Follow through Friday - A new low and training begins!

It’s TRAINING season! My half marathon training officially started on Monday! I’m excited to put in the effort and see what kind of results I can gain from this training plan! I probably won’t be quite as excited when I’m 10 weeks in and my long runs are in the double digits though haha. Because of how I track my weeks on the blog, my first week of Half training is only a partial since my plan goes Monday – Sunday and my FTF goes Friday – Thursday.

 On a whim, I decided to sign up for the Pixie Dust Challenge, which is the Tinker Bell 10k and the Tinker Bell Half Marathon out in California at Disneyland in May 2016. This will also qualify me the Pink Coast to Coast Medal since I’ll be doing the Princess Half Marathon (and 10k) at Disney World in February. I wouldn’t have even considered signing up for the Disneyland races except that we can fly and stay essentially for free with points, so other than the cost of the race, which is stupid expensive, it’ll be a relatively inexpensive trip! And because I was on a roll, I also signed up for a 10 miler in October. It happened to fall the same weekend that my half training plan has me running 10 miles, so figured it was a sign to register! I may also register for a 15k or 20k the week before Space Coast, but haven’t decided yet so figured I’d wait until right before the price goes up and make a decision then.

Well let’s back up a little, this week was kind of a roller coaster. It started off good, then went bad… real bad, and then I got re-energized and finished it off with a bang! Friday morning, I started with a nice run in Clermont with a friend from MRTT. This was my first time ever really running hills. And these aren’t even really hills compared to what most people think, but definitely hills compared to anything I’m used to. I only had time for 3 miles, and my RunKeeper actually showed me a little short, but hers said 3 miles, so close enough. I ate TERRIBLE Friday night, Saturday Night, and ALL DAY Sunday. I’m talking Apple Fritters (Donut King seriously has the BEST apple fritters) for breakfast/snack all day, Dominos for Lunch, and then Dunkin Donuts for dinner. Yea, I was feeling like crap Sunday night. I decided to go for a run anyways though as I knew it would be my last chance to run outside until the weekend when G was back in town. It was drizzling the whole run and felt just wonderful! Surprisingly, I was able to maintain a decent pace and knock out 3+ miles.  I didn’t meal prep on the weekend, but did get it done Monday night so at least I knew my meals would be taken care of the rest of the week and that always really helps me.  And other than the provided lunch at work on Thursday at a team building event (and I didn’t even go overboard) I did really well all week!

 My first official training run on Monday was pretty terrible. It just FELT really tough and I was starting to feel a cold coming on which didn’t help. Then when I finished the run, I realized I had the treadmill set on incline 3 (I normally run on incline 1), and my struggle seems to make a lot more sense. I also woke up super congested on Tuesday morning so I’m sure that played a factor as well. Luckily, I seemed to kick the cold with the help of some Sudafed and Day/Night Quil and taking it easy on Tuesday and Wednesday. I finished my week off with my second training run on Thursday and did rather well.

 Needless to say, I did NOT hit my DietBet Month/Round 5 goal, but I have one month to make up for it, and I’m determined to hit it. I haven’t NOT hit a final Transformer weigh in yet, and I’m not about to let this one be the first! To see 150 on the scale again is going to be so glorious and I’m almost there! Pretty sure today’s weigh in is a new low for me!

 

Results for the week:

Weight:  151.6

Half Marathon training:
     Run 1: 2.54 miles in 30:00 (11:49 pace)

     Run 2: 3.01 miles in 30:00 (09:58 pace)     

     Strength Training: none

Other:

     Run: Friday – 2.94 miles in 30:39 (10:26 pace)

     Run: Sunday – 3.18 miles in 34:40 (10:54 pace)
     Walk: Monday – 0.5 miles
     Walk: Thursday – 0.5 miles

Total Weekly (Running) Miles Logged: 11.67 miles

Overall Weight Lost since "Starting Point" 10/24/14: 25.0 lbs