Week 5 Training Update

As I wrote earlier this week, the training got really tough this week. 

Pretty sure it was a combination of being on vacation at the beach + the extreme temperature shift from North Carolina to Florida + the realization that I have a little under three more months of this to go. It'll wear you down! AND the mileage was pretty tough this week. 

The training calendar looked like this:

 That's a 36 mile week.

It was no joke to get organized while on vacation, get up early cause it was hot and then manage this mileage. I was tired. Cranky and irrational. I'm glad for those around me being merciful.

 Overall you can see the leap in the mileage over the last month has just been incremental but this week was pretty big from last week to now.

And even in the last three months! That is pretty amazing for me to see. I thought I was running a lot in Colorado. Peanuts compared to now. 

 But it has been worth it! Check it out! I hit some personal bests this week!
Distance, Duration, Calories Burned, Elevation Climb for the workout and the week! That is really fun to see the results getting cranked out like that.

Saturdays run was a special one because I got to join back up with the running group. The ladies were only running 9 miles. But Amy Noll continued on with me for the additional 4 that I needed to complete my 13 miles for the training week. But within the training group was my good friend Natalie Knauer and my old roommate and teammate from soccer at South Carolina, Linda Greene. Linda was visiting from Dublin and is running a marathon there in October. She joined us for a couple of miles before driving back to catch her plane to Dublin. I was thrilled to run next to her again as we did 15 years ago on the pitch. It filled my heart up big time. 

I was battling this week with a bad blister on my toe, dehydration issues and exhaustion. But I made it! Exceeded my expectations really. 

Gear of the week:

ING NYC Virtual Trainer: This is a program put out by the marathon. It emails you the night before and tells you what the workout for the day is going to be. Then you log in and tell them how it went. 

I love this! 

I ran on Thursday and it gave me a target pace to slow me down. I ran faster than the target and it told me "You ran too fast. We know you think this is a good idea, but you have a long way to go until race day. Try to keep to pace and you will have plenty of energy."

I really appreciated that perspective and feedback. It is hard to adjust from running 10k's to marathon pace and you have to learn to go slower to build stamina.

Brooks Pure Cadence: My sweet shoes have had it. I got a blister this week. My arches started hurting during the long run. I think they've had it. I thought they were fairly new. But when I bought them the salesmen said they would last around 200 miles. I looked on runkeeper and I have far exceeded that mark. Time for new shoes. 

Here we go! Onto Week 6!

Here's the link to donate: 

http://inheritanceofhope.org/leslie-sloan-2232