Happy Mother's Day! I hope everyone enjoyed their celebrations and had a wonderful weekend in general. Below is a picture of my mom and me from the Lake Michigan brunch cruise we attended earlier today:
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| Photo credit: Adam |
Here are my workouts from last week:
MONDAY - Rest
TUESDAY - Yoga class
WEDNESDAY - Zumba class, lift 45 minutes
THURSDAY - 3 miles of speedwork on the treadmill. This included a 10 minute warm-up, followed by 20 minutes of 1-minute tempo intervals at 7.6 MPH (7:53 pace) and 1-minute recovery intervals at 5.5 MPH (10:55 pace).
FRIDAY - Accumulator class (45-minute ladder workout alternating cardio/strength intervals)
SATURDAY - Cinco de Miler race (full recap to come)
SUNDAY - Rest
A few notes from the week:
I had a great time running the Cinco de Miler yesterday with Marcia! I hope to have my recap up by Tuesday. In the meantime, here's a snapshot of Marcia and me prerace:
It is officially time to change my running focus from hillwork to speedwork. My next race is the Super Sunny 5K on June 4. My near-term race calendar also includes the MCRRC 4-Miler over Memorial Day weekend, the PAWS Run For Their Lives 5K in July, and the BTN Big 10K. Short race upon short race upon short race. As noted above, I did my first speed session last week.
Before my unplanned PR at the
Ravenswood 5K, I was targeting the Super Sunny 5K as a PR attempt. I still plan on targeting it - but I realize the challenge of trying to set another 5K PR within just two months of breaking my old one. I've got four weeks to cram speedwork - let's see how much I can make it count.
I can't believe I'm saying this, but I genuinely do still want to continue doing hillwork. After all the efforts I put into hill training over the past three months, I don't want to just let the impacts disappear. In an ideal world I would do both hill-training and speedwork once a week each, but in reality that is probably too aggressive for me. Maybe over the long-term I'll try to alternate them and do one of each per week?
At the very least, I'm proud of myself for even
wanting to maintain hillwork. A few months ago, this concept would have made me laugh myself out of town!
One of my new goals is to start experimenting with different fitness classes. This is for a variety of reasons, most notably to shake up my usual routine and alleviate potential boredom. The Accumulator class I went to last Friday definitely achieved both! Tomorrow, I am planning on attending a new-to-me class called Power 45. Description: "Cardiovascular routines interlaced with weights and resistance work." Yes, I am bracing myself. =)
On a non-training note... Alton Brown's Eat Your Science show yesterday was a great time. I wasn't sure what to expect, but the show was very entertaining and humorous. Alton has quite the personality! He is
exactly the same in person as he is on his television shows. Here's a picture:
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| Alton was discussing some of the changes he would make if he had the powers of a food god |
As
HoHo would say, that's a wrap for me! I am looking forward to another more low-key week this week. How about you, tell me about your weekend?
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Linking up with HoHo and Tricia for the Weekly Wrap.
That is a great picture of you and your mom! Also so neat you got to meet up with Marcia for the race this weekend. I look forward to your recap on it as well. Thank you for linking up with us in the Weekly Wrap. :)
ReplyDeleteThank you so much, Tricia! Happy Mother's Day to you, too, and congrats again on your daughter graduating with honors! It was great to meet up with Marcia yesterday and what a difference it made on a day when the weather conditions were challenging! Thank you to you and HoHo for cohosting the link-up, as always!
DeleteI'm enjoying my easier workouts since Big Sur! I get to run how I want to run. And no hills is a bonus...
ReplyDeleteIsn't it the best feeling to be able to take the training more casually now that the big goal race is over??? It's hard to know what to do with ourselves anymore, right?
DeleteHmmmm...you wanna keep doing hill work. Trying to remember who predicted that...
ReplyDelete😄
Four words: "You were right, sweetie." =)
DeleteLooks like you and your mom had a nice day together. I kind of like running hills too I always feel so strong afterwards.
ReplyDeleteThanks Deborah! YES on feeling so good after running hills, it is very empowering. =) Happy Mother's Day to you, too - and can't wait to hear more about the Tour de Cookie! That's my dream event. =)
DeleteThank you so much, Karen! We were very blessed with beautiful weather and good company today. After reading your last workout week recap, it sounds like you are definitely making big strides with your strength! Your splits on that 4-miler were KILLER! Power to you, my friend!!!
ReplyDeleteYou and your mom are so pretty! Glad you enjoyed! Mad props to you for wanting to continue with hills. Might as well maintain all that strength you've built up!
ReplyDeleteThank you so much, Marcia! I hope you had a wonderful Mother's Day with your family, too! Yes, it's always the getting started part that is the hardest with any new workout regimen - once you get rolling, it's easier to keep rolling. =)
DeleteWhat are your plans for the speedwork in the next four weeks?
ReplyDeleteI think alternating speed and hills every other week is a good idea, if you are going to keep to running 2-3 times a week. I am not surprised you want to keep doing hills. I miss the bigger ones I used to live by!
