Week 16 - Boston Marathon Training

It's finally here! I count down my weeks in training, so we are on Week 16 of Boston Marathon training! The holidays are so hard to start or be in a training cycle. With all of the bad food and tons of events throwing off your schedule it is a struggle. I was nervous to start my training cycle the day after Christmas, and allowed myself to still be a slacker on my nutrition (there are tamales everywhere and I need to eat them, right?). Needless to say, I think training is off to a great start and I'm happy to be back in a structured routine.

Compete Training Journal

I was interested to see what my coach would give me this week besides easy paced aerobic miles, but she kept it interesting for sure. On Tuesday, we did a heart rate test - a 1.5 mile warm up, 4 miles at 145 bpm, 1.5 mile cool down. I've never done heart rate training, but the goal was to keep my heart rate as close to 145 during the 4 miles in the middle as possible. I averaged out at 147 bpm. We'll do this test each month - my pace during the 4 miles should increase. If it doesn't it's a sign of over training. I'm interested to see how my paces develop over the course of the cycle.

Week 16 Schedule:

Monday: 5 aerobic miles (8:47 average pace)
Tuesday: 7 mile heart rate test
                1.5 mile w/u, 4 miles at 147 average bpm, 1.5 mile c/d - 7 miles at 8:49 average
                25 minute kettle bell workout
Wednesday: 4 mile recovery (9:12 average pace)
Thursday: cross training
                 800m row, lifted shoulders + back + chest, 25 minutes stairclimber
Friday: 6 miles + strides
            2.5 mile w/u + 8 x 20 sec strides w/ 40 second active recovery + 2.5 mile c/d
Saturday: 8 miles at 8:01 average
                 15 minute recovery yoga
Sunday: Rest Day

My coach gave me the option to use Sunday for a 30 minute recovery run or as a rest day. Sunday would've been my 9th day working out in a row. coupling that with a New Year's Eve hang over and I was ready to sleep in and not work out. I started 2017 doing absolutely nothing! It's ok though - my biggest thing is not to be too hard on yourself. We're all human, we all make choices that don't necessarily help us. For me, that meant mixing cocktails, wine, and champagne with a late night, resulting in no running the next day. I had a great New Year's Eve, and thus, have no regrets about it.

I hope everyone had a great New Year's. Now to tackle my second week of training and really getting back into a good nutrition plan.

What Spring races are you training for?

How's it going so far?

J