I had a lot to learn between my long runs! The first thing I took myself to task on was my diet. I upped my calorie intake on MyFitnessPal, and I put my scale into the trunk of my car. This has helped alleviate some of my OCD so that I don’t end up starving myself again. I also decided to do my long run on the treadmill, which would be boring, but would help me with my confidence issues after that bad run. It also would help that I would have better access to water.
Leading up to this long run I did speed training Wednesday, and biked Thursday. I changed it up because I wanted to spend some social time Wednesday night at the Townshend, and it was well worth putting off the biking.
On another note, I passed a big mile marker (ba-dum-tsh) on my journey to Boston. We are now only in the double digits until race day! This is starting to get scary real! I also will be getting my official registration information this week in the mail (yup, snail mail!).
I also tried 2 new recipes on my new wok, my brother and sister-in-law gave it to me for my birthday last month. The lo mein didn’t turn out great, but the rice was fantastic (especially with my new rice cooker from my grandparents). It is really easy to make, you make the rice, you take some frozen veggies, garlic and spices, soy sauce (I added hoisin for some added taste to the chicken after cooking it) and you have chicken fried rice!
It’s especially good because it has a lot of protein (egg/chicken) and tons of carbs. I keep frozen chicken breasts around for salads so it is nice to be able to utilize something I have around my apartment anyways. I love to cook, so it’s really nice to add something to my repertoire.
Friday I settled in at home, and rested for my long run the next morning.
Now at first I thought the new treadmills would let me complete my distances without interruption. Sadly it let me put in 17 miles, but still reset at 1 hour. This is kind of annoying once you get into the groove. I kept the incline mostly at 1%, but every 2 miles I would increase it to 3% for 0.25 miles, and every so often I’d play with the speed up or down 0.2 while keeping myself around 9 min/miles.
While I do not want to get into the habit of running on the treadmill, as an outside run can teach you a lot and help with training in so many ways, this did help train me in ways an outdoor run cannot. The first thing is that I could really space out and just think. Running helps me not only physically but mentally. Since I wasn’t worried about other people, or routes, I was completely focused on decompressing my mind. This was very freeing and helped me get tapped back into one of the reasons I love to run so much. I could just run and exist IN the run itself.
Second, I focused most of the run on my breathing. Instead of trying to get a set effort, I had more or less a set speed, so that allowed me to put a lot more thought into my breathing. I have the tendency to push myself and it wouldn’t surprise me to find that I tend to be more speedy than I should be on my long runs outdoors.
Third, I also focused on my form, paying attention to how I’m rolling my feet, how my legs are turning over, etc. Normally I’m also paying attention to where my feet are landing over cracks, or bumps in the road. Not having that extra piece of information pulled me more towards the basics. I definitely run a little different now, and one of my blisters (the most prevalent one on the right foot) did not form at all this time.
Finally, without my scale, and with a holster for my water, I was able to get a lot better hydration throughout the run. I finished all 17 miles thinking I could do a couple more, which is the ideal situation.
I finished my run, jumped in the shower and had a very enjoyable relaxing weekend with great company. Monday at work was hectic, but I’m gearing up for hill training tonight, then trivia Wednesday, and playoffs Saturday!
trapstoohottohandle 