Day 5, Week 7: The Six Stages of Speed Work.

This morning I had some speed work show up in the ol' Runner's World My Run Plan app: a 3 x 2000m workout.

In case the "2K" isn't familiar to you, that's shorthand for 2000m repeats.  That's also shorthand for "holy crap that's 1.25 miles and I have to run three of those suckers." Seeing that sent me spiraling through the stages of speed work.  What stages of speed work, you ask?  Well, let me list them out for you:

STAGE #1: DENIAL

"Speed work again? Nononononononononono  NO"

STAGE #2: ANGER

"Speed work I hate you so much I will SHAKE MY FIST AT YOU"

STAGE #3: BARGAINING

"Maybe I'll just do this after work.  Or only do two of those repeats.  Or none of them and just do the warm-up and cool-down.  Or not do it at all.  Yeah."

STAGE #4: DEPRESSION

*checks weather for the day* It's going to be too hot to do this workout later in the day.  I'm going to have to do it right now.... *silent sobbing*

STAGE #5: ACCEPTANCE

"OK DAMMIT IMMA GONNA GO DO IT STOP PRESSURING ME....but I need to take selfies first."

And finally...

STAGE 6: CELEBRATION

Got 'er done.  Woot.  And in paw-print running shorts, no less.

Tomorrow's workout: Some heavy lifting of some heavy weights. Woot.

Day 4, Week 7: My cycling motivation this morning.

Today was a cycling day.  It was supposed to be 20 miles, but the workout ended after 17.5-ish miles because, you know, work.  And because my legs were all sorts of tired from the mile repeats done way too fast yesterday.

This workout almost didn't happen because of several reasons:

1) I woke up late despite zonking out asleep at 8 PM.
2) I wanted to have my morning coffee more than getting into my cycling shorts.
3) I had to Instagram my normal photos of my cute workout-interfering animals, and
4) I just didn't wanna do it.  I was tired.  My quads were clearly saying NOPE.

But I did get out and do it, for several more reasons:

1) Because I am a slave to the training schedule.
2) There was no wind and temps were in the 50s.  You can't waste a morning like that.
3) Because if I didn't do some sort of workout I fear that something drastic and vaguely apocalyptic would happen, like the Earth suddenly no longer spinning on its axis
4) Most importantly, I wouldn't have any stupid workout pics with which to annoy people on this little blog of mine.

I just FELT like biking. I crack myself up lol.

Your guess is as good as mine as to why I have that stupid smirk
on my face.

Look, ma, no tri suit for once!

Tomorrow's workout: The app calls a 3 x 2000m repeat workout a "threshold" workout.  I call is CRAY CRAY.

Day 3, Week 7: I'm 43 years old, dammit.

I'm 43 years old, and...

...I ran 5 mile repeats with large dog on this 50 degree summer morning.

...I can bike for hours at a time at speeds I never thought I would ever be able to do.

...I can sign up and run a marathon on a whim.

...I can lift heavy weights on the regular.

...I can train before the sun comes up and not begin to fall asleep at work until at least 2 PM every day.

...I have more race t-shirts and medals than any human being will ever, ever need.

...I have run 20 overnight long-distance relays where I made some awesome running friends.

...I would worship the person who first mass-marketed iced coffee to the world...if I knew who he/she was.

...I used to look like this.

...now I look like this.

...I am fed up with thinking about the body parts on my body that could be skinnier. 

I'm tired of forever-scrutinizing where I have excess body fat and feeling bad about it being there.  I'm 43-years tired of this.  It's time to think about the parts that do all the above amazing things (that I couldn't do at 23, by the way) rather than on the parts that I wish didn't bulge in odd ways when I put on clothing.

And now that I got that off my chest, it's also time to think more about replacing the water in my water bottle with iced coffee 24/7. 

Tomorrow's workout: Cycling, but not for 2 hours, peeps.  I gotta get to work some time in the morning.

Day 2, Week 7: Barbell + these Cathe workouts = Hope you don't want to use your arms for a few days.

This morning was upper body weights courtesy of Cathe.

mmmm barbell

I did the "two sets of each exercise + finishers" timesaver premixes on two separate discs from her Ripped with HiiT series, which means that these workouts consisted of three exercises in a row, two of them being the same exercise repeated and the last one different and highly annoying for the most part.

