Lynne Flores Running LLC

Week 5 of my marathon training schedule is a wrap! It was yet another up-and-down week, with a bit of a crisis of confidence. I was having some trouble with my lower back again (a recurring problem for me) – it had started to be achey, both when running and at rest, with some sciatic nerve pain. When I get this issue I also get a strange kind of strained feeling in my ankles when running which is radiating down from my back. Like I said I would at the outset of my training schedule, I did the sensible thing and went to my chiropractor on Thursday.  He did the necessary adjustments, and I’m happy to say that my back has felt much better, especially a couple of days after my visit. He reckons I should be visiting once a week, and since I pay a monthly subscription instead of pay-per-visit, I’m going to do that, especially during marathon training.

Anyway, what with my back giving me some problems and just generally feeling a little tired, I was feeling somewhat, “can I do this?” with regards to running this marathon. I wasn’t feeling good about it at all, and was not looking forward to my long run on Sunday. I even took a rest day on Saturday, which wasn’t on the schedule, but I felt like rest would benefit me more than going out there and running the day before my long run. This means that my mileage for the week was lower than I had planned, but sometimes you have to listen to your body and do what feels right. I was listening to my mind as well as my body – I felt that psychologically I needed a rest day too before heading out for Sunday’s long run.

With all that said, my Sunday long run actually turned out to be fantastic! I was dreading it for nothing! My back felt great, I took it easy, had good fuel and water with me, and once I got a few miles in I began to really enjoy it and I felt really proud of myself at the end for running 18.45 miles when I really hadn’t been feeling it beforehand. I feel like I’ve got back all my enthusiasm for marathon running too after that long run, which I’m super happy about! I know that I’m very fortunate to have a place in the Boston Marathon, and I want to go there and do the very best I can and really enjoy the whole experience.

All in all, my total running mileage for Week 5 was 39.15 (not the planned 48). I did get back into cross-training, with an hour-long indoor cycling class on Thursday evening (during which I cycled 16 miles). I only did one strength workout (35 minutes on Tuesday) but did do core exercises after all my runs. Hopefully during this coming week, I’ll actually manage to do everything that’s on my plan – 48 miles, two 30 minute strength workouts and an indoor cycling class. Fingers crossed!

Hope everyone’s having a great Monday!

Thanks for reading!

Lynne.

 

 

Yesterday saw the end of Week 4 of my marathon training schedule, and it ended with a bang with a tough half marathon race. I ran the Ralston Creek Half Marathon in Arvada, Colorado, and phew, it was a toughie! A fantastic event, though – really well organized and the course was beautiful with some incredible views. Getting to those incredible views was the hard bit, with a challenging switchback / hairpin hill to run up. These are psychologically difficult as you can see what’s to come, as well as being physically tough! Before that, too, in mile 5, there was a long slow climb up a hill. This was followed by a nice downhill, but then we all noticed the big switchback in front of us! All in all, though, it was a fun race and a great experience, with some downhills too to balance out the uphills. My time was a bit slower than I’d have ideally liked, but with such a challenging course I was happy with it, and I was thrilled to win third place in my age group, F45-49!

The rest of last week’s training was a bit up and down again. A combination of getting over being sick the weekend of February 11th/12th, then some snowy weather last Wednesday meant that I didn’t push myself to do any speedwork last week. I just ran steady or easy. I also never got any cross-training done again – I MUST get back into it this week. Strength training was a bit spotty too, although I did do core exercises after all my runs except for Sunday’s race, and I did a few other strength exercises after Thursday’s run too. My total running mileage for the week was 45.5 miles.

Hopefully this week I can return to speedwork, cross-training and do more strength training!

Wishing everyone a great week!

Thanks for reading!

Lynne.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Week 3 of my training schedule has been a bit of a mixed bag!

On the upside:

Monday’s, Wednesday’s and Thursday’s runs went great. Wednesday’s run included a successful fartlek session – felt fantastic to get some good speed work done and I enjoyed this session a lot (fartlek is my favorite kind of speed work).

I did two full strength workouts, one on Tuesday (34 minutes and 30 seconds) and one on Friday (28 minutes). I also did core exercises after my runs on Monday and Wednesday.

