Life Lately and St. Louis Go! Half Marathon Training Week 6

Hi! How was your weekend? Did anyone race this weekend? I love to hear about your races and running! 

Life Lately

After a couple weeks of glorious spring weather, winter is back for (hopefully) it’s last round. We got snow on Monday and Friday. I’m not a fan of second winter and totally wussed out this week and ran on the treadmill whenever it snowed. Denial may be my mechanism for coping with this weather. 

Second Winter

Welcome to northwest Indiana, everyone. We have winter for about six months out of the year. I just hope and pray that by next winter we are living in the Pacific Northwest and don’t have to deal with the snow, ice, and wind. 

For fellow Brooks shoe addicts: they have their Pure Project 3 shoes on final sale on their website! I love my Pure Flow 3s and even though my current pair have plenty of miles left in them I ordered another pair since they were on sale. I’m totally guilty of stockpiling running shoes when I find my favorites on sale. Example A: I have four pairs of Merrell Bare Access Arc 2s that I bought back a year ago before I discovered that they do not agree with my feet for runs longer than 8 miles. They do make great hiking shoes at least, and I’m weird and refuse to put extra miles on my running shoes by using them for hiking and walking. But seriously, if you need any new shoes or running clothes, go drool over the Brooks sale. (Not an affiliate link —> I just really really love their clothes and shoes). 

Brooks Pure Flow 3
Old photo but seriously these shoes are the best. Too bad they don’t look as new now thanks to all the spring mud.

PSA: don’t leave your phone nearby when you’re boiling bagels. It doesn’t end well (at least the bagels turned out tasty—working on more recipes for what will turn into an e-book!). The screen of my phone now looks like the eclipse in the opening credits from Heroes. Again, thank goodness for insurance.

Since my phone met an unfortunate, untimely, and gradual demise, I didn’t snap as many photos over the weekend. Not that we did anything out of the ordinary: drinks out on Friday (I’m still loving Guinness after having it for St. Patty’s), running together at our favorite park, renting Unbroken (if you haven’t yet, you must see this movie! It’s more of a war/historical movie than a running movie but it is so good and inspiring), church on Sunday, and eating all the carbs. 

If you follow me on Facebook or Instagram, you likely saw that I was accepted as a Fitfluential Ambassador this week! I’m so excited about how much this little blog has already grown and honored to be part of such an awesome community.

Ambassador-Badge 

St. Louis Go! Half Marathon Training Week 6

Peak week! Even though I’ve only been specifically training for 6 weeks so far, I had 6 solid weeks of base building with some good tempo workouts and 10-12 mile long runs, so I feel like I’m actually carrying 12 weeks of training fatigue. Physically I’m more than ready for a taper, but even with the short taper of the half marathon I feel like I get a bit of the taper crazies. But I find that for me personally a taper really does help me get ready to reach my goal, so it’s worth it.

The weather this week was so weird and definitely impacted my workouts: Monday, Tuesday, and Fridays runs were all on the treadmill because of snow, icy spots, and very cold wind chills, while Wednesday’s run was made way more difficult than it should have been by some very strong winds and high humidity. 

Monday: 8 miles on the treadmill, 8:39/mile average pace. Originally this was supposed to be my speed work day, but an ache in my ankle caused me to decide to keep it easy instead. Hills are like speed work in disguise, so I add hills up to a 6% incline on my run. In the evening I did about 25 minutes of strength training and core work.

Tuesday: 8 miles on the treadmill, 8:50/mile average pace, 0.5-1.5% incline, and 20 minutes of recovery yoga.

Wednesday: 9 miles with 2 x 3 miles at goal pace: 7:28, 7:33, 7:31 and 7:37, 7:32, 7:29. The headwind was awful but as I learned from the Valpo Half Marathon, wind can definitely happen on race day so it’s good to learn to run through it.

Resilience and Perseverance 1

Thursday: 4 recovery miles with Charlie, 9:32/mile average, followed by foam rolling and 25 minutes of Pilates in the evening.

Friday: 14 miles on the treadmill, 8:33.mile. I practiced race day fueling, hydration, and hills. I also learned that Pilates the night before means sore abs, and sore abs mean mid-run cramps.

Saturday: 2 hilly miles on the trails with Charlie and Ryan. 

45 miles total for the week. Another all-time mileage high and it felt good, which makes me excited to ramp up my mileage even more for marathon training in the summer/fall.

 

Goals for This Week

1. Lower mileage with two solid workouts: mile repeats on Monday and a short goal pace run on Wednesday. 

2. More recovery yoga and foam rolling.

3. Lowered sugar and high vegetable intake. I cut down on vegetables and increase simple carbs on race week, so it feels good to eat super healthy the week before that!

Questions of the Day:
If you raced this weekend (or recently), how did you do? And if you’re training for a race, what’s your goal?
What’s your favorite running shoe?

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4 Responses

  1. Brooks pure flows are my favorite running shoes ! However, I feel really bad spending money on running shoes when Im not even running. I already have 2 extra pairs that I haven’t worn yet, but bought them just because I found such a good deal:)

    1. It’s hard to pass up a good deal on running shoes, especially when they are changing the models. Hopefully soon you’ll be back to running and get to use your other pairs 🙂

  2. Wow, 14 treadmill miles!! That’s impressive. Sorry about your snow, spring will be here soon!

    I’m training for my first half marathon (May 17) and then I hope to run a full marathon in November this year. I’m hoping to do the half in 1:50.

    Favorite running shoe: Brooks Ghost, but I’m currently running in the Brooks Glycerin. I’ll have to try the Pure Flows next! I’ve never been disappointed with a Brooks shoe, ever.

    1. Thank you, Maddie! Spring did finally arrive today 🙂 Good luck on your first half marathon! I had a similar goal for my first half – it’s definitely possible when you set your mind and train for it!

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