Hello Old Friend!

Wow – It has been awhile.  Too long.

But, I’m back.  And going to document my 2019 California International Marathon training.  I feel that this helped me when I trained back in 2017 for it, so here I am.  Back at it.

I will post my training plan.  I’ve decided to do the Hanson’s Marathon Method again, but modified.  I’ve taken out a few of the easy days, and upped the mileage on the long run days.  Not sure how this will go.  We will see.  As long as I finish.

I’ve been struggling with my paces, so I am not sure if I want to focus on a time goal.  Obviously I would still love to break 4 hours, but I have had a lot of setbacks this year, which meant running hasn’t been an option for me.  (Think eye & collarbone surgery).

 

weekly recap

To keep myself motivated with my goals, I’ve decided to do weekly recaps, even though I’m not training for anything right now.  I have a few races that I’m thinking about, but at the moment, nothing set in stone.  However, writing out what I am doing keeps me motivated to stay active.  If I have nothing to write down, I feel extremely upset!

Each week I would like to accomplish a speed session, a tempo session and a long run.  The long run being relative – at the moment I’m considering 4-5 miles as long, but hopefully they will get longer as the year progresses.

So, let’s start with this week, as I’m pretty happy with it, and hopefully it will continue.

#SK2BQ

When friends make you do crazy things….

My BRF, has decided that we need to qualify for Boston – and I’m all for that challenge!  Hence the #SK2BQ (Suzanne & Katie to Boston Qualify).

Now, this is a huge challenge, especially for a slow runner like me.  This may take a few years.

California International Marathon Recap 2017

It’s been a week since I ran the CIM.  This post probably won’t be too long.  And it will probably be written all over the place.

I’m still confused on how I feel about this race.  Last year I loved it, read that recap here.  This year.  I don’t know.  I never got super excited to run it.  Maybe I was worried about my ankle.  I got sick with a cold/flu thing a few days before the race.  I am not sure.

Well, let’s start off from the beginning. 

It’s that time

It always comes to a point of marathon training where I feel defeated.  I feel worn out.  I feel that I hate running.

I really start to question myself.

It is one month until M-day.  The CIM is only one month away.  Let me repeat that for a third time.  ONE MONTH TO GO.  And I’m having serious doubts.  I need to type this all out, and hopefully it gets out of my system.

Thinking about triathlons

I’m not sure why I’m even writing this post.  But why not?  It’s like my diary to myself.

ladder workout

So, I feel after my last (complaining) post about missing a run, my run that I completed the other day deserved a post all of its own.

I love the days were you feel on top of the world.

First, I went for a surf.  It looked so-so, but decided to get some sunshine and go for a paddle.  And it was amazing!  I had such a fun surf.  I got long waves, did a bunch of good little turns, and there was a good (but small) crowd of people out there.  I didn’t want to get out of the water, but I had an appointment in the middle of the day with optometrist.  Ugh.

Well, actually, the middle part of the day sucked.  The Eye Doc dilated my eyes, and I had to wait around Costco for 3 hours to get my car tires fixed.  Which ended up being expensive.  (I probably should add that getting the tires fixed and rotated was free, but the three hours of me waiting lead me to the running store where I bought new shoes!).

I got home, rested my eyes for an hour, then decided I better get this run done.  I didn’t want to do it.  But, I made myself get out the door.  My eyes were still a little messed up, but I had sunglasses on, and the sun was setting – so it wasn’t too bright for the most part.

The workout? 400m, 800m, 1200m, 1600m, 1200m, 800m, 400m – with 400m recovery between each one.

I warmed up for a mile, then went into the first one.  My pace wasn’t too bad, around 8:20min/mile and I thought if I could do that pace for all the intervals I would be very happy.  The next one, the 800m, was a touch faster – and I actually felt ok.  I kept pushing, thinking if I could end up doing the 1 mile interval at a 8min/mile I would be extremely happy.

I actually found my groove, and the run felt amazing.  The last 400m was a little tough, but I did push myself on that one.  I was able to run the whole workout, no walking, no stopping – and felt so strong!

I finished with just over a mile cool down, to bring me to 8 miles total for the run.

A tempo run is on the cards for this evening.  Let’s see how that one goes.

missing a run

I missed a run. A long run.  It was only 8 miles.  And I had just run 8 miles the day before.  I’m not sure how I feel about this.  I had run every run up to that point.  Now I’ve missed one.  Do I try to fit it in at some point this week?  Do I just try to forget about it?  It’s only week 7 of marathon training.  It won’t kill me if I don’t run it.

Urgh.  So frustrating.  But, that is what I get for not getting up early and running in the morning. (Which, of course, I haven’t done today either – I’m sitting on the computer, after a sleep in, with a ladder workout looming over my head for this afternoon.)

So, in order to make myself feel better, let’s write a list on why it doesn’t matter too much about missing this one run:

#streakingwiththecoolkids

The start of the month was a month of run-streaking on Instagram.  This just happened to coincide with me getting sick!  I decided not to let this affect me, and still get out to run at least 1 mile every day.

It’s now day 23, and I’ve run every single day!  This is quite a feat for me, and am hoping to continue for the rest of June.  It isn’t daunting, knowing that it is only a mile, and that I can do it as fast or as slow as I like.

I’ve tried to run a little faster on a few runs, and now that I’m working (which for me means living out of hotels) I will be running on treadmills quite a bit.  I don’t mind this, as it can make me push the pace and do more speed work.  It also means that I’m in a gym, which makes it easier for me to add in some extra strength work.  I’ve got a few 20 minute treadmill plans that I’m going to start implementing, so I’ll try to write a post about them.

I start my training for the CIM at the end of July/start of August, so this run streak fell at a perfect time to keep me active. I have to say, I am loving it!

HBF run for a reason training – week 4

This week was an interesting one. My mileage wasn’t were I would like it to be, but I did actually get in 3 quality days of running.

I also flew out to California, so traveling can always make it a little difficult.   I have to say, I’m loving the cooler temps in California – I can run in the middle of the day at it’s only around the mid 70s!!