Days 5 & 6, Week 8: A tempo, some weights, and holy crap how long is my bike ride tomorrow?!?

Guess who ran a tempo Thursday morning and only had her left butt muscle hurt a little bit?

OK, I won't make you guess - it was me.

woot woot

Of course, after I landed from that jump I re-injured myself.  Just kidding--I had to race inside and get ready for work because they crazily expect me there in the mornings, not just the afternoons.

Anyhoo, two things about that tempo:

1) I ran it too fast, as you can see below:

2) And I ran it with my new Nathan 20 ounce hand-held, and I'm pretty much in love with the thing.  I could give many smooches to the person who finally figured out how we could carry water with us in a bottle and not actually grip it, causing me to feel like my arm will fall off mid-run from the effort.

A tender bonding moment.  Totally running BFFs.

Today's workout was just some weights (Cathe's PHA workout), and I was surprised I actually did it because I farted around most of the day.  Evidence of aforementioned surprise is for you below and is maybe totally not faked at all (those sweat stains are extremely not faked):

ZOMG how did this dumbbell get here?!?

But the biggest surprise of all will be when I get done with this bad boy of a ride tomorrow.

Fifty point freaking one seven miles, people.  That's what's on deck for tomorrow, along with a 3 mile run afterwards.  If I can stay awake after I'm finished, I'll tell you all about it righcheer on this blog.  Stay tuned kids.

Tomorrow's workout: Weren't you paying attention?  I already told you.

Tempo Runs: Yet another unhelpful FAQ.

Last night the hubbs and I were actually awake and home at the same time, so I decided to actually converse with him rather than blog. However, please rest assured that some lifting of heavy things and a bike ride happened yesterday morning:

Some call this "blurry." I call it "artsy fartsy."

Those workouts were a nice recovery from the speed work the day before, and really helped me have a nice 8-mile tempo this morning.  How nice was it?  Well, there were lots of paces that included the number "8" at the beginning even though there should only have been 9s, there was no wind, the temps were in the upper 30s, and large dog kept pulling me into ditches for absolutely no reason.

Large dog be like "WE SAW SO MANY DITCHES
IT WAS AWESOME"

Well, large dog thought that last reason made this a good tempo.  I, however, can definitely do without a tour of the local ditches unless Mother Nature calls me into one...which only happens maybe once or three times during a run.  And that, kids, is why I always bring toilet paper with me on every run.

But I digress.  I want to address the questions I always get about tempo runs, not the questions I get about my toilet paper-carrying habits.  So get comfortable, kids - it's time for another one of my unhelpful FAQs, this time about tempo runs.


So, why exactly do you tempo?  Are you just a weirdo or what?

While I am most definitely a weirdo, I am not weird in respect to doing tempo runs.  Tempo runs work wonders in terms of endurance and speed, and the end result is that they help you run a certain pace for longer distances.  Well, if you actually do them during training they help you, that is.

Have you ever not done your tempo runs during training?

Absolutely.  And my race completely and totally sucked, resulting in a lot of desperate internal please to whatever deity may out there to help me make it to the finish line.  And depending on what mile you're at during your marathon, sometimes this results in a LOT of whining and begging to deities.

So how fast do you actually run a tempo run, anyway?

If you read anything about tempos on the internets, you'll see a lot of "comfortably hard" and "lactate threshold" and "so many minutes/seconds faster than your race pace" and whatever.  To avoid all this extra thinking about how fast to run my tempos, I pick a training plan that just freaking tells me how fast to run, and then I go outside and run WAY faster than that because I'm a moron.  For example, see exhibit A below of this morning's tempo, which should have been run at a 9:20 pace:

Let's see...where's those 9:20 paces....they must be hiding.

You didn't really run that fast.  Did large dog help pull you along?

Large dog only pulls at the beginning because he runs like every running rookie ever - goes out too fast and then fades at the end.  There are sections of our running route where he doesn't pull me at all, and in the last few miles he just kind of saunters next to me like "I'm tired...you're on your own now, woman."  The jerk.

