Reassessing life

Last week I put together a training/cross training schedule for the Paris Marathon. While I had a few "successful" marathons last year, I definitely could improve both in time and in how I felt towards the end of the race. I never hit the wall per se but fatigue definitely played a major role in how I felt at the 30k mark. This is due to not enough mileage. Not enough mileage. Not junk miles, recovery, steady, easy kilometres. They are as important as the hard stuff, tempo/speed/hills and to a large extend, the long slow distance run that we have to do every week. I also decided NOT to do any race during my training cycle. They are TOO demanding on my body. Yes, they can be good to determine where you're at fitness wise but I prefer not to risk an injury.

So I looked at what I wanted to do and it looked like this:

Monday - recovery spin class followed by YogaFit Sweat
Tuesday - tempo run with the Running Rats. Start with 6k, eventually go to 10k
Wednesday - body pump
Thursday - run with Lululemon crowd but eventually do it on my own when hills training starts
Friday - marathon pace run. Start with 6k, gradually increase to 10k
Saturday - hot yoga
Sunday - LSD run follow schedule with cut back weeks.

A friend, who has run many marathons AND two Ironman, pointed out that there is absolutely NO rest days in this schedule. At first I thought, noooo there is! there is! When he asked... I looked and sure enough, there isn't one single day I'm not doing something fitness related. No wonder I crash every month or so... LOL

So I tweaked the schedule and it now looks like this:

Monday - hot yoga
Tuesday - tempo run with the Running Rats. Start with 6k, eventually go to 10k
Wednesday - body pump/spinning alternating weeks
Thursday - run with Lululemon crowd but eventually do it on my own when hills training starts
Friday - marathon pace run. Start with 6k, gradually increase to 10k
Saturday - hot yoga
Sunday - LSD run follow schedule with cut back weeks.


So while there isn't THAT much of a change when you look at it, I will have in effect, two days of rest from any active fitness. The 1 hour hot yoga, even though does work the legs and arms, is in an environment that allows me to make it as gentle or as active as I want. And I do want to expose myself to as much heat/humidity as possible as it is something my body is not used to and it has impacted on my performance.

Training will start Sunday, December 11. I'm not sure with whom I will run, the marathon clinic starts in early January so I may run with them, adjusting my distances. I want to put in a few kms of marathon pace in the mix so may do this on my own after they turn around to go back and I have to continue for another 10k or so. I believe the lack of marathon pace is what hurt me last time. I had no clue!

Reassessing training also applies to life. I still carry with me so much garbage from my past and it's when I expect it the least that it rears it's ugly head. This song brought it all back into perspective for me.

http://youtu.be/sHnkHW-zf0c

The most important thing in life is love. Never give up about love. Just as I never gave up about running, I cannot give up about love.