And just like that, we’re off. This first week was a good week, I think. It began on Christmas Eve and finished yesterday: As I mentioned in my previous post, this marks an ending of sorts (to 2018) and also a beginning.
This first week’s workouts were a good entry back into the structure of marathon training. Mostly, I ran 6 milers. As it turns out, running 6 milers is just as much of a pain in Pittsburgh as it is in South Carolina. I have a really great 5 mile route in both places. Adding a mile gums up the works, so to speak, or at least it feels that way.
M: 6 miles in North Park. My legs felt tired and the run, which was just easy miles, felt like more of a challenge than I’d have liked.
T: Switched it up and went to Millvale to run along the Allegheny River. It was windy, but since it was Christmas, there weren’t many people around.
W: Usually my day off, but one of my Oiselle Volée friends was also in Pittsburgh to visit her family, so we decided to meet up and run together. The plan was an easy 6. As it turns out, her easy pace was not so easy for me, so this run turned into my tempo run for the week. That worked out really well since I was having such a good time catching up with my friend, that I couldn’t worry about hitting my paces.
T: Easy 6. I went back to the river and had a really nice run.
F: OFF (Finally!!)
Sat: Easy 6 back in Spartanburg.
Sun: Long run = 13. This was something of a struggle. It was drizzly and 50 when I left my house, so I was dressed in a lightweight long sleeve top and shorts. After 3 miles or so, I was very warm and sweating quite a lot, so when I got stopped at a traffic light pretty close to my house, I decided to detour back to my house and change into short sleeves. That was the right call–I was much more comfortable for the second part of the run. But around the halfway mark, my stomach decided it was unhappy. This was not long after taking a gel. I hope it was just a fluke thing and not a harbinger of future issues with Gu, but we’ll see. The remaining miles were okay, but my shins talked to me a bit in the middle there, and I was very glad to be done at 13. My armpits started to chafe around the 10 mile mark, and they’re still pretty unhappy a day later. I’m counting this as a deposit in the GRIT account.
All in all, a solid week. I’m back to box-steps and core/hip strengthening in hopes of warding off further shin issues. It’s work I should be doing anyway.
