So thankfully I don't get paid to write this blog because if I did, I wouldn't be making any money. I've actually noticed a decline in posting frequency throughout the blog world lately (or at least the one that I subscribe to), and I'm more than okay with that. Posting only when needing to speak usually yields quality content that I enjoy.
Also, I'm thankfully not the only person who has to work, run, and doing parent-y type things. Several commenters on last week's post do way more parent-y things than me and still find time to run. So thank you all for reminding me to quit being a spineless asshole and to remember that we all have to juggle so much in so little time.
Onto last week's training and such.
Week 8 Recap
Monday: 3 mi @ 9:49 (stroller)
Tuesday: off
Wednesday: tempo 6 mi @ 9:15 (w-9:52; t-9:15, 9:10, 9:05, 8:57; c -9:11)
Thursday: off
Friday: 3 mi @ 9:24
Saturday: 16 mi @ 9:47
Sunday: off
Week 8 Notes
Despite having to go back to work last week (kind of), I managed to fit in all four of my training runs. I think the key here was allowing myself that one day to get in speedwork before picking Charlotte up from daycare. Knowing that my hard run for the week was knocked out made me feel better and more confident about my mom-runner status.
Maybe it's just another honeymoon phase, the kind where I'm so excited to run that I get every run in, but whatever it is, I hope it lasts through October.
Week 8 Marathon Musing
Ok, so after shitting glitter all over last week's runs - especially that tempo session that had me feeling like Leo in Titanic before he dies a sad, cold death - I still felt apprehensive heading into Saturday's 16.
Although I've done 16-milers before, and even though 16 is only two more than the 14 I did two weeks prior, something about that number just jabbed at me, making me question not just that run, but marathon training as a whole.
I couldn't quite put my finger on it until I was about three miles into it. Then I realized I was crossing over into a Twilight Zone of sorts. A Zone that meant abandoning my running inhibitions and abandoning what felt "easy".
Fourteen miles - okay. But 16? Sixteen is serious. Sixteen is for realz. Sixteen is a party on a yacht, a new Benz in the driveway, a performance by Drake, Katy Perry, and Rihanna, and a cake made of gold leaves and diamonds.
Sixteen is scary.
For me, it's a number that means pushing into real marathon training as I frantically reach out to imaginary coaches going, "Oh, hell. Am I supposed to be running this marathon? How am I going to finish this? What's going to happen to me in D.C.? Why did I sign up for this - again?"
Oddly enough, though, as soon as I figured out what made me so nervous about 16, the feeling disappeared. I successfully plodded through 16 miles and came home, not to a bow-adorned luxury sedan, but to a nearly crawling 7 month old whose toothless grin silently applauded my endeavor (in my head it did, anyway).
And then, as I highlighted that run on my training plan, I peeked ahead to the next week's 18-miler, smiled and nodded in her direction, knowing that she had two more miles under her belt, thus rendering her all the more wiser, all the more mature.
Much less scary.
At what point in your training do you start to question what the eff you're doing?