March in Review

March in Review

Total Miles: 140.6 up from 82.5 up from last month. (151.1 miles from March 2010. poop nuggets! stupid st. patty's day causing me to lose 25 miles.... >:o)

Total Time: 22:32:35 up from 13:28:10 (23:35:49 last March.)

Total Runs: 21 for average of 6.7/run (including the St. Patty's Day races of 5m/5k/1m individually)

Highest weekly mileage:

3/21/2011 — 3/27/2011:

39.0 Mi

6:11:30

(although this current week should be higher, but it's only halfsies march and halfsies april.  Sad.)

Favorite run: Hilly 16 miler.  I feel like this run helped me to mentally get back in to training.  It was tough, but felt great.

Most hardcore run: 18 miler on ice and snow where I almost broke my hip or the tempo run that reminded me I'm not as much of a turtle runner as I had been thinking.
Favorite Race: Probably the 5k of the Irishman Challenge.  It's hard to not enjoy a beer after downing a Guinness.
Bike Miles: 0 which is exactly the same as last month's 0. Number of miles I wanted to cycle:  eleventy billion.  I don't think a nice day has gone by that i haven't wished I was riding Princess Leia.  hey-o!

Favorite Jams:  I'm back in love with Foo Fighter's Everlong.  Otherwise nothing I'm obsessing over too much.
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I'm not sure why, but I've been getting really psyched up for my tempo runs lately.  Yes, the training runs that I deem just below mile repeats on the scale of "workouts delivered directly from Satan."  After last week's (was it last week?  I'm too lazy to look) knock out tempo run that felt easy, I've been excited to see how longer ones feel (clearly twss).

I had 7 miles with 5 at tempo pace on deck.  Luckily for me the all day rain had let up for me to run along.  Wind, not so much.  Oh well, Fargooooooooo has a tendency (almost 100% likelihood) of heavy winds, so might as well practice my B.A.-ness in trianing. ;)

I took the 2 warm up miles very easy, and then ran the first tempo mile at the slow end of the tempo range (8:09-8:31 goal tempo pace).  I always feel like I'm going to keel over during that first mile and then the legs are ready to go.  Totally the case. 

Partially through the 3rd tempo mile a car ran a stop sign and almost hit me.  Luckily I noticed they weren't going to stop, and slowed down myself, simultaneously hitting the stop timer on my Garmin (no attempted homicide is going to mess up my splits yo!).  However, when I started the timer seconds later, it wouldn't start.  I had my Garmin unlocked (which I NEVER do because my sweat causes it to FREAK THE EFF OFF) so I could hit the light to check my pace as I was running in the dark.  My Garmin continued to freak freak freak out for a few minutes.  I tried to reset it, lock it, unlock it, and it just kept toggling through random displays and functions on the watch.  I was soooooooo frustrated I almost started crying (I'm so emotional lately, you'd think I was tapering... sweet Jesus....).  Luckily I got it back to the timer page AND could get the timer to start, and I was off, after locking the bezel.

Because of this, I wasn't able to check the pace at my leisure, and could only randomly check it under street lights.  Sub 8..... uh... ok.  I expected my legs to start objecting, but they didn't.  The last few miles actually felt easier than the first tempo mile had. 

Tempo miles:  8:32, 8:23, 7:59, 7:55, 7:45.  Avg. pace:  8:06.

So I realize that I essentially had a "break" (aka temper tantrum) in the midst of my tempo run, but it got me all jazzed to see what I could do in a shorter race.  On my cooldown walk, I started thinking.. 10k.  Clearly I needed approval from the masses, and sent out a tweet to my "coaches" Jason and Angry Runner to see their thoughts.  They, along with many others, thought it was great idea to have a tune up race two weeks out from the marathon, and many training programs also suggest the same thing.  Heck ya!  Plus, I know Jenn did the same 10k last year before the same marathon, and posted an insanely fast 10k time, and since we're basically the same runner, maybe I can too.  :)

Starting the end of this month I'll be racing every other weekend for a month and a half.  And I couldn't be happier. #yayzies