Stop with the dead kittens, Universe. Please.

Workouts:

Wednesday: 20 mile bike ride
Thursday: Tempo Run.  Sort of.
Friday: 45 minutes of upper body weights and 10 minutes of core work.

Take a look at that bike ride.  That's the longest bike ride I have ever taken.  Let me tell you, 20 miles on the bike is absolutely nothing like 20 miles on the run.  Twenty miles on the bike feels like this:

After a 20 mile run I feel like this:

But I am currently experiencing a dilemma with this "biking on Wednesdays" thing.  You see, my training schedule says that I should be running 6 easy miles on that day.  However, sometimes my shins and ankles are so shot from the speed work I do on Tuesdays that the bike turns into a much-needed low-impact recovery run substitute.  I just worry that I won't be running the right weekly mileage to prepare me to run the 26.2.  I know it's about quality over quantity, but...I'm torn.  I think I may leave the biking to the weekend and put that 6 miler back in.  I am open to any thoughts or advice you may have on the whole "bike or easy run" dilemma.

Now let's shift gears for a second (BAD CYCLING PUN TOTALLY INTENDED).  Let's talk about running angry.

I woke up yesterday to find a particularly irritating email in my inbox.  It was the kind of irritation that grows inside you the more you think about it until it consumes all of your thoughts and blossoms into a full-on anger that you just can't shake off for a few days.  Or years.  Anyway, an hour after reading that email I was firmly and completely pissed off.  I was planning on doing my scheduled tempo run in the evening, but decided to go for a short 2 mile run just to shake the angries out before I went to work and glared at people all day.  So I pulled on a cute running skirt and my favorite running visor and scooted out the door and down the driveway.

What do I find at the end of the drive way?  A dead kitten.  Dead.  Kitten.  A little grey and white cute little furry ball of death was lying on my property, flies buzzing busily about its little dead pink nose.

Yeah.  I took that as a sign things weren't going to go well that day. The universe needs some lessons in tactfully breaking it to you that you are going to have a shitter of a day, methinks.  A simple post-it note on my car would have sufficed.  "Dear Terie: Today your day will suck total arse.  Prepare to be dominated and owned regularly and consistently.  FYI-The Universe."

So, after a day of slow-boiling rage wherein I managed to cover said anger with a thin veneer of professionalism and one-word phrases, I came home and got dressed to do my tempo run.  Now, if you are one of the very very few people who read this blog, you know how much I despise my traditional 8 mile tempos.  While I was looking forward to running, I wasn't looking forward to this particular run.

But I sucked it up and went outside and got it started.  And all I could think about was the work situation that made me angry in the first place.  My focus was destroyed, the run felt way harder than usual, my legs felt wooden, and, to add insult to injury, my large intestine had decided NOT to cooperate with me.

I quit after 3 miles.  I was angry and full of intestinal gas that was slowly ripening into a situation beyond my control.  I walked home so I could use a bathroom inside for a change.

I think I was the most upset about the fact that I let my mental state destroy a perfectly good workout.  The more I run, the more I realize your brain needs to be trained much, much more than your body.


photo credit: EYECCD via photopin cc
photo credit: jczart via photopin cc

For every running triumph, there is a huge vortex of suck.

In every life, a little rain must fall.  For every yin, there is a yang.  For me, for every good run, a little bad form must fall.  For every running triumph, there is a huge vortex of suck.

Yesterday I proved to myself that I could run my long runs at race pace.  After that run, one of the tendons in my foot proved that it could be a huge pain in the ass.  As I write this, I am trying to keep an ice pack on the top of my right foot.  After Googling frantically last night, hopping up and down on my foot about 12,000 times, and bending my foot and toes every which way (some of them in ways I'm sure they're not meant to go), I , Dr. Engelbrecht, have made the following diagnosis:

Tendinitis.  (Huge vortex of suck here.)  The prescription?  Rest and stop my moronic self from lacing my shoes too tightly.

