239.5 when woke up
From notes for Nov 25th run – 240 when woke up – 236 after run – total of 20 miles but was too cold and slippery in the park to do full run there – did 2 laps there and that took almost a full hour (58:30 – should have been 10 minutes faster than that) – drove home and got on the treadmill at home to do the remaining miles – snacked on 1-3 jelly beans per mile and that seemed to help but got pretty slow in the end – grabbed a bottle of coke and that seemed to help speed me up near the end. In the end it was about 3:52:30 for the full 20 miles (if include the driving home and a couple pauses at home the full time was from 6:20 to 10:55 – total 4:35).
Need to find a way to refuel faster on the longer runs.
After run was done had a quick meal of pizza and then had to go into work – was there for 7 hours and had pizza there too as well as a litre of coke. Then had more pizza when I got home. Certainly felt refueled but was pretty heavy and was 239.5 again when I woke up on the 26th.
Friday morning was 238 – just short of 20 pounds down.
Saturday run was not able to do outside – too cold – really high wind chill – so did it on the treadmill in 108:37 – 1 min at 4 mph and 2 at 6.2 mph cycles – average 5.5 mph – was 241 when woke up (so 3 pound gain from Friday morning) – was 238 after the run. Tried jelly beans and almonds for fuel on the run (9 jelly beans and 4 almonds starting at about 5 miles in). They seemed to help but as indicated in the notes above for the 20 miler it just wasn’t absorbed fast enough into the system but the coke certainly helped.
Going to try mini chocolates for the longer runs and going to have to figure out some other thoughts too. I drank entirely too much water for the 20 miler which didn’t help either. I need to think better about how to properly fuel during the longer runs to keep going.
I also hope the weather turns warmer for the Saturday and Sunday runs so I can get some more legitimate long runs outside to see where I truly stand. After the longer run on Sunday with the split between outside and in I really don’t know where I am at for timing and actual endurance – the last long outdoor run I was able to complete fully outside was a 17.6 miler on Nov 4th – in 3 hrs 27.5 – have done a 19 and 20 since but both were split between outside and treadmill – at least the 19 I did half marathon distance outside in the cold in decent enough time (2hrs 23min) considering temperatures and road conditions.
I am looking forward to this rest week – the 5 milers should feel less of a pain without having to follow them up with a 10. 5-6-5 and then 6-12 on the weekend – weather is supposed to warm up for the weekend according to the current forecast so I should be able to do the 2 weekend runs outside without any special considerations for fuelling and changing clothes – If I am able to run outside I will probably change the 6-12 to 6.6-13.2 and push for good times – this should help me better understand where I am and how I feel going forward. The next week is another tough week but I will feel better and more rested if I can get decent outdoor times on the weekend.
Most training plans have only 1 or 2 20 milers, not 3 – but each of the tougher weeks that are left should feel easier than this past week – before each of the next 2 tough weeks there is a lighter week which this tough week did not have – basically the way I see it this week was to prove to me that I can do the distance even at maximum drain – then the next 2 are to allow me to rest a bit and then to do it again to build confidence and probably show some improvements to myself. So in the end I think I am ready or at least could do this right now better than I have done in the past but I am going to need to do well on the next tough week to feel right – even after the 3rd tough week I will still probably be nervous / scared – I have put a lot of myself into doing this right – the family has kind of sacrificed for this too so if things don’t go well I will definitely feel like I have let them down. If that happens it will be harder for me to maintain and step up to do more training and keep up the momentum because it will be hard to justify the effort.
If things go well on the run – say less than 2 hrs 15 for the half and less than 5 hrs for the full – then I will want to keep going – I will definitely need to keep the weight loss going. If I can keep the drive up then I will want to get better and push for the Manitoba Marathon for sure and possibly the WPS half – the goal would be to get back well under 2 hrs for the half and try for a personal best on the full – I would love to get under 4 hrs and 210 pounds – in my head those would both justify the work put in for the training. To be 42 and back in the shape I was shortly before I met my wife would be amazing – this would put me in a good place mentally and physically as I get older. This would give me so much more energy moving forward for life in general. The biggest thing right now though is dealing with the stress – I need to sort this out so it doesn’t get in my head and make me self-destruct.
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