AM: I ran with Sam, Josie and Alison today :) the pace felt alright until the long gradual uphill towards cafe rio, but then Alison asked if I wanted to slow down for a bit. I was good with that haha. But then we sped up again and around 4 miles or a bit after is where it got rough. It was the small uphill right before the downhill and I was breathing hard, my legs were burning and I fell off them about 10 meters. I caught back up to them on the downhill. Sam and I went 5 while Alison and Josie added a mile to get to 6. I wasn’t feeling great so I didn’t want to go another mile. But it felt really good to run with people again, I like being pushed. That’ll help me get back into it quicker, and being with people makes it seem not so bad. I started my watch before it got GPS so I’m not sure how accurate it is, but according to it 5 miles at 7:36 average
PM: Went in for weights, did Day 1’s workout. It felt a lot easier today. I was surprised, must’ve been a lighter workout. Added 200 crunches at the end. I also talked to Coach and asked for running tips for summer training, he said he’ll be emailing the packet out later today. He said to do nothing on the track and I can tweak the workouts if wanted, like make the pickups longer or something. And he said that we’d decided 10 miles was too much for me but 8 miles seems to be a good distance. And then once I get up to 8 for a few weeks see if I can throw in a 10 miler on Saturdays (all at once). Then if I feel good after a couple weeks I could try to go 2 10 milers a week, Wednesday and Saturday. So first I’m going to get up to 8 miles, I’m a lot more motivated now
Later PM: 2 mile shakeout with Maddy, 7:15 average. It felt good, a little faster than I’m used to but I was expecting that because Maddy always goes fast :) We talked about how we both put a lot of pressure on ourselves to hit a certain pace and even 50%s can be rough sometimes. For example, only going 7:45 and being discouraged because you’re working hard but 7:45 is “supposed” to feel relaxed. She said she’s started wearing a heart rate monitor and it’s helped her a lot to ease the pressure. Rather than going for pace you’re running in a zone and giving effort that your body can handle rather than pushing so hard to hit a pace and dying while feeling discouraged. I’m looking into getting one for myself because I think that would help me a lot to not feel so bad about not being able to hit a certain pace. Then gradually as I get into better shape hitting my heart rate zones will be at a faster pace.
Also, random fact: my freshman incoming class of 12 girls at SUU (it was a lot) is now down to 2: Maddy and I. Everyone else quit and Brighton decided to be done after this last track season because she graduated, didn’t want the extra year. And Maddy graduates next spring. I looked at a picture of those who traveled to a race my freshman year, about 10 of us, and the only person still running for SUU in that picture is me now that Angie and Brighton are gone. In another picture, our top 7 had gone up the mountain to train at 10,000 ft and I’m the only one from that group left. Ironically I’m one of the slowest on our team now- that’s how much faster our team has gotten. Plus I haven’t run well for a while. Kinda sad and weird. I’m gonna be an old nanny because I still have 2.5 years left, it’ll be a completely different team my last year here. I just hope that I can find my old groove and start running well again.
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