Running is a means and never merely an end

Long jog today. 7 miles with .5 warm up and cool down. I had to stop and go to the bathroom in the middle of it, which annoyed me, but you gotta do what you gotta do. Anyways, I don't know what else to say about that run...I am feeling pretty burnt out.

Didn't feel like running today. It was very cold and I needed to work on homework anyways. This is one of the few perks of training alone, without any teammates or a coach. If I need to take a day off, I have the power to do it. Likewise, if I want to do a harder workout than what was planned, I have the power to do that as well. I like that flexibility. But, it is pretty lonely out here. I would kill for someone to do my long aerobic runs with. I miss my wonderful teammates from cross country (they almost all swim). They meant the world to me!

Taking a little break. My workouts have sort of sucked lately... I do them and all, but I am just counting down the seconds until they are over and feeling burnt out physically and mentally. Now that Foot Locker is over, I should have a good bit of time before my first indoor meet. Break time it is.

I don't feel so good. Being on this short break, I've really just let go to a lot of the good habits I have to have while I am running. I haven't been drinking water like I should, sleeping like I should, and especially not eating like I should. Dessert galore was acceptable for 2 or 3 days maybe... but I have eaten so much junk for the past 5 days that I literally am just losing my apetite.

First day back from my little break. I took 6 or 7 days off I think. It felt really nice mentally to take a few days off, but physically I actually didn't like it too much (see previous posts). I did about a 30 minute jog (a little less than 4 miles) around my school. I ran the last few minutes of the jog pretty hard, and I'll admit I was lazy & didn't warm up properly, considering I just jogged a lap and did about half of my dynamics. My cool down was lazy too - 1 or 2 laps. Anyways, after my jog, I went up to the track and did 6x200 sprints with a 50 meter walk inbetween, thinking it would be good to help shake out my legs. Looking back...I think that was a very bad idea. I should not have done any sort of sprint work, or even those fast last few minutes of my jog, on my first day back.  I should have taken it easier today, and warmed up and cooled down better. Now my calves are so tight and my right achillies hurts. Lesson learned. I am feeling some ice tonight and a nice long, slow jog tomorrow.

Today I was still sort of getting back into it. My body wanted to do a real workout but at the same time I knew in my mind that that is how injuries happen, and I needed to build up a little more before I jumped into any fast workouts. I just did a nice 40 minute jog (roughly 5 miles) and some stretching. It was fine except I was very cold. Winter sucks! But at least I am able to run.

Today sucked. It was just one of those days... It took me from after school until about 4:30 to even muster up the motivation to walk out of the door to head out for my run, and then once I got to the rec center I sat there in my car for another 15 minutes just trying to wrap my mind around my workout and prematurely establish the fact that I WOULD do it. Didn't go so well. I did a .6 mile warm up, and then had planned to do 6 reps of the .4 mile loop at a fast pace (somewhere between 800 and mile race pace) and a 2 mile cool down. Instead, I was just feeling so sick of running that I did a super short fartlek run of 1 minute fast, 1 minute slow for 8 minutes (a little over a mile) to get a little warmer and then went inside to the spin bike. I biked a little over 5 miles. Biking does nothing for me cardiovascularly, honestly, but it did set my quads on fire. Afterwards I did a pushup circuit and stretched. I hate when I don't follow through with the planned workout.

Half-mile warm up, 8 mile jog, dynamic drills and lots of stretching for a cool down. My favorite day of the week (running-wise)..aerobic run day! I love my long runs because I get to think a lot. A lot of the time in sprint workouts and tempo runs I am only thinking about my time and how much further till I am done. During my high-mileage runs, which are generally at a reasonably slow (8-minute-mile-ish), recovery-type pace, I am not really hurting for most of my run. I have the capacity to daydream and explore. These long runs are when I fall in love with running the most! A lot of times I just like to pray as I jog. I am thankful to God for this awesome sport and ability He has given me. Today I was especially thankful for the mountains and beautiful scenery He has placed me in...I feel like it would suck to have to run in a city or flat road for 8 miles. On one mile-long stretch of a back road I took out of campus, the sun was setting perfectly over the mountains on my right side and it just looked like heaven!! God is so good.

Today was my main speed workout of the week. I started with a 1.25 mile warm-up, dynamics, and some acceleraters. My workout was 12x400m at 5k race-pace (for me, 1:30-1:35 per 400) with 70 seconds rest in between. I've been doing this workout periodically on Saturdays since August, and each time I do it I shorten the rest 10 or 15 seconds, but keep the pace the same. I started out at about 2 minutes rest, so it has been pretty fulfilling to be able to feel how my body is improving and recovering faster over the course of the season. I hope to be able to hit the same splits with only 30 seconds rest one day! Its also a really good workout for me because even though it isn't really my hardest workout physically, it is such a hard workout mentally since it is pretty repetitive. I like to think it helps my 3200 mindset a lot (8 laps can get monotonous). Anyways, I hit my split on all but 2 reps today, 1 being 1:36 and the last rep being 1:28 (not complaining about that one). Most reps were 1:33. Afterwards I did an easy 2.25 mile cool down. I feel good about today.

