Whew, last week was a tough one for sure. It's gotten warm here in the DC area and it's really been taking it's toll on my not training (but sort of always training) running. Most of May so rainy and cold (it started raining the day Prince died and didn't stop for what felt like forever) that with the arrival of summer temperatures it was tough to get in any sort of quality runs last week.
After the Historic Half (see post here), I was kind of DONE with running. I decided that I would take a week off and enjoy a week of doing absolutely nothing physical. Although I thoroughly enjoyed my week off of ADULTING, I missed running and jumped right back into it... kind of. For the last two years I have been one of those people that feels GUILTY missing a workout and the last few weeks I have been making a concerted effort to not feel guilty.
I am generally an after work runner (I'm one of those people that will talk myself into sleeping more rather than run) so the heat and humidity are always at full force during my summer training. Last week was no exception to that...
Monday morning, I packed my gym bag and made plans to go out for an easy 3 miles after work, However, mother nature had other plans for me.Normally I would totally run in the rain and love it (during training in the summer), but a huge storm rolled in and I just did not feel like running in a thunder storm and since I'm not officially training for the NYC Marathon yet. I decided that I do not HAVE to run in the rain at this point, so I didn't, I went home and opened a bottle of wine and watched the storm roll in and roll out from the comfort of my balcony.
Tuesday and Thursday I met up with a group that I usually run with at and took out to the trail. I was super excited that the temperatures had FINALLY reached the 80 degree marks and it was time to pull out the tank tops and shorts for good. In all of my excitement (BOTH DAYS) I totally forgot that the humidity SUCKS in DC in the summer, it's kinda like running through soup and it makes it hard to breathe and keep going. I tried to press through on both days but for each day I broke down around mile 1.5 and by the end of my 3 miles on Thursday I was starting to feel defeated... which is NOT the way that I want to lead into Marathon Training. My intervals (yes, I am an interval runner) went from (run/walk) 2/1 to 1:30/1:30 to 1/1 and I was GUZZLING water at every walk interval, which was not helping to not feel bloated and sloshy (yup, I made up a word). I decided that I was going to chalk it up to a bad running week and make a plan for everything to be better.
Saturday morning my friends ventured out to my neck of the woods (they all live 30 minutes away and we generally meet near them) to try out a different route to shake things up. The first couple of miles (we did 6) were fairly normal and being mostly downhill they felt easy. I was do happy that running had FINALLY become enjoyable again. We ran 2 miles to Roosevelt Island and started down the path. About a quarter of a mile into the run we were suddenly on a small trail in the middle of the woods complete with tree roots, fallen trees, DEAD SNAKES and large rocks. As we adopted the "run when you can" mentality I couldn't help but think to myself "of course we get lost in the woods when I'm just starting to feel good running again". After about a quarter of a mile, we found the large packed gravel path (the one that I thought we would be running on for all of our time on the island) and picked up the pace again (there was also a large section of dock that we ran on). I was feeling great at this point and we were rocking and rolling off the island when BAM! I hit the freakin' wall at MILE 3.75. The next 2.25 miles were a nightmare of an uphill battle (both figuratively and literally) and I felt like I was losing bad! The last 1.75 miles were uphill through the Rosslyn Neighborhood of Arlington and the hill which I lovingly call HELL HILL (ok, maybe not so lovingly) was kicking my butt. Jamie and Rachel were totally having a great run and bounding up the hill, while Natalie and I were walking more than running and complaining about the hill the entire time. I think that at one point Jamie and Rachel were at least a quarter mile ahead of us and we couldn't help but curse them a little. **I am not usually a hater, I love it when my friends have a great run and/or PR a race, but my run was going that terribly at that moment that I couldn't help but feel a little bit jealous that they were feeling unstoppable.
FINALLY, we got back to the car, the run was over and I was so GRUMPY about what had transpired. I was starting to feel like I would never have another good run and that I was probably going to fall apart during training (cue the balloons and music for a pity party for one). We decided that we would hit up the diner for some well earned breakfast (there may have been some chanting the word "bacon" but I'll never confirm nor deny that). As I was eating my chocolate chip pancakes, scrambled eggs and bacon. I had an epiphany... what was different this year from last year? I was eating better last year and incorporating some cross training (until marathon training started taking off and I discovered that the cafe in my work building sold chocolate muffins and I started buying cartons of moose tracks ice cream). It was at that moment that I decided that I was going to eat healthier and try to get back to my "ideal running weight" (you probably wouldn't be surprised what 6 months of eating like you're training for a marathon while only training for half marathons will do to your weight).
So here I am, on the brink of marathon training to begin, embarking on a journey to lose a little weight and trying to get back into a cross training and strength training routine... I believe I can do it, so I WILL do it. I am determined to knock a good chunk of time off of my marathon this year and I'm beginning to feel optimistic.
What do you do when you're having a bad running day/week/month? What is your "reset" to get back to feeling amazing?
No comments:
Post a Comment