Why does large dog pull you into ditches, anyway?

Who knows.  When he gets that look on his face like in the picture above, the only sound that's probably running through his head is the sound of a spring making a large cartoon BOING...and that noise is probably so loud it distracts him and throws him off course.

Or maybe he's just a jerk.

BOING

Do you have to tempo run outside, or can these tempo runs be done on a treadmill?

They absolutely can be done on a treadmill if you have enough mental treadmill fortitude.  I usually do not treadmill a tempo because I usually end up stopping way too often to do things I would never stop to do outside, such as: blow my nose, adjust the song on my headphones, and get off and do a wellness check on all the animals in the house for absolutely no reason other than I'm taking a break disguised as an animal wellness check.  This turns the tempo run into an interval run, but I just lie to myself and call it a tempo and move on to the next workout on the training plan.


Is there anything that helps motivate you to do your tempo runs when you're training for a marathon?

Yes, there are three main motivations I have for doing my tempo runs:

1) Not dying during my marathon and bugging deities with my pleas for survival, and
2) Getting to wear cool new shoes I do not need yet have still recently purchased, such as those below worn for this morning's tempo run:

I need all the luck I can get on a tempo.

3) Not looking like the human equivalent of this:

Hyooman.  I said no more fat shaming.

Summary of post learnings in progress below:

• Tempo runs.  Just do them.  They're good for you.
• Unless the large dog attached to you is yanking you into ditches.  Then they're only OK for you.
• I recommend the Brooks Launch 5s if you're a neutral runner.  And not just because mine have faux gold dust sprinkled along the bottoms.
• Every time large dog stops pulling I start running faster because I think I'm slowing down...and then end up running a fast mile.  You'd think I would have solved this problem by now.
• BOING.

Tomorrow's workout: A bike ride...I'm going to try and make it happen outdoors.

A fast post about my too-fast tempo this morning.

This morning I was supposed to head out and do a 10 mile tempo at marathon pace.  Here's how it ended up:

As you can see, I did not get to 10 miles this morning because I farted around finishing my coffee instead of going upstairs to get ready when I should have.  But, 8 miles is better than no miles, people, especially since I didn't want to do the run at all because it was cold, windy, and snowing at 4:52 AM.  Since misery loves company, I dragged large dog outside with me and I begrudgingly ran this tempo way too fast as usual, as my target marathon pace is a 9:20.

Keeping the "running tempos too fast" streak alive, one cold dark morning run at a time.  Mother Nature called three times during this run because she's freaking needy like that, so that made the run begrudging AND frustrating:

The headlamp really completes the outfit and accentuates the frustration.

I'm also keeping the "I get up at 3 AM on Thursdays so I can be at work pretty freaking early" streak alive, so I will have to end this post rather abruptly with a picture of some of my animals doing exactly what I am about to do, only in a bed and not on the floor:

Make no mistake - the dog is dreaming of
eating the cat's head.

Some abrupt post learnings:

• I stuck to my snack cut-back that I talked about yesterday.  Day #1 - mission accomplished.
• Looks like the cat could cut back on some snacks as well.
• Running in the dark + snow + large dog yanking me into ditches + annoying calls from Mother Nature = Why do I run, exactly?
• No more learnings for tonight; time for snoozing.

Tomorrow's workout: 30 minutes on my beloved new exercise bike.

ZOMG Race Photos

Geez.  Go out of town and run a little marathon and ker-BLAM work tends to get a little nuts when you get back, preventing a little running blogger like me from blogging because you pass out exhausted after you get home.  But it didn't prevent me from working out, managing to do a 30 minute bike ride Tuesday morning (skipping my usual speed session in homage to my really tired hill-abused legs) and a tempo run this morning that I ran too fast (supposed to be run at an 8:44 pace) even on my poor tired legs:

Need a tempo run too fast?  I'm your girl.