A few things about these little workouts:

• They are small but mighty.
• And by "mighty" I mean "Holy cow these weights she's making me use are mighty heavy"
• The cat chooses the worst moments for rubs, such as when the barbell is quivering dangerously above my head
• I will be lucky to be able to lift my arms to wash my hair in the shower tomorrow.

Speaking of tomorrow, what's the workout?  9-10 miles of mile repeats...Imma gonna die.  Check back tomorrow to see if I'm dead.

Day 1, Week 7: Stupid workout thoughts.

I admit it - I haven't been consistent with this blogging thing like I promised I would.  Work has only picked up in velocity this summer and I have found myself getting home with only about 2 hours before I have to be in bed...and posting is usually not on the priority list in those two hours. 

But I hereby swear to do better, even if it's to post one random picture with an incoherent caption that my sleep-deprived brain thought was hilarious when I posted it. In fact I PINKY swear it to all of you.

Now that that's out of the way, let me show you what workouts I've been up to over the past week:

A little weights, a little running, a little cycling, and a little putting up with large dog taking breaks when I least expect it.  Or want him to.  So, in other words, the usual.

But what's not usual is the distance of the bike ride I did two days ago.  And then the run I did the next day.

40 miles on the bike at nearly 18 mph?  For me that's pretty freaking UH-MAYZING people.  However, busting it out on the bike on Saturdays is causing my long runs to be much slower on Sundays...but I've come to terms with that.  It's teaching me to run on tired legs (or at least that's what I'm telling myself).  It's also allowing me loads of time to think deeply about things, giving time for weird thoughts to come bubbling to the surface.  These bubbles are most likely helping me cope with the distance training I'm doing...or just a sign that I'm a moron.  Either way, let me lay some of these weird workout thoughts on you:

• "If I ran a race company, I would change the direction of the course if the wind was too strong so people wouldn't have to bike into the wind.  Because this sucks."
• "If I were to carry bananas with me on long runs, how can I prevent them from becoming really hot banana mush in my pocket by the 6th mile?"
• "If I run one more mile outside, that means I could go inside and only do ____ miles on the treadmill." (This thought usually repeats every mile outside until OOPS workout completed outside how'd that happen)
• "If I am doing loops and I just ran by the driveway to the house and I am 0.17 miles into the mile that means I only have to run...uh....ummm....screw it math is hard I'm just running to that stop sign and back."
• "I wonder what would happen if I threw my water bottle at the next car that only gave me 3 inches of clearance as they passed me."
• "If a runner runs between cornfields singing old U2 songs and no one is around to hear it, does she really make a sound?"
• And, last but not least..."Exactly why do I do this again?  Oh yeah - to have an excuse not to clean the house."

Instead of learnings where you learn nothing, I'm just posting all the bad pics I took from the ride and the run this weekend.  Enjoy.

Star Trek SEXY

Shadow derp.

A rare in motion derp

Almost thrown at several cars during the run.

Awesome shorts alert.

Tomorrow's workout:  Anything that doesn't involve using my legs.  Probably upper-body weights.

Day 1, Week 6: Pros and Cons.

I didn't blog yesterday because I was pretty much exhausted by the time I sat down to do so.  It's amazing how much a 35-mile ride will do that to you (not really). 

In terms of pros and cons, "exhaustion" is most definitely a con of training for a long-distance race of any kind.  In fact, let's review some of the pros and cons of the workouts for the past few days, shall we?  Because that's really all I have time for before I pass out again from today's workout, which was a 13 mile run if you really must know.  And I guess you do need to know, since this is a fitness blog and all.

Anyway, to the pros and cons!

Pros:

• Temperatures were very, very nice (60s and 70s with low-ish humidity) considering it's July in northern Illinois.  That meant I didn't have to go out as early in the day to get the workouts done.
• It stayed cloudy for both workouts.  It's always nice not being fried by the sun when you're trying to get some distance in.