I started this week out with a 3.5 mile tempo run at 6:45-6:55 per mile (I hit 3:20ish for that last 800) with a mile warm up and a mile and a half cool down. I usually hate tempo runs, to be honest, but this one was better than most. I could really feel myself getting better. Even though getting better means hurting, I love those runs when you can feel that you are making yourself better. I know they all pay off. Plus the weather today was such good running weather, it was nice and cool with minimal wind. I'm very thankful (and confused) that the weather hasn't gotten too bad yet. Hope I didn't jinx it!

I was planning on doing the Prefontaine workout (200's) on the track today but that sort of fell through when, during my warm up, I realized I need at least 1 if not 2 coaches to help time me...so seeing as I am all on my own this winter, I decided to do a little ladder workout. After my 2 mile warm up, I did 200-400-800-1600-800-400-200 all at my 5k PR pace, except the 200's which I did at about 90% (like the start and kick of a race). Then I did some form drills and a mile cool down. I was feeling really strong today! I am finding that I run better when I look straight ahead instead of at the track. Anyways, I can't do my workout after school tomorrow so I am going to have to wake up early and do it before and I still have no idea what to do. Haven't done a hill workout in a while? Maybe I'll dream up a workout tonight.... Oh, days like today are the times it would be very helpful to have a coach...or team...or anyone. Loner status over here.

I really didn't know what to do today, and I also didn't have a lot of time because I need to be back at school by 3rd period. So I just went on a 4 and a half mile semi up-tempo run in my neighborhood loop. It is extremely hilly (well duh, this is the mountains...) so I wasn't all that fast, but I got faster as I went, which is a habit I've been trying to better solidify. But it feels kind of nice to have already gotten my run in and have the afternoon off to watch my little sister's basketball game & hang out with my friends.

Easy 6 mile jog this morning with a half mile warmup and some strides afterwards. It was a gorgeous day and I felt fantastic! 

I enjoyed getting some cross-training mileage in today! I jogged a mile warmup, and then biked 7 miles, stair-climbed half a mile, and jogged another mile for cool down. It was kind of nice to give my joints a bit of a rest. Speaking of cross training, I've been thinking a lot about doing an hour of yoga every week on my off day. I don't know much about yoga but I think that would be good for my overall health and injury prevention. Couldn't hurt!

13 mile jog with a short warm up and cool down! Longest run I have done in a long time. It was raining which started to feel amazing after about mile 6. I felt solid, except for my feet hurting towards the end from all of the pounding (most of the run was on pavement). I think I'm going to sleep very well tonight.

3 mile tempo run with a 1.25 mile warmup and cool down. I usually do my tempos on this half mile loop walking path at the rec center so that I can measure it confidently, but today I wanted to change it up. I ran down and back this beautiful back road along the river that is (conveniently) 1.5 miles long. Given that, I don't know my exact mile splits, but my final time was 21:41, so they were probably spread out in the 6:50-7:30 range. Regardless, it was 65 and sunny, so it was quite a beautiful day that The Lord created and I enjoyed my run!!

Christmas Eve! Today I went out with Taylor for a little cross-training via mountain bike. We biked a super hilly trail on the mountain overlooking WCU, my first time ever actually biking a trail. Then we came out down on campus and biked a loop around campus and went back up to where we started. All together I think it was about 5 miles (plus a little warm up jog I did). My quads feel like iron, I am going to be so sore tomorrow. I don't get sore much anymore from running, but any time I cross train I feel so out of shape. My muscles are so conditioned to running, but not to anything else! I think biking is good for my overall fitness, even if it doesn't necessarily make me a faster runner. Taylor and I had fun with it though!

5 miler around Buchanan loop (hill work). I could definitely feel that it was the day after Christmas. I got side stitches like crazy and I just felt really lathargic. But my pace wasn't too bad considering that, and the hills (7:38 avg per mile). Afterwards I did some ab work.

6 miles easy around town. I felt great until the last mile and then I started feeling those side stitches again. I think I really need to start hydrating better.

Today was a rough one. I had my signature workout planned for today - 12x400 with 2 mi warm up/cool down. But I hadn't accounted for my staying up as late as I did last night. I literally got to sleep around 4:30am, and ended up with a grand total of about 3 hours of sleep. Needless to say, I was completely lifeless even during my warmup, so I decided there was no way I was going to be able to do this workout effectively. So I just did 3 miles easy, then 2 quick 400's all out with a full recovery, then a half mile cool down. Excuse me now while I go nap the rest of my day away.

Met up with Nancy for church, a 3 mile jog, abs, and 60 minutes of yoga. This was our first time in a yoga class, but we really liked it! It was very relaxing and we got some good stretching in. Today was a solid recovery day.

5 mile mountain biking sesh at the trails in panther town with Tori and Taylor. I had SO much fun with this. My quads were on fire on some of the uphills but it was a good feeling. The mountains were especially wonderful today, I always love getting out & exploring God's handiwork!

Strange workout today of 8 miles collectively at the high school. 2.5 hard, then some abs, .5 medium, then lunges, and 5 easy to wind it down and get some endurance in. I felt really good on the first two hard, I could have thrown in .6 more and made it a solid 5k time. No side stitches today.