On the downside:

Life happened this week and interfered with my plans, as it sometimes does! I didn’t get my cross-training done this week, then on Friday things took a bit of a downturn. I ran on Friday morning, and during the run (and during the strength workout afterwards) I thought I felt a little bit off but put it down to simply being tired. Later on Friday afternoon, though, I started to feel really unwell – flu-ey, hot and shivering and with body aches all over. Saturday was a planned rest day anyway, but I wouldn’t have run even if it wasn’t as I still felt pretty rough. Today (Sunday), I’m definitely on the mend, but I don’t feel well enough to run yet, hence I’m missing a long run this week, a planned 18-miler. These things happen, though, and I’m just going to rest today and accept that my mileage for this week is lower than ideal for my training schedule (27.7 miles rather than the planned 45). I’m hoping I’ll feel back to normal tomorrow and can get back out there running again.

Hope you all have a successful week ahead!

Thanks for reading!

Lynne.

Last week was Week 2 of my training cycle, and on the whole it was pretty satisfying.

The speed session I attempted on Thursday, though, had me re-evaluating things somewhat. For this session, I was supposed to run 2 miles easy as a warm-up (which I did), then the speed section was to be 5 x half a mile at 5k pace with quarter mile jog recoveries in between. Well, after 2 x half miles at 5k pace with the jog recoveries, I was totally exhausted and felt like I couldn’t do it five times! I amended the session and instead ran a few more miles and included 5 sets of 30 second fast strides (mostly with 30 second jog recovery in between, although one recovery was a little longer as I waited to get past a lingering icy patch before running fast again). The strides went well, although I felt tired on the run back home afterwards. I did cover the prescribed distance of 7.75 miles for the whole session (including the recovery at an easy pace), so that was good, and I did get some good speedwork done, even though it wasn’t the session I planned.

It’s gotten me thinking about where I’m at as a runner, and how I’m probably not in the shape I was in several years ago when I was training with Bellahouston Harriers – in those days I could’ve managed a tough session like that without too much trouble. I’d still have found it tough (it’s supposed to be!), but I could have done it. I don’t know…..I find myself pondering, is it because I’m getting older (mid-40s now as opposed to very late-30s / early-40s back then)? But then there are runners the same age and older than me who are still regularly busting out tough training sessions and awesome 5k times. Is it because I’m running at altitude here in Colorado as opposed to at sea-level back in Scotland? But I’ve lived here for nearly three years now and am well acclimated to the high altitude (although I’m sure I read somewhere that you never really run quite as fast at altitude as you can at sea-level, no matter how acclimated you are).

Was I just having a bit of a bad running day on Thursday? That’s certainly possible and happens to all runners now and then. I think it might be something to do with having less mental toughness and resilience for tough speed sessions these days too – partly to do with training on my own vs. training in a team setting when I trained with Bellahouston Harriers. Having a team of people around you doing the same workout, and the bit of competitiveness that kicks in, really does help, for me at least. It might be something to do with getting older in that I’m becoming less competitive, and being slightly less prepared to totally bust a gut in training sessions – I really want to enjoy my running and not have certain sessions become something to dread. With all that said, I’m definitely going to keep speed sessions as a part of my training to help me run the best marathon that I’m capable of. I think I just have to tone them down a bit in the meantime, and hope that I build up some more resilience for them again.

Like I say, though, it wasn’t a bad week’s training overall. I actually ran (and enjoyed!) a different speed session on Saturday, which was 8.25 miles with 6 miles of that being at marathon pace. This went great, and gave me a much-needed mental boost after Thursday’s session. My long run on Sunday was fantastic – 15.1 miles on a beautiful morning. Including my other runs I did complete the proposed mileage for the week too, which was 45 miles (I finished up the week at 45.65 miles). I only did one full strength workout this week instead of the planned two, but I did do core exercises after all of my runs except on Sunday. I also got back to cross-training, with a 45 minute indoor cycling class on Tuesday.

Onwards and upwards into Week 3!

Wishing everyone a great week!

Thanks for reading!

Lynne.