Since I got into the Dopey Challenge through early registration as an Annual Passholder and the weather finally turned nice enough to run outside, I figured I would give myself a bit of a challenge over the Easter long weekend.
I had 4 days off work and was able to get out and run.
So I did one lap of my neighborhood on Friday for 4.4 miles, 2 laps on Saturday for 8.75 miles and 3 laps on Sunday for 13.1 miles. This left Monday – I had been thinking at the beginning of the weekend that I would shoot for 20 miles to make up for my missed 20 miler from last weekend but other obligations meant I had to back that off.
Still when I headed out I expected to do 2 laps at least and for the first 15 minutes or so of the first lap I was moving – I was well on track to have my fastest lap of the entire weekend…but at around 17 minutes or so my GPS watch locked up and I couldn’t tell how fast I was going or anything like that. This threw me off a bit and I definitely slowed down and started thinking about all the other things I needed to do (like fix my computer and get a new bike for our son) and I ended up stopping after one lap. I was then able to check how fast that lap was on my smart phone’s gps app and it was still my second fastest of the weekend even after slowing down.
So, on one hand I am disappointed I didn’t go further on Monday, since I definitely still had energy and was physically fine. But on the other I am feeling pretty positive about how I was feeling and that even though I stopped the run early on Monday it wasn’t because I was feeling drained or messed up.
Top those 4 days of running with an solid run tonight to make 5 days in a row and I am in a good spot for physical conditioning at this point.
Based on what I saw I have no doubt in my mind that I could have finished a Dopey Challenge this weekend…the question now becomes “how do I make sure I don’t lose that and continue to get better for the next 8 months or so?”
Best answer? Probably “consistency” – My current schedule takes me through the Manitoba Marathon in June and from there I will have to make a new one to take me through the summer and into the fall and winter. I’m not sure what that is going to look like yet but I bet it will mean moving around how my running days are split. Right now I run Tues-Wed-Thurs and Sat-Sun for 5 days of running a week – I will probably still do 5 days a week but will need to get some 4 days in a row running practice in. So my initial thought is a mid-length run on Tuesday and then run Thurs-Fri-Sat-Sun with progressive mileage increase each successive day. That is still a ways off as I need to stay focused on the Manitoba Marathon right now.
At least it is nice to know what I will be obsessing about for the next 8 months…
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