Well, let’s just call my daily writing challenge a fail and move on, shall we? It’s not so much that I am unable to sit and write every day, I actually enjoy writing quite a bit. I think I’ve created other, unnecessary, blocks for myself. I sit down to write and I realize I’ve failed to take any pictures, and sometimes taking said pictures, of myself anyway, requires stepping outside of my comfort zone. Does it matter that I don’t have image heavy posts? Probably not. Mostly I’m compelled to document and share my journey, and for me that means writing about it. Will I write more if I remove this self-created pressure? Maybe, and perhaps if I revamp my goal with this caveat (no pressure to snap daily running selfies) I’ll find a happy medium for myself. Okay, enough of the meta talk about blogging. I’ve probably written more about writing than anything else. Let’s talk running.
Highlights from This Week’s Training
I had a great long run on Sunday morning that encompassed 11 total miles with 6 progression miles in the middle. I worked down from 7:50 to 7:08, and my overall average pace for this run was 8:12. I felt great the whole time, and this was one of my better long runs. I love it when long runs don’t feel long and you hit that zone where you feel like you could run all day, while also being 100% happy about quitting while you’re ahead in the name of things like pancakes.
My runs since Sunday have been easy runs, with a medium long run on Tuesday (80 minutes). Tomorrow I will tackle 5K effort speed work, as I’m gearing up for another race next weekend (April 15). I’m working on my mental game to really push through that final mile. I’m toying with two possible approaches. 1) Break the race down into 5 x 1K blocks instead of miles. Maybe focusing on shorter segments instead of miles will help me stay more consistent. This idea was inspired by the fact that tomorrow’s workout will be 5 x 1K, and it’s start to make more sense to me as a racing strategy. 2) I might do something I’ve never, ever done in a race before, which is to use music. This one is 100% situational, as I’m finding the smaller 5K’s to be lacking in numbers, both in terms of other runners to push against and crowd support. So far, all my races this year have been out and back, and I’ve found the back half to be a slog, so I thought if I cranked some music it would help me push through the mental barrier. This almost feels like cheating, but maybe it’ll help me learn what running a consistent 5K feels like and it won’t be necessary next time around.
I’m sitting here looking out at a lovely, sunny day, and also reveling in the fact that my work week is half way over. I took Friday off and plan to do nothing but sleep in, read, eat. I’m sure there will be some wine in there too.
How’s your training going this week? Gearing up for a target race?
Yours,
Sarah
