Marathon Training Recap: Week 5

I’m bringing you this post from the comfort of my freezing cold basement! Since the birth of my daughter, the basement has become part rec room (playroom for the kids, gym for me), part home office. Up until now it’s been far too cold to work down here. My husband finally brought me home a gift I can really enjoy…

Ta da!

Isn’t it so pretty? I’m thrilled with my new space heater! I can finally work in peace and quiet whereas before, I was broadcasting from the dining room table which is smack in the middle of the house and all the chaos two children bring.

Let me enjoy this for a moment… ahhhhh…

All right, down to business. Week 5 of marathon training is in the books.

Last Tuesday was a 3-miler. I went too fast. Which was awesome at the time, but then Wednesday rolled around. Wednesday was tough. My husband had to be at a meeting at 8:00 am sharp, which meant I had to be up and running by 5:30 am. Not only did it make for an insanely long day but I was very tired physically as well. Thursday was another 3-miler, plus strength training. I changed up my routine and I’m not sure if it was because of the new exercises or because of Wednesday’s lingering fatigue, but I felt like I could barely pull through. I did it, though, and was thankful to be done. Friday was rest day.

Saturday. Oh, Saturday. The day I love to hate. And hate to love! Saturday was not only Valentine’s Day, but also 12-mile day! Whoop whoop! It was oddly not as tough as it seems like it should have been. It’s truly amazing what the human body is capable of with proper training, mentality, and nutrition. If you had asked me a couple months ago if I could pull off 12 miles in the middle of February for no particular reason at all, I would have laughed and laughed. And laughed and laughed! 12 miles is no easy feat. My husband used to joke with me about how I could rip off 5 miles so easily and with no problem. I kinda liked that. I was really proud of myself. And now I can say I can do 12.

Let me back and be clear — 12 miles isn’t easy and it wasn’t easy. But, it was much easier than it had been even when I was in training for both of my previous half marathons.

On to details:

The forecast for Saturday was amazing. Shocking, really. We’ve been stuck in the arctic dip in Cleveland, and we had a small break in the action. Woke up at 6:30 am and checked my phone — “feels like 13˚F.” Rockin’. We’re on!

I got dressed (in my Val Day red!), packed up my nutrition, yaktrax, miscellaneous gear — and got a text from my friend saying she was brushing off her car and then on the way to my house. Sweet.

I opened the door to let me dog out and gasped. It had snowed several inches overnight. Several. And it was still snowing. This, I had not anticipated. Sigh… It was “warm” though, so we were heading out anyway. My friend Julie picked up my friend Noemi and me, and we headed south to meet up with our friend Sara.

The run itself was pretty amazing. It was strangely beautiful. We ran in an area I had never been to, and we only saw two or three people out on the trail while we were doing our “out” of the out-and-back. It seemed like we were in a very desolate area despite being in quite an industrious area of our city. I was a little edgy for about two thirds of the run. Sara and Julie had been there numerous times before so that put me more at ease.

We did see some amazing wildlife, though. We ran by an area of the Cuyahoga River where apparently a lot of Blue Herons call home during the winter. I would say we saw about 15 of them hanging by the shore line and then take flight when they heard us approaching. It was pretty amazing.

Clockwise from top: Julie, Noemi, Sara, and me!

After we made it 6 miles, we stopped for a snack. It was delicious. After a couple minutes we turned around and headed back. At one point I noticed I had picked up my pace considerably, and I was definitely feeling it. My knees started hurting, which has never happened before, and then my hips started hurting. I slowed it down a lot and felt better.

Snacktime!

Halfway!

Halfway shenanigans.

The snow throughout this run was relentless. It was beautiful but it made for tough running conditions. Not only were we battling snow in the eyes and on the trail, there was thick ice in areas that you just couldn’t see which made for some exciting times and screams of momentary panic!

What else happened… oh yes, I broke a spike off my YakTrax. Which, let me just tell you, is a huge HUGE bummer. I’ve been searching for replacement spikes and apparently NO ONE SELLS THEM!!! Who does that?! It’s becoming a bit of a problem.

Sad little YakTrax…

I had another technology fail. Why does this keep happening to me on long runs? Rookie mistake and word to the wise — do not start your Garmin when you’re inside a parking garage. Because A) you will never find satellites and B) when you do find satellites you’ll be at least a half mile into your run.

Post run we stopped at a local eatery for some delicious nosh and tried to warm up. It was super awesome. We had some great conversation and an overall amazing day. I’m looking forward to our next run together!

#eatallthefood

Long run aftermath: Our drive home was tricky. Since the snow never stopped and the wind started kicking up toward the end of our miles, the roads were kind of a mess. We were basically crawling on the freeway. Thankfully we made it home in one piece. I stripped at the door and warmed up in the shower. After that I felt pretty great all day. I even enjoyed some Chinese food for dinner. Yum!

I slept pretty poorly on Saturday night, too. You know the feeling you get when you’ve been on a boat all day and you can’t stop rocking when you’re lying down? It was kind of like that, except on my feet. I kept feeling the crunching of the snow while I was drifting off. Then my muscles were tight as heck all night. My husband got me some Epsom salts the next day and I will definitely be using those next week.

Sunday is really when I began feeling the after-effects of the snowy run. I was sore all over. I almost didn’t do yoga like I do on cross training days, but something told me I needed to. And boy am I glad I did. My legs were much looser after that, and I didn’t feel quite so tight when I would move from sitting down to standing up. I also ate all the food. Everywhere. If it was in my eyesight, I ate it. I had an incredible, insatiable appetite. It was delicious.

Post-run happiness.

A lot of learning and take-aways from Week 5 of training. No more waking up before 5:30 am (if it can be avoided, of course), go to bed earlier, don’t push the pace so much on the shorter distances, and soak in Epsom salts post long run. Also, eat all the food. 🙂

And just for reference — two photos below. The same bridge. Oh, how I miss summer!!!