy" run I have ever done. A lot of extra effort went into not falling off the treadmill. It was a super odd feeling as the ship went up and down. My knees felt like they were crunching into the treadmill as the ship came up and then my feet felt like they were nearly losing contact with the belt as the ship went down. I did have a front row view of the ocean, so that was nice! Meanwhile, my throat had a super annoying tickle all day long. Wonder what that could mean?



Tuesday: 0 miles
We were in port in Juneau so I hadn't planned to run this day. The throat tickle turns into chest congestion and a cough.

Wednesday: 0 miles
This day was at sea with a few hours spent at a glacier in the afternoon. I had been hoping to run this morning, but it was clear that I had a cold (I'm blaming the flight over). My voice was basically gone. I didn't feel terrible but didn't feel great, and it seemed to make the most sense to conserve energy for the port activities/Alaska touring rather than running.

Thursday: 0 miles
In port in Sitka. Hadn't plan to run this day. Still sick with a lost voice.

Friday: 0 miles
In port in Ketchikan. Also hadn't planned to run this day. My chest/throat cold seemed to be improving so I declared that the worst was over. Usually my colds follow a pretty consistent progression: sore throat -> head cold -> chest cold/cough. I hadn't had the head cold piece at all.

Saturday: 0 miles
And I was 100% percent wrong. I had been hoping to get a run in this morning or early afternoon as we were at sea until 6 pm. But overnight, the cold suddenly decided it wasn't done with me. Got a terrible night of sleep (or lack of sleep) with sinus congestion/sneezing/running nose, etc. (sorry, TMI!) and was just not interested in accomplishing the run.

Sunday: 0 miles
Off the ship in the morning with enough time in Seattle to find a pharmacy with nasal decongestant spray to keep me from dying of pain in flight, then spent the entire day flying home. Flight got delayed, so didn't get home until midnight. Still feeling crummy.

So that was a downer/complaint-filled update! Although the cold threw a wrench in my vacation running plans, for the most part I was able to see and enjoy everything as planned (we bailed on the last port stop, Victoria, a little early but thankfully I had been there before). Alaska was beautiful and we had amazing weather! In an effort to find a positive note for the running, the bonus time off hopefully gave my knee some good R&R time, so I'm hoping it won't give me any more trouble. Still struggling to recover from the cold and am now thinking that I may have a sinus infection so I've already missed at least one day from my next week of training. Hoping to make some recovery progress soon as I have a 5K on July 23, and I was really gunning for a PR!

Mushu reflecting about how I feel: