My Biggest Week!

Training week runs from Monday through Sunday.  In that aspect, I am at my biggest mileage week at over 60 miles after today's run (exact number unknown until I've completed today).  But the big deal for me is the week from Sunday through Saturday.  Since I did my long run on Sunday last week and Saturday this week, I hit 75.5 miles in 7 days!

I am officially tired, sore and constantly hungry.

Here's what that looked like:

Sunday:  18.6 miles - Swords Park    Mitch ran 15 miles too.  He dropped me off at the airport end of the trail and started from the other side.  We've done this a couple of times and its great because we can run our own pace and still see each other from time to time.  We did the last 7 miles together.  My overall average pace clocked in at 10:51/mile but most of my spits were in the low 10s.
Punxsutawney Phil made an appearance.  He's a long way from home.  (Actually a rock chuck is not quite the same thing as a groundhog but this is my story and I'll tell it how I want).

Monday:  10 miles - Shiloh Rd (Big Ditch Trail) at a 10:27/mile avg. pace.  I did this one after work and I dressed too warm for the weather.  This trail isn't much to look at so I didn't bother to take any pictures.

Tuesday:  3.4 miles - Zimmerman Trail    Yay!  The some of the trails are dry enough to run on!  I was mad at myself for not bringing a belt to carry my phone for pictures.  Mitch and I enjoyed a leisurely run/hike and then went out for dinner.

Wednesday:  9.6 miles - broken up in to two runs    This one was supposed to be a 3/3/3 (3 miles each done at a certain pace) but I was getting tired and it can be difficult to give up my entire evening to run when I have that many miles to do after work.  I got up and did the first half in the dark and then finished it with a treadmill run after work with a little speed thrown in.  I was trying to complete a challenge on Zwift anyway, but I wasn't excited about the treadmill when the weather was nice, but I admit that it is handy to be able to cook dinner while I'm running.

It was a beautiful morning for run -

Thursday:  10 miles - 2 out & back laps in the neighborhood.  I decided to take this one very easy.  It was cold and rain/snowing so I tucked my hands in to my jacket and refused to look at my watch the entire time.  It's so easy to feel like I need to push faster if I can see how slow I am running.  My goal was to run the whole time, including the hills at as easy of a pace as I could make myself do.  I kept telling myself "slow and steady, take it easy."  I managed an average of an easy 10:50/mile pace and only walked in a couple of spots for a few seconds.  The pace was what I was hoping for.

This is what 10 miles running in the rain does to the end of a braid:

Friday:  4.4 miles - Phipps Park   We've been waiting so long for this trail to be runnable again (Mitch's favorite).  In the winter we ran the steep climb for hill repeats often until the trail became to slick and then eventually too deep to run.  Now it's mostly clear with a short section that is till too muddy but otherwise perfect!   I love when the dirt is a little tacky because it's so much easier to run down than when it's completely dry.

Pause a moment here to look back at the first picture in this post.  There was quite a bit of snow still on the ground.  It's amazing how quickly it melted!

Saturday:  20 miles - Swords Park to the end of Zimmerman Trail and back.  Mitch and I did this together even though he was only going to do 18.  It was a long day.  I had already forgotten how much harder it is to do long runs on trails and overall it took us over 5 hours because we did a bit of walking and a few stops.  We are both sun burnt because I still haven't wrapped my head around the fact that I need to wear sunscreen.  I can't think of a better way to spend a beautiful, spring Saturday with my husband.  We took time for a little photo shoot along the way:

 

 

While this was a big week for me, I have to give Mitch a shout out!  He topped out the last 7 days with over 47 miles and that is a huge week for him too.  I'm very proud of him.

 

 

 



If I'm following my plan to a "T" then I would start tapering now.  Unfortunately, my training plan is a week ahead and assumes that my race is in 3 weeks. I have 4 weeks so I need another peak week.  I'll be traveling for work again and that makes getting the miles in pretty difficult, but I will do my best to get in a good run every day and work in some speed since my training plan hasn't incorporated that in a while. Next weekend I will run an 18 miler on Molt Hills to simulate race day and make sure I'm good with the gear choices I've made and then.......... it's taper time.