Fit Friday! 2 Days to Race Day!
The Surf City Half Marathon is in 2 days! I wish I could say I'm excited about it, but the truth is I'm not. Sometimes, you're not excited or positive going into a race, so I want to be honest. My training has deteriorated over the last 2 weeks, and my goals have shifted.
The first, and only other time, I've run Surf City was in 2010 and it was not a good race for me. It was my second half marathon and I went through a full 12 week training plan, but only did a 10 miler as my longest run. I wasn't as focused on proper nutrition, I had no control over the holidays, but I figured I had run one half, so it was no biggie. On race day, I was nervous about my preparation, my shoes were old, I stopped every half mile after mile 8 to tell my running partner I couldn't do it. And I finished it up with losing my big toenail on my right foot. I've never had a desire to run this race again because of that experience.
When I signed up for this race a few weeks ago, I was feeling strong and wanted to run another race before my marathon because I do think running more races has reduced my jitters and anxiety that comes on race day. I initially wanted to PR and shoot for a sub 1:40, but now I'm looking at this as just a training run. My only focus from here on out is my marathon and logging miles. I'm not worried about my time anymore because the reality is, I need to just finish the marathon before I can move onto improving my pace.
This week my focus was getting more sleep and trying not to push too hard since I've been feeling so fatigued. I started the week with a pretty lousy attempt at a 12 mile run on Saturday - it morphed into 5 miles with a few stops. I'd like to blame the weather - it was dry and windy and I couldn't breathe - but my legs and mind weren't into it. I went out again on Sunday to try to log the 12, and only made it 6 miles, stopping a few times to stretch. I figured I needed some sleep, but the muscles in my legs were so weak. It wasn't a mental game at that point - I knew my body was too tired to keep going.
I took Monday as a rest day. Tuesday I was back at it with a gym session in the morning, and a scheduled 5.5 mile run at night. I completely forgot to charge my Garmin before this run, and after mile 1, it died. While I don't know my pace, the run felt great and it was nice to focus more on just enjoying the run and less on my splits.
Wednesday I went for a hill session. I didn't want to push too hard, so I did 6 x 200 and logged a total of 7.2 miles at an 8:27 pace. Much slower than my last few hill runs and my legs felt the way they had in my long run attempts over the weekend. But I pushed through without stopping.
Some good, but painful hill training - trying to get back into my training routine
I decided to do a strength training at the gym again on Thursday morning, followed by Spin class that night. I focused on holding back a little in Spin - just doing 75-80% effort. My legs were sore, but it was good to break a sweat without going to the max. Strength training has been great this week - I've really noticed that I'm building muscle and starting to show definition.
I'm starting to see real definition in my arms now!
I'm taking two days off before race day. Normally I'd only take one, but I'm working on listening to my body and it needs two this time. Again, my focus is just to log a 13 mile run, not necessarily PR. If I PR, great. If not, I still have another race experience under my belt.
While I'm not excited about the race and what my potential results will be on record, I am meeting up with some of my social media friends from a few weeks ago, so it will still be an enjoyable run with some awesome people.
J