• I am really enjoying the bike riding - way more than I thought I would
• I spent a total of 4-ish hours working out this weekend and that makes me feel like a badass. 
• I actually met other cyclists on the ride on Saturday, who all gave me weird looks as they passed me and realized I was blasting music from seemingly nowhere on my bike.  Nowhere, by the way, is from the little pouch on the front of my bike where I stow my bike speaker.
• I did not crash on my bike and did not get hit by any cars on the run.  Always a plus.
• I took some pretty awesome selfies with my bike.

• I got to wear my Partridge Family shoes on the run I did off the bike on Saturday.

Cons:

• Doing a long bike ride and a long run in the same weekend makes your legs, you know....tired.  I'm realizing I will need to take it easier on the bike to get the run done on Sunday.
• I'm also realizing that the long runs are not going to be at the pace I would normally run them at--I'm going to have to slow them down too.  I'm still in the process of convincing myself that training low to race high will actually work.
• Large dog went with me for the first 7 miles of the run because he begged me to go...and then he kept trying to lay down every half mile.  BUH.

• I sure do know how to make a mess of my transition area.

• I made and ate the BEST japaneno popper tater tot casserole on Saturday night which caused me to spend a lot of time looking at the inside of a corn field on the run today.  In case you don't know what that looks like, here you go:

So what can we learn from the random lists above?

• Don't eat japaneno-baked goodness the night before a long run (this is a lesson I'll have to re-learn because I freaking love jalapenos)
• Always bring toilet paper with you on a run
• Large dog is getting lazier and lazier during the run
• I have too much crap in my dresser drawers
• I am a masochist because, you know, two huge workouts every weekend for me!
• A blog post can never, ever have too many bullet points.  Ever.

Tomorrow's workout: Upper body weights because I'm freaking tired.

Day 6, Week 5: Facetious injury recovery tips you probably shouldn't use.

Today's workout du jour was some Cathe, of course.  There was a lot of heavy weight lifting, barbell toting, random animals int the workout area, and animals messing up all my post-workout selfies.

TOTES BARBELL

Did a LOT of this.

Small dog be like "why hooman doing this stupid selfie thing?"

I was not thinking about stealing this dumbbell.  OK, yes I was.

But I had to be a little careful during the workout, and not because animals would randomly come and hang out around me while I had a heavy barbell over my head.  As I mentioned yesterday, my left glute has been giving me some issues lately--issues such as being a tight ball of hurt that makes coming down on my left leg feel like I'm running on a stump.

You know.  Just some small issues. 

So, in order to make sure I'm in tip-top shape for training and for my races, I plan on taking a few days off to let my glute heal and stop being so angry.

Ha!  Just kidding!  I plan on training right through it, like any sensible runner/duathlete would do.  But I do have some facetious tips for all those injured runners out there still training away:

• Take it easy (or easier) during your workouts.  Slow down, whether your biking, running, cross-country skiing, or underwater basket weaving.  You can also consider shortening your workouts as well so you're not aggravating your injury as much.  Or at least that's what you can tell yourself.
• Practice some self-care when you're not irritating your injury further by working out.  Massage the area (unless it's a stress-fracture...then I wouldn't advise touching it at all.  Or working out, really, but hey-you know your body), get on a foam roller.  What helps me is a little trigger point ball that works best for loosening up those tight muscles deep inside the glute.  You know, the ones even the massage therapist won't work on no matter how much you tip her.
• Ignore the pain and hope it magically disappears.  Because it's probably just a weak muscle that just needs more training, right?  Work that weak muscle into shape.
• Google the cause of your pain and then ignore all the advice they give you.  Because who wants to read "rest and take it easy" when you want to see "train through it you big baby?"

Seriously, if you're really injured, don't train through it.  Just take it easy and silently curse and shake your fist at all the runners you see on your commute to and from work.

And now silently curse and shake your fist at these stupid learnings:

• The trigger point ball was worth all 6 bucks I pad for it.  So much screaming glute relief.
• I should be in bed right now because I have a 35 mile bike ride tomorrow.  Looks like I'll be taking it easy at 6 AM because I'll be took freaking tired to push too hard.
• So many animals in my workout today.  I'm surprised there were no tragic accidents involving the barbell.
• "Train through it you big baby" is one of my favorite mantras.  Not the healthiest mantra, but definitely one of my faves.

Tomorrow's workout: I already told you - 35 mile bike ride with a 3 mile run off the bike.  Fabs.