Week 4 Boston Training Done. More Revisions to the plan.

6/27/2021

Week 4 is done! The good, the bad, and the ugly is all here. The truth of my journey as I train for Boston at 45 years old with a hope to be able to perform 106 days from today in a way that will make me proud of my work.

This week, I bombed my speed work with Dave and then promptly "recycled" myself for a speed-work do-over while planning to move hills to Tuesday. This way I can keep training with Kim as she goes longer and longer on Mondays, climb hills on tired legs on Tuesday, and have a chance to nail my speed work on Thursday after a rest day. I raced a check-in race (just a mile) on Saturday and then got a heat-exhausting 18M LR done with Rich. And this was a 57 mile "drop-back" week.

The week, mostly in pictures.

Kim and I moved our Mondays to the beach. I just need to see the ocean. It is 45 minute drive each way for me to do this but it is so worth it. The cool ocean breeze in hot humid air makes it feel more comfortable. The smell and sounds of the surf distract from the work. It is so rewarding to run at the beach for me.

STRYD data was fun. It was windy. On the way out it was at out backs. On the way back we rand directly into it. It was interesting to see the pod picked it up (as it should) but still this was interesting to see.

Tuesday, it was hot, humid and even though I thought I was fine after the 10M with Kim yesterday my legs clearly were not peppy and needed more rest. This workout was .3 mile repeats as fast as possible. Last week I got down to 5:56 pace but this week I was falling apart and trying with everything I had to hold on to sub-7 pace today. (This did not build my confidence for the Mile race I would do Saturday).

I asked Dave if he would mind a repeat week at .3's because I don't feel good about graduating up to .4's yet since these felt horrible. He was fine with us recycling the workout.

I also want to make was to move our hills to Tuesday instead (I can climb tired and that is more likely to help prep me for late-race hills anyway). I would like that rest day before the speed work (which we will now do Thursdays). This should help me nail speed-day or at least be better at it.

On Wednesday, Sidney and I did a lot of walking, with (before work) and without (after work) the dogs today. It was nice to just walk. I need to bring my phone for pictures of the walk days too. Sidney is getting left out of the blog and he is a big support for me. The dogs need to make there own appearance here too. They help me get a lot of time on my feet.

Thursday was Hill Repeat Day. We did 10 repeats of the 16% climb. We made some changes to this workout.

We decided to stick to just 10 repeats for the rest of the training cycle but we want to improve out time in three ways. We stopped resting at the top and now immediately turn right back around to recover at the bottom before the next round. That is more like what we will deal with when climbing over a hill.

So now as we do this workout, every other week,
(1) we will try to climb faster (my fastest split on my Garmin is 1:03),
(2) we will try to get faster on the decline, and
(3) we want to rest less at the bottom.

Fridays are just a relaxing day. Run/Walk with Kim. No rush today.

Today, Rich joined me to race the first USATF-NJ Long Distance Running Grand Prix Race of the year. It was 1 mile. :) My entire race report for The Big Bang Mile is here.

I ran a 6:19 for 7th place in my heat and 3rd place in my age group (45-49). This is good. I am happy. I am only in week 4 of training, still focused only on volume building, with some hills, and some fast short speed session. I am not race-ready.

My favorite part of the day may have been with Dave D. put down his trumpet to say to us "OMG you are here to run 1 mile, That's hilarious... now go off and do like 20 more!" and Rich says to me quietly "We'll do that tomorrow" :)

Saturday. This was grueling for me. So hot and humid. "Felt like" 92 degrees. Did I say Humid? It's summer. Nothing is shocking here. I could have gotten their earlier but my phone died over night and my alarm never woke me. Thank goodness for Lapis's big giant paw to my face at 6:20 am. She was wondering why I was still sleeping which means she does pay attention to me :) She is a sweet dog.

Coffee and BCAAs on the way to the run. Then just water the rest of the way. No calories. I paused the watch at bathrooms and when back at the car so I could get more water. So this is just run-time.

I hit the wall hard at maybe 14.5 miles. But that is the point. I want to Embrace the Wall. Give it Big Fat French Kiss and tell it I love it... and I want to visit it regularly in training. If I get to know it now, when I am carb-depleted, dehydrated, under-trained and cumulatively fatigued, I know it will then not interfere with my carb-loaded, well-hydrated, well-trained, and tapered dreams on race day. That is what depletion training is all about for me.

Random meaningless weekly stats:

First, my sleep stinks. I should just shut the laptop right now and go directly to bed!

Last week, I said I wanted 7:15 hours average but I got less! 6:39 hours average. I can't function like this. This is in part because my bed situation is horrible but it should be better soon. Sid and I are trying to find the perfect mattress topper that is good for both of us and this has been a tricky little puzzle. I think the next topper we get may be the right fit. We shall see.

Next, although I gained 0.5lbs this week, it seems that some of that is muscle so I am ok with that.

AND next, I added strength training 3 times per week but only AT HOME Body-Weight resistance stuff. I'll get back to gym eventually. For now I am thrilled that I can use my left foot solo when doing calf raises and single leg hops because as of last week I could not do that (heel bursa was mad). The ironic things here is that my heel bursa improved after I raced he mile? I am confused but happy.

I do need to add flex work next. That is always the hardest to make time for. I do add some in throughout the day but I make no dedicated time for it.

Finally, STRYD and my Garmin both agree that I am getting faster. I have no idea what makes them think these are times I could run, but I would bet if I ran a marathon right now, I would be closer to STRYD than Garmin at this moment.

That is all I got for this week! Bring on Week 5.

I am off to sleep now.

This is just my lowest weigh-in from the week. I care only that it is also the highest in muscle % that I have been this training cycle. Something is changing. More % muscle is good.

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