Going With The Flow

AM - 7 miles along the boardwalk in Rio de Janeiro. I feel tired from all the traveling and action. 

Spent the weekend in Rio de Janeiro with a co-worker and her friends. We took a tram to the top of Sugarloaf - a huge rock formation with beautiful views. We also went to the famous Cococabana Beach, Baja Beach, and three others. The beaches are so cool here because they are segregated from each other by mountains and other rocks. It was kind of awkward hanging out with the group because they only speak Portuguese and I only speak English. So I had no idea what they were saying for two straight days but I still had lots of fun and was grateful that they were willing to let me tag along. Thankfully, I was able to run outdoors in Rio because they have a great bike path along the beaches!

Now I'm in Juiz de Fora. I don't feel as safe here, so I'll probably be doing treadmill runs for the rest of the week. The treadmills here are the equivalent of treadmills in US about 15 years ago - no incline, pace oscillates +-0.5 km/hr, and the distance kept changing. Anyway, I THINK I ran about 5.8 but who knows!

PM - 3.1 miles on the treadmill, very slow because I had to run after dinner and was very full! 

AM - I was able to find a treadmill that had incline and worked at higher speeds! I set the incline to 1.0 and warmed up for 2.4 miles. Then I ran a 20:00 5K tempo, 6:26 pace. It felt hard, probably as much mentally as it was physically. Treadmill running feels a lot more difficult to me for some reason, but I was still glad to get in some faster running this morning (did I really run a marathon at this pace only 4 months ago?). Cooled down for a total of 5.9 miles. 

PM - Ran 2.9 miles on the treadmill very easy - had to run after dinner again tonight. 

AM - Got up really early this morning to get in some decent mileage on the treadmill because I will not have time for another workout this evening. Ran for 60 minutes for 7.5 miles, very slow at first to wake up then gradually faster. Threw in some incline every once in a while for hills but mostly stayed at 1.0.

After work today, we are going to my co-worker Rafaela's English class. Apparently they really like to practice their English with Americans. I'm just relieved that I will actually be able to understand people - the language barrier here is becoming very frustrating. Afterwards, Rafaela's mom is treating us to an authentic Brazilian dinner. It should be an interesting evening!

AM - Treadmill workout. Warmed up for 1.75 miles then ran 3 x 1.55 miles at 1% incline (2.5 km) at 6:26 pace w/ 3 min active recovery. The effort felt hard this morning - my legs felt fatigued but my breathing wasn't too bad. Glad to get another workout in - I'm worried about the BAA 5K in 3.5 weeks. Cooled down for a total of 7.6 miles.

I've been really struggling with my back for the past 3-4 days to the point where I can barely sit down for more than a couple minutes without pain. Maybe it's because I haven't had as much time to stretch and do yoga every day, I don't know. The pain seems to be stem from the SI joints and radiate up my back. It is the worst when I am sitting but can feel it all the time. When I start running, I get a burning sensation in the joints but running is not necessarily painful. I wonder if the back pain has been the result of SI problems this whole time (I haven't ever been treated for that). I've been taking a lot of ibuprofen and putting on Biofreeze to help. So frustrating..

AM - 5.1 miles on the treadmill with varying inclines 0-3%, 8 min pace average. Felt better today because I spent a lot of time last night massaging and stretching my back.

I got my results back from my blood work yesterday. My ferritin value was 35 ug/L which is borderline low. Camille Herron posted a great article on this topic that I would recommend. She also links to a Review of Iron Supplementation in Athletes that recommends a supplementation of 100mg of iron a day on an empty stomach for 3 months if you are under 35 ug/L. The target ferritin value is 60 ug/L. Although I have already been taking iron, I haven't been taking enough or under the right conditions for optimal absorption. So I'm going to modify my supplementation and hope that I will see improvements! 

Other relevant values are (with reference to elite XC women skiers, similar to runners):

Red blood cells 4.76     (Ref 4.23-5.94)
Hemoglobin 14.6           (Ref 12.5-15.1)
Hematocrit 44.8             (Ref 37.6-45.1)

So I'm about the same as the references, which is good!

My Vitamin D was low - 33.3 ug/L (Ref 30-100) so I am supposed to take a supplement for that too. The spring and summer sunshine should also help.

Most other values on my blood work were relatively normal. I just need to make sure I keep my blood and bones healthy!

AM - Flew into Sao Paulo, Brazil last night. Took a taxi this morning to Ibirapuera Park and it is awesome! They call it the "Central Park" of Brazil and it has a 4 mile loop dirt trail along the perimeter with beautiful bamboo trees and huge trees with vines everywhere. It was beautiful. I didn't take my camera today because I didn't want to carry it for 13 miles, but I'll try to get some good pictures tomorrow. My run went pretty well - the 7:45-8 min pace felt easy compared to running on the treadmill. I ran a couple miles really slow with a co-worker and then ran at my pace. At 8 miles my back got so tight that I couldn't run anymore, so I stopped and massaged it for a minute then was good to go for the rest of the run. I threw in a faster 6:25 last mile.

Now we are off to check out the other sights!

trail