I am currently addicted to wearing Mizuno Wave Rider 16s.  I just got a second pair (red) after my first purple pair, I am convinced, has help ease my Achilles suffering.

Yesterday's run was only the second time I have worn these beauties, having tried them out on a speed session earlier last week (these are some very very light shoes).  It was on that day that I realized my laces were a bit snug on my left foot, but I didn't loosen them.

And I didn't loosen them yesterday before my 16 mile run either.  So, kiddos, it's now time for a little lesson from the teacher:

Tight shoe + 16 mile run faster than you've ever run it before = Ooooh girl your tendons are in TROUBLE.

I'm just glad it's not a stress fracture.  To make sure it doesn't become one, I think I may end up cancelling my treadmill session for tomorrow and cross training one more day, especially since the pain was worse when I got up and walked around on it all day. Speaking of cross training, I am trying to make sure I get in weights plus more cardio on those days so I can get the best of both worlds and increase my training volume, as the boys from Run Less, Run faster say.  That means today's Cathextravaganza DVD choice was Athletic Training, a workout I haven't done in a long time.

I forgot how much the cardio portion at the beginning kicks my sweet patootie.  You start with about 20 minutes of low-impact cardio using a step--very simple moves, but very effective.  I felt like I was gargling my heart at the end of that section.  After that, she uses light weights (5-8 lbs), some resistance bands, a firewalker band, and a gliding disc to work all your major muscle groups.  It's a nice workout for the day after a long run because it doesn't kill you, but still gets your heart a-pumpin'.

And I may end up doing the same tomorrow if this tendon thing doesn't clear up.  We shall see what some ice and a good night's sleep can do.

All bummed out.

It's been an interesting working out week.

I had a good 6 x 800 m treadmill session on Tuesday, a nice slow run on Wednesday, and finally got to run a tempo at my 10K pace outside Friday morning.

But it seems like something is amiss.

I'm midway through my marathon training program, and I am tired.  Not just my legs, but my whole body, mind, and soul is tired.  I am having a hard time getting my butt up and moving for a run these days; I'm hoping its just because now I am pulling 40+ miles a week, a mileage my body has never experienced before with this much regularity.

And I'm not seeing a lot of gains in speed or endurance.

Part of me is a little scared that I haven't been pushing the intensity of my workouts in order to achieve my goal race pace.  You see I went and did that whole "reading" thing again, and bought the book Run Less, Run Faster, which proclaims that by running 3 solid workouts a week--and pushing their intesnity--you can PR and run miracle miles and have a fabulous life.  Well, maybe not that last part, but the PRs are sprinkled throughout the book.

Looking at my training plan, I realize it's just a modified version of the plan presented in that book.  But I've been slacking on the pace of my tempo runs when I do them on the treadmill.  And I don't think I've been practicing enough at pace during my long runs or doing cross-training that is aerobic enough (I love my weights, dammit).

I guess I'm torn as to what to do--go with what my body feels I should do, or push beyond that and go for pace.  Because you only get faster by running faster.  Like all things, I suppose, it's a matter of meeting myself somewhere in the middle of all my fear and tiredness.

That's what I have to keep telling myself as I prepare for a 16 mile long run today that is supposed to be at race pace.  It was supposed to be yesterday, but my intestines and a lack of a place to use nature's facilities without being spotted changed my plans.  I managed 5 miles yesterday, with the last 400m speedwalking back to my house so as to not embarrass myself on the road.  There's something inherently cruel about the fact that when you REALLY have to go when you're out on a run, running just makes that "about to mess my pants" feeling worsen--but walking in single-digit windchills isn't all that fun, in case you haven't experienced that.

Looks like I'll have a lot to think about when I'm on this run today.  I'll let you know if I work anything out, or push myself too far and end up injuring myself.  But I will leave you with this picture of me after I took off my balaclava after Friday's tempo run just to lighten the mood:

Mother Nature: Knock it off so I can run outside.

This week has been another week stuck on the treadmill because Mother nature feels like she has something to prove by either making it:

1) Too cold to run safely outside unless frostbite is the new black
2) Snow like a *BLEEP* with high winds and white-out conditions.

