Week 2 is complete! This one went pretty well, with a small (planned) deviation from the training I was supposed to do. It's still early days yet, so I'm not super worried about it! In other random running-related news, I got picked to be highlighted in the running subreddit's weekly user feature - I have no idea how that happened! Of course I found out right before heading out of town with spotty internet access (and no device other than my phone)... but I just turned in my response and it should go live on the morning of the 25th. Hello and welcome to anyone reading this because of that!
Here's how Week 2 went!
Sunday 8/13: Planned - Rest / Actual - Rest
We had a pretty late night Saturday, so Sunday was eggs, ham, mini bagels, D&D, and some much-needed downtime - I even managed to keep my calories on target despite our typical proliferation of junk food in addition to the delicious breakfast. My next few weekends are a lot more chaotic so this quieter day was appreciated.
Monday 8/14: Planned - 40 minutes @ Z2 + 5-10 minutes cooldown / Actual - 40 minutes @ Z2(ish) + 5:49 cooldown (2.77 miles)
I'm definitely getting more used to what I need to do to stay in the zone, but it's still not entirely intuitive. Hills in my neighborhood continue to make it harder than it would be otherwise.
Tuesday 8/15: Planned - Intervals: 10 minutes warmup + (3 minutes @ Z4, 1.5 minute @ Z2) x 5 + 5-10 minutes cooldown / Actual - Intervals: 10 minutes warmup + (3 minutes @ Z3-4, 1.5 minute @ Z2) x 5 + 9:36 cooldown (3 miles)
My first interval workout! It wasn't too difficult to get into Z4, though running fairly steadily I still stay in the lower end of the zone unless I push pretty hard. For some reason my watch differs from the written-out version of this plan so I mostly hovered at the top of Z3 because it kept yelling at me. I enjoyed the intervals; it seemed to make the time pass a lot faster. It was a relatively short workout and I had the time, so I went ahead and made sure to finish out 3 miles for my cooldown.
Wednesday 8/16: Planned - 40 minutes @ Z2 + 20 minutes conditioning / Actual - Ice Cream 5K (32:27)
Woof. It was incredibly hot and humid, which isn't exactly a surprise, but between being on a deficit, being 15 pounds heavier than last year's race, and the weather - this was definitely not a PR day for me. This is the course I got my 5K PR on (last year), and a ton of incredibly fast people show up to get their 3 miles out of the way as quickly as possible so they can stuff their faces with an incredible amount of ice cream.
We had a lot of fun at this race last year, but it's an hour and a half out of town and doesn't start until 7pm, which means a pretty late night getting in. We may skip this next year and revisit another time. I'll write up a more comprehensive race report, complete with drone video and extra mile split stats - this really is a cool, unique race!
Thursday 8/17: Planned - Rest / Actual - 30 minutes improvised gym session
Second week of mid-renovation workouts. I had the back room to myself again and did an improvised routine with squats, push ups, TRX rows, and deadlifts. I went out to the main room and threw in some sit ups, back extensions, dumbbell side bends, and kettlebell swings for good measure. They put out a 70lb kettlebell at some point, which is great - it's actually heavy enough to be challenging for swings, so I'm looking forward to doing more of that in the future!
Friday 8/18: Planned - Intervals: 10 minutes warmup + (4 minutes @ Z4, 2 minutes @ Z2) x 3 + 5-10 minutes cooldown / Actual - Intervals: 10 minutes warmup + (4 minutes @ Z3-4, 2 minute @ Z2) x 3 + 12:07 cooldown (3 miles)
This workout says to run uphills, if possible. No problem! This wasn't too different from Tuesday's workout but did seem to fit my route pretty well as far as timing the Z4 hill portions and the resting bits. This one was also pretty short so my cooldown got extended to finish out the 3 mile loop.
Saturday 8/19: Planned - 70 minutes @ Z2, 5-10 minutes cooldown / Actual - 70 minutes @ Z2(ish) + 5:02 cooldown (4.82 miles)
Now this was interesting - early Saturday morning, Mike and I stuffed ourselves and some suitcases into the car and proceeded to drive to Tennessee! We had made plans to meet up with a friend near Nashville and see the solar eclipse. The weather was supposed to be great for watching the sky, but that also meant that it was going to be incredibly hot and sunny during our visit - not so great for running. It also took us about 12 hours to get to our destination, which didn't leave much time for getting this week's long run in!
Luckily, Mike and I had scouted out potential running locations on Google Maps ahead of time, and there was a park within a couple minutes' drive of our airbnb. After a sunset dinner, we got changed and headed to Don Fox Park. I couldn't have been more delighted at the decision - this place was pretty much perfect! There were a bunch of people playing volleyball, a few people walking and running, and the park was open until 10PM. I guess that makes a lot of sense when you're in a place as hot as Tennessee - it might not be cool but at least it's not miserably hot after the sun goes down. We stuck to the main park loop that was lit, which came in just under a mile by my watch. I had exactly enough time to do my 70 minutes but hoped that no one would be kicking people out at ten on the dot. They didn't, though thankfully I had the headlamp that clips on to my hat because in addition to having some less well-lit parts of the path, some of the lights did automatically shut off at about 9:55. I was still able to finish the run and a short cooldown. It had been an incredibly long day (10 there is 11 Eastern so an hour later than the clock said, to my body) and I was ready to go get a shower and crash.
Weekly Total Time: 3:55:40 (up 47 minutes from Week 1)
Weekly Total Distance: 16.75 (up 4.15 from Week 1)
Weight Lost: About 2 pounds, the loss from the week before finally came through! I'll be happy to hold steady through Week 3 since I'll be on vacation.
Next week: Training Week 3, including vacation/road trip food and running more in unfamiliar places!
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