Speedwork plans - do one midweek interval run. I started out with 1-minute intervals but Xaar suggested trying to work towards longer intervals. On weekends, I'll probably do runs between 5-8 miles during which I'll probably incorporate some fartleks or a tempo mile or two. Thoughts?
DeleteThanks for the feedback on the alternating speed and hills! That's a bummer that you no longer live close to those bigger hills!!!
Yeah, that is what I was wondering - what you plan to do specifically in the next four weeks :) Midweek intervals sound good. And definitely something different than 1-minute repeats (all the time). I feel like those get your fast twitch muscles fired up, but don't teach you to run fast for a longer periods, like, well, longer intervals do (LOL!). :) Speed play may be fun on your long runs too, but I'd be careful not to overdo it with speed work since you're just starting it up again :) But you know your body best! I bet you'll discover you like the speedwork too, and will want to keep it, along with the hills. :)
DeleteGreat advice, Kim! I know nothing about fast twitch muscles but I believe what you shared about firing them up and learning to run fast for long periods. That would be awesome to discover I like speedwork and want to keep it along with the hills. I very much hope you are right!!! =D
DeleteAww!! you are your mom look so cute!
ReplyDeleteCongratulations on another race! It looks like a fun one!
Hillwork is a killer, but it works wonders! Here in PA we only have hills, so cannot even begin to imagine no hills.
I've always wanted to see Alton Brown live, now I'm inspired to go find tickets to one of his shows!
Thank you so much, Ana! Indeed, there are some incredible rolling hills in PA so you locals have so many great fitness opportunities in your natural landscape! If you come to Chicago and run, you're pretty much guaranteed to get an automatic PR since it's so flat here. =) Yes, if you do have the chance, Alton's show was a lot of fun - I think you'd really enjoy it!!!
DeleteCould you throw in some random hill workouts to change things up? I understand not wanting to lose that hard work, so once in a while might be good, maybe even speedy hills?
ReplyDeleteOoooooh.... I never even thought about the concept of combining hillwork and speedwork! That's an intriguing idea!!! It'd be the killer of killer workouts, but you get what you put into your training, yes?
DeleteThat is a great photo of you and your mom :) And those cruises are so fun!
ReplyDeleteThanks so much, Alexandra! The cruises are very well-done - you can tell they have a lot of experience putting them on for customers! =)
DeleteThat is a great picture of you and your mom! Between the scenery and your smiles....just beautiful!!
ReplyDeleteHo fun you got to run with Marcia!!! I hope to meet up with blogging friends at a race soon ;)
Speed and hills alternating sounds like a good plan...I am no run coach or anything ;)
Thank you so much, Tamieka! I hope you had a fantastic Mother's Day also! Congratulations on both your son and daughter achieving so many big milestones. =)
DeleteMeeting up with blogging friends is the bestest! Incidentally - I know you live in the DC area and I'm considering running the Army 10-Miler this fall. Let me know if that race might be on your list for consideration, too. It would be great to meet up with you in person soon! =)
Thanks for your thoughts on the speed and hill alternations! I am no run coach, either, but collective intelligence always works wonders! =)
Sounds like a good week! What a cute picture of you and your mom! Fun that you got to run the 5 mile race with Marcia. Looking forward to your recap! Also yay for wanting to continue hill work! I actually haven't done any since RNRSF so I am scared for the hills at Bay to Breakers this weekend. :O
ReplyDeleteThank you so much, Sharon! Happy Mother's Day to you, too - it looks like you had a fantastic celebration with your family! BTW - I was thinking about what you said on feeling unprepared for the hills at RnR SF, but then doing better than you expected. You were absolutely right! So I predict you'll tear it up on the hills at Bay to Breakers! Go get 'em!!!!!
DeleteWhat a gorgeous pic of you and your mom. That's great that you PR-ed at your last 5K. Even though PR-ing again might be a challenge perhaps you can set a different goal, that way you won't be disappointed either way! Good luck!
ReplyDeleteThank you so much! Great idea on setting another goal for the upcoming 5K!!! I am always trying to work on negative splits so that would be a terrific other goal to focus on. Thank you for the fantastic suggestion!
DeleteI think alternating your hill and speed training is a good idea. I was told it takes the body 3 weeks to make certain gains. So you could do 3 weeks speed, 3 weeks hills, and go back to speed -- if you have the time. I'm glad you got to spend the day with your Mom. A brunch cruise sounds lovely too. Get busy on that recap!. I want details of your Cinco De Miler. Thanks for linking with us Emily.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your thoughts, HoHo! I hadn't heard about the 3-week timeframe for the body to make gains, but that makes a lot of sense! Happy Mother's Day to you, too and I am still amazed at your nearly 4-minute plank. You are a planking beast! Cinco de Miler race recap will be up tomorrow. =) Thank you to you and Tricia for co-hosting the link-up, as always!!!
DeleteYou are super speedy! Nice work!
ReplyDeleteThanks Gina! Much appreciated!
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