Week In Training Review

About six weeks ago, I sealed my commitment and registered to run in the Akron Marathon, half marathon event. A half marathon is 13.1 miles. I did this for several reasons. First of all, I always have to have a goal, and I find that in making my goals I tend to take the "Go big or go home" approach. This is not always a positive way to create goals, but it is how my mind tends to work so it is what it is. Also, I tend to do things that sound nuts, just to show I can do it. It is my way of gorilla slapping my chest and letting out a huge feminist Tarzan (Jane?) call. I've done several things for this reason including a 52 hour dance marathon, why not a running marathon?  In February, while on a rather frigid run, I decided that if I could run 10k by May, then I would register for the Akron Half. And well here I am, a registered runner. Officially. (officially nuts, perhaps)

After building up to it over several weeks, I started a thirteen week training program published by Cool Running. I just finished week one. I chose this program because Cool Running is the creator of the Couch to 5k program, with which I had great success. I enjoy the philosophy that Cool Running has of training, running, and exercise in general. I used their 10k program and also had success with it. It made sense to move on to their half marathon program. I chose the intermediate level because not only was I able to run the recommended pre-training schedule for several weeks for this level, but the schedule met my goals and timelines really well.

This first week, the schedule was:

Week	Mon.	Tue.	Wed.	Thu.	Fri.	Sat.	Sun.
1	Off	4M	6M	4M	6M	3M	8M

The first few days of training were pretty unremarkable. First thing was first, I had to take a pregnancy test. Although there was little to no chance of me being pregnant, I did not want to embark on this physically demanding schedule without knowing for sure. Stranger conceptions have happened! So with a negative pee stick giving me the all clear, I hit the treadmill. The treadmill where I finished watching the first season of Glee, and started in on a couple of different documentaries I've been meaning to watch.  I used to think that I should only focus on my exercising, my breathing, my stride, when I ran. But after countless hours of staring at the brown wall while on my treadmill, I learned that it is not a bad thing to stream netflix onto my husband's tablet (which he lends to me in the evenings- his little way of showing his support)

The complications came on Friday, when we made a three hour drive to Daryl's parents' house for the holiday weekend. I had to skip a day. Running on Friday just wasn't a possibility. In addition to packing the car for our trip, Fridays are already quite hectic, and I had the added errands of picking up Jonah's new shoes and going shopping for shorts since it was supposed to be very hot, and I own no shorts that fit me. Friday night, after arriving to the in-laws house, I went to bed past midnight even considering that I did not go running. It would have been closer to 2:00am if I had gone. Not an option!

So I bumped the friday 6 mile run to Saturday, leaving out the 3 mile altogether. On Sunday I was very confused. I must have read the training week for the advanced track rather than for the intermediate. When heading out, I thought I was supposed to run 12 miles. Defeated by the heat, exhaustion, and the knowledge that my kids would soon be needing lunch, I gave in at eight miles. Which it turns out is exactly what I was supposed to run in the first place!

With the first week of official hard core training under my belt, I am tired but confident. I feel that this is very do-able for me. I feel that it is constructive and positive. I hope I still feel that way in a month or two!

***I will be running the Akron Half Marathon on September 24, 2011, to raise money for St. Jude Childrens Research Hospital. If you would like to sponsor me by giving a donation to St. Jude, or if you would like to know more about the hospital, please go to my donation page. All of the money raised will go directly to St. Jude. I will be giving weekly updates on my training here on this blog***