Weekend Preview and Goals!

It's finally Friday - I made it through my first full week of being self-employed!  I had a bit of a freak out on Tuesday when it finally hit me: I don't have a job!  Thankfully, the hubbs was able to remind me that everything will work out, that this is right where I'm supposed to be and that this is best for our family.  And I do really have a job - I have one client right now and I know it will only grow from here.  Thank god for a wonderful, supportive hubbs ;)

Running has been going so-so.  And when I say so-so, I think that my last two weeks of high mileage also finally hit me this week.  This is another build up the mileage week and my legs were finally feeling it all.  Not just my legs either, I think my heart and head needed a step back.  I had to switch around my running schedule this week since I'm racing a 10 miler on Sunday.  As I'm sure you can all relate to, when you switch around your normal running schedule things don't always go as planned.  Instead of doing my long run on Sunday I moved it to Wednesday.  It looked good on paper, but when I woke to get my long run done on Wednesday - I just wasn't feeling it.  I didn't take into account that I had just run 18.5 on Sunday at a pretty fast clip - I did 11 miles at MP, or 8:00 miles for the majority of that run.  My legs felt good all through the run, but attempting to run another 18 just a few short days later was probably not smart.  So I did an easier 7 miles and decided that Thursday would be the day.

Yesterday, everything got in the way of me getting out the door.  Thankfully I didn't have too worry too much about, the weather we have been having has been really nice cool temps, so I kept putting it off.  Finally, around noon I headed out.  My head and heart did not want to run.  My legs felt like led, I was giving myself every excuse in the book to quit and it was just miserable.  I ended the day with 13 miles.  Not the 18 I needed.  I did manage to do 5 miles at 7:30 pace to make myself feel a bit better but I still felt like I sold myself short.  Marathon training is not easy - no one ever said it was.  But on days like yesterday, I just wanted to quit.  As my friend Amanda reminded me, I'm still prepared, even if I didn't hit 18.  Thanks girlie - I really needed that tweet!  And she's right - not every run can go perfect, not every run is going to be sunshine and rainbows.  What I learned was that I still did a decent job, I still got out and ran a decent set of miles, now it's time to sit back and let my legs recover from all he hard work they've been doing.

I've been running lots of 10 milers as of late.  I think I said before, and I got a bit of heat from a certain someone, that anything less than 8 feels like you're not doing enough when your neck deep in marathon training.  And with the 10 mile race coming up it was perfect time to jump up the miles mid-week.  On Sunday I'm racing the Buffalo Stampede 10 mile race in Sacramento.  I'm actually really excited for it as I have never ran a 10 mile race before - can some say instant PR?!  But more than anything I wanted to use it as a way to gage where my MP is at.  On most of my training 10 milers I have been running in the range of 1:20 to 1:24, right where I would need to be.  And I'm hoping that with the race excitement I will be able to come in right around 1:20 or sub 1:20.  I hate putting time goals on myself, and I hate putting it out there for all of you.  But I think I will need the fire come Sunday since my legs will have a decent amount of miles on them and well, anything can happen on race day - especially when you're not sleeping at home the night before.  So Sunday will be a good gage of where I'm at with my racing and my goals.  I'm excited to see where I land, but more than anything I want to focus on pre-race nutrition and race nutrition since my last few road races have been disasters in those departments.

With today's run and Sunday's race, I should finish the week around 55 or so miles.  Then next week it's a scale back week and I couldn't be more excited.  I need a bit of a break mentally and I think my legs (and knees!) will thank me for it.  October just can't get here fast enough! 

Thanks for all the encouraging words on my last post about maybe possibly switching up my goals for Long Beach.  The blog world is awesome.  And all of you were right - I will know once I get closer to the date and once I can cross Tahoe off my list.  I really am enjoying my training right now and I want it to stay that way!  So, thank you, all of you, for your encouragement! ;)

It's Friday peeps!  I hope you all have wonderful weekends!  I'm off to catch up with lots of you before the boss walks in and calls me back to work! LOL!
Happy Friday and Happy Running peeps!