So…one of the reasons for my absence? It’s peak week! Of my half marathon training! Not sure if anyone else actually calls it that, but this week is my heaviest week of running, with the training plan telling me to do 4,6,4, 12. Last week was pretty heavy as well-4,5,4,11. Sooo it’s sort of been knocking me out! That being said, let’s talk about some of my noteworthy workouts from the past week!
Thursday(last week)-run club workout. There was a sub leading it, and she planned out a route right through downtown. As a result, about halfway through (maybe less) we started getting stuck at every. single. light. Which I personally welcomed because I was casually dying. However, what this meant to my companions was that we should sprint the distances between the lights. Dying.
Friday-rowing workout at the gym+abs in the morning-nothing too crazy, just 4 sets of 5 minutes on the erg plus about 10 minutes of abs. To be honest it was an excuse to use the super fancy showers at my gym…seriously, they are amazing.
That evening was Crossfit-Death by Slamballs. This was a 15 minute AMRAP, with every minute starting with 3 burpees, and then 1 slam ball, then 2 slam balls,3,4,5, etc, increasing by one every minute so that the last minute you do 3 burps plus 15 slam balls. If you fail to complete the slam balls, you “die.” Somehow, I “lived.” But barely. Ugh, in the last round I sort of wished I had died earlier! I used a 30# slam ball.
Later that evening, since it was Friday night, I was asking around Georgetown and stopped by the Reebok store. They had a promotion that if you do 20 burpees, you get 20% off. Uhm, yes! I ALMOST got some beautiful turquoise Nano 4.0s but they didn’t have my size. Probably just as well though, because I think I like my 2.0s more-they just fit my feet better! I did however, get this shirt (putting burpee count for the day at 65 if you’re counting):
Saturday: Crossfit-I haven’t gone on a Saturday in forever, and I wanted to work on handstands since I”m getting close! We also did snatches. The WOD was a fun one-sprints in the form of Cops and Robbers (basically tag). It was only 10 sprints, but I definitely felt it the next day…which was…
Sunday-11 miles! This was a pretty uneventful run. I incorporated lots of hills in the first couple of miles, and the end was awful because I messed up my complicated planned route a bit so I got back to near the start at about a mile short, so I had to run in circles for a mile. Which I hate doing-I like pure out and backs. Plus I was dying at that point and contemplated finishing at 10+ but I did it. The best moment though was finishing at the Georgetown waterfront where there was this fountain/sprinkler thing that kids were playing in in their bathings suits. I stuck my head in and it was the best thing ever.
The issue was that after my run I felt really…uncomfortable. I don’t know, not bad, just weird. I walked to a cafe to get some food (and lots of water) into me. I sat at the cafe briefly contemplating whether I was going to pass out, and then realized I was being ridiculous and paranoid. Does anyone else do that-they feel slightly off and then it freaks them out? Anyways, I think the problem may have been lack of electrolytes. It was pretty warm, and while the heat didn’t really bother me, I sweated quite a bit. Given all my races are in San Francisco and I train by the bay, I’m not used to this kind of thing! I think I’m going to try and get salted goo for this week’s run, or carry coconut water or something.
Monday: Crossfit-Not ideal after a long run, but I felt decent and didn’t want to miss squat day.
Tuesday: Rest/yoga. My legs were kind of beat up, and my hamstrings were tight, so this was perfect. It was power yoga in a warm room (~80?), but it wasn’t too intense and my hamstrings got a great stretch.
Wednesday-legs felt restored for my morning 6 miler! Uneventful-I ran to the Lincoln Memorial which I can only do on longer runs now because I live further, and almost swallowed about 50 gnats at the reflecting pool.
And that’s what you missed! I promise to try and be more consistent-but after my 11 miler I lay on my bed not moving for a solid 3 hours. It knocked me out!
Also-I’ve been making an effort to tweet more, so feel free to follow me there!
How do you handle the heat?