Of course large dog went with me so I could wear him out and save my baseboards and drywall for one more day from his entropy production.

cheeeeeese

Lazy laying down water-drinking dog being eyeballed supiciously
by a cat.

And would you get a load of all the awesome scenery you get when running at 4:53 AM around my little countryside house?  Just beautiful...beautifully dark and boring.

Beautiful.  Gorgeous.  Wish you were here.

But even though I am still currently exhausted from my running too fast and my crazy work day, I had one overwhelmingly compelling reason to still post instead of crawiilng straight into bed: I got my marathon photos.

Someone gave me this medal at the end of the race for some reason.

So please -- allow me the pleasure of sharing some of the better ones for you.  And by "better" I mean "ones I intentionally screwed up in the name of humor."

#1:

ZOMG the finish just snuck up and surprised me!

#2:

Look!  A medal!  Who knew?

#3:

I'm pointing down to distract people from my
crazy visor hair.

#4:

A picture of me posing for a picture SO META

#5:

And another watch-stopping picture to add to my collection.
Because I don't have enough.

#6:

Could be a pre-race photo...could be me helping to
hold up my sister while she suffers a face seizure.

And finally...lucky #7:

ZOMG a starting line to a race just popped up
out of NOWHERE will you just LOOK at this?!?

Sleepy exhausted post learnings:

• I took way crazier ones on a different part of the course but apparently those pictures have completely vanished from the face of the earth.
• I'm so tired just looking at these pictures of me running is making letter "Zzzzz"s form directly above my head.
• Maybe if I wouldn't run my tempos too fast I wouldn't be so exhausted right now.
• Don't you hate it when a starting line just pops up from nothing and then you just have to run the race?  Yeah, me too.

Tomorrow's workout: 30 minutes or so on the exercise bike staring at a blank wall.

One day when I'm all grown up I will exercise AND eat right at the SAME TIME. And happy VDay.

Happy Valentine's Day!  Please know that I love each and every one of you.

My gift to you is my first post this week, seeing as now I'm not in a hotel that charges $15.00 a day to check email and $20.00 a day to get access to the full internet.

Bogus.  If only Blogger would bring its iPhone app back.

Anyway, here's the rundown of my workouts this week, two of which were done in a hotel fitness center at 4:30 AM:

• Monday: 6 x 800 treadmill workout next to a small child on another treadmill in a swimsuit running barefoot at top speed.
• Tuesday: 30 minutes on an exercise bike, 20 minutes of weights, and 5 minutes of fitness center selfies.

• Wednesday: Yet another too fast tempo with large dog in the cold.  The pace for miles 2-6 was supposed to be 9:00 min/mile.

But what about my eating? 

• Monday: Nice omelet for breakfast, hotel scavengings all day, too much coffee from the coffee bar, and a FREAKING EXPENSIVE steak dinner at the hotel restaurant because I was much to lazy to leave the hotel and find something cheaper.
• Tuesday: Again an omelet for breakfast, more hotel scavengings, and a trip through a McDonald's drive-thru because I had to drive back from Chicago to work to present at a night meeting and I had to eat in the car while driving or I would have been late
• Wednesday: My usual oatmeal and lunch since I was now back at home but had to run through another drive-thru on the way home to eat while driving or dinner would have been at 9 PM.

Now that I have overshared my workouts and my eating for the week, let me leave you with another VDay gift: Some learnings.

• I never understood how people could say that fast food was their only option until I got my current job.  Now I get it.
• I've still been logging my food in MyFitnessPal (I'm spacemonkey75 in case you want to connect) faithfully, so I have that going for me, which is nice.
• However, I have wanted to lie to my food diary several times.  Especially when I break down and have fast food.  But I have resisted....so far.
• One day, when I'm all grown up, maybe I will get my workout AND eating acts together at the same time.

Tomorrow's workout: 3 mile easy run, and exercising some good judgment not to hit a drive-thru on the way home. Except if it belongs to Starbucks.