Maybe she's trying to make up for the fact that I ran 4.5 miles in this outfit on December 2nd:

My house is under perpetual construction.  It's my cross to bear.

At least I can wear similar outfits when I run on the treadmill.

Wednesday was an easy run day (6 miles), and I feel like those are getting easier to do mentally.  Six slow miles doesn't seem so torturous anymore, especially not with good treadmill TV on in front of me.  The tempo run I did today wasn't any easier on the old mental state than last week; however, I tried something a little different with that 8 mile tempo, 6 of which are supposed to be actually run at tempo pace:

I split it into two 3 milers with a 400m walk in between each 3 mile segment.

Part of me feels like I totally wimped out, and the other part of me feels super-duper smart by figuring out a way to survive this workout on the treadmill.  I had to split this into two smaller, achievable runs, because when I got up I had absolutely NO INTEREST WHATSOEVER in running this run on the treadmill.  I wanted to run outside so I could run faster than I do on the treadmill.  By my outside was full of white stuff and 20 mph winds, so, like Mother Nature, I only had two choices:

1. Skip the workout entirely and be a total and complete *BLEEP*
2. Make the workout work for me.

Obviously, option #2 won out, which I consider a smallish victory.  However, I still need to kick up the speed (which I did compared to last week) on these runs when I do them on the treadmill.  I take a small measure of comfort in the fact that it looks like I didn't stop at all when you look at my Garmin graphs:

And I only ended up doing 7.5 miles because I had to get to work and my dogs were circling the treadmill in a rather menacing fashion, waiting for me to get off it (they have an intense desire to lick my sweat, which is intensely gross.  But they're dogs.  They lick a lot grosser things).  

Looks like I'm going to have to work on not taking that break in the middle as well as kicking up the speed.  That is, if Mother Nature doesn't decide to back off on this whole "Oh gee it's, like, winter or something" thing and I'm forced into another week of treadmill running.  

Tomorrow the treadmill isn't an option--it's outside for a slow 20 miler.  I'll let you know if Mother nature behaves or not.

Treadmill Tempo Run Fail

I woke up dreading my run today.  Mainly it was because I was up late last night blogging all sorts of blogariffic things on all my blogs, and the late was made later by the fact that I teach a grad class on Wednesday nights.

I need to learn to make better blogging choices.

Anyway, I woke up very tired and very cold.  The wind was howling, the temperature was in the teens, and there was no way I could run a tempo run in sub-zero wind chills.  Or, at least that's what the hubbs mumbled to me when my alarm went off at 4 AM.  It's very cold here in Illinois right now, in case you didn't know:

Even my puppies are feeling the cold, and they're built for it (partly genetics, partly too much blubber):

This morning I had to gather up all my courage--even the stray bits under the bed and in the back corner of the linen closet--to go downstairs and do a 4 mile tempo on the treadmill.

You probably already know I can barely handle running 1000m repeats on the thing, so you can imagine the state I was in when I started running 4 miles at my tempo speed.  Outside, I can run a 4-mile tempo without much thought. The treadmill, however, is a much different and completely sad, pathetic story:

First 800m: "This isn't so bad.  At least I have some good TV on the trusty old ID channel."
Next 800m: "This is starting to suck."
Next 800m: "Maybe I should kick the speed down a notch.  If I were a total wimp."
Next 800m: "ZOMG I'LL NEVER MAKE IT I SUCK I WILL TOTALLY FAIL AT THIS MARATHON."

In case you were counting, I barely made it to the half-way point of this tempo.  After that, I had to break it up into 800 m repeats just to get through the workout.  What's extremely sad is that the last part is no exaggeration; I was mentally cracking by the second mile.  I really need to mentally toughen the you-know-what-bad-word-to-which-I-am-referring up.  So, to punish myself, I shall be doing more tempos on the treadmill until my inner whiny baby learns to put a cork in it.  It's kind of like self-flagellation, only with a treadmill.  I think.