20 weeks of training, 6 more weeks of winter :(

Marathon Training Week One Recap!

I have a love/hate relationship with winter. I love the first snowfall, when the trees are covered in white and everything has an ethereal glow about it. I love Christmas, and warm fires in the fireplace, and a cute pair of boots; but I hate not having fresh fruit and veggies, I hate winter driving, I hate running on black ice, I hate that brown/black sludge that accumulates along the sides of roads, I hate wearing thick socks, I hate that it gets dark at 4:30, and I hate being cold! Maybe I have more of a "sort-of-like/hate" relationship with winter, either way, I chose to live in Minnesota, so I know, I know, I need to just get over it! Which leads me to beg the question...why on earth did I choose to train for a marathon during the winter?!?

Grandma's Marathon will be held on, a hopefully balmy, June 20th. When I registered I thought, "June in Duluth...it won't be too cold, it won't be too hot, perfect!" I kind of forgot to think about the fact that I was going to have to do some running to get ready for this "perfect" day in June. So, when I looked at my training plan an started counting back 20 weeks from June 20th, I got a not-so-pleasant surprise, training was going to start on February 2nd. Smack dab in the middle of winter, on Groundhogs day nonetheless. Now, I am not one to base my hopes and dreams on a made-up rodent prognosticator's opinion on whether or not we get an early spring, but man, was I pissed when that stupid thing saw his shadow! I was already sick of winter running, now I had to deal with SIX MORE WEEKS of it! Not cool, Punxsutawney Phil, not cool.

Of course the week started off in the deep freeze, negative windchills. I've run on some pretty cold days, but the last time I ran in negative windchills I almost lost my fingers to frostbite (see below), so I have drawn the line at ZERO...if it's below that line, I'm hitting the dreadmill. Monday's Three miles plus four strides and Thursday's Tempo run were both inside. Thankfully my BRF was by my side, and those runs actually felt pretty good. Tuesday I did make it outside for my "easy 3"...it started out easy anyway, then a blizzard moved in and I barely found my way back to my office....I probably should have just run home from campus, would have taken less time than my commute that night! Wednesday I cross trained with TRX, my favorite fitness class. If you aren't familiar with TRX, it's a strength training class that uses straps suspended from a metal truss and you do various exercises using your body weight for resistance. I love it, except for the part where our trainer makes us do burpees...that part sucks, but I generally live through them! Friday I got in the pool despite my mind's intense opposition to swimming that day. The pool was crowded so I had to share a lane, but in the end, as usual, I was happy to have gotten in. I did a great set of descending 100's that were surprisingly fast for me.

Yeah, that is not normal...

Saturday was a super busy day, the kids and I did the Twin Cities in Motion Fieldhouse Fun Run in the morning (1/4-mile for Logan, 1-mile for Kayley), then some swimming at the Y, followed by an annoying trip to Costco (however, there were ice cream and dark chocolate sea-salt caramels being sampled, so I call it a win overall). We picked up a pizza and got home around 4:45. All this time, I knew full well that at some point, I was supposed to be getting an 8-mile run in. As soon as I opened the door, Bill grabbed the pizza out of my hand and stuck it in the oven, "I'm starving!" he said. I had a moment of weakness and almost said "Oh, good, I'm hungry and exhausted, let's eat!" but I knew that if I let this day go by without doing the first long run on my training plan I was going to regret it. So I said "Okay, why don't you and the kids eat and save me a couple pieces, I'm going on my run." He didn't talk me out of it like I hoped, instead he said "Sounds good, see you at bedtime". I had to remind him that I only had 8 miles and it wasn't even 5:00 yet, I should be home WELL before bedtime...at least, I hoped so anyway.

So I set off in the dusk and finished in the dark. I felt super-strong though and feel like I would have had a much better pace if I could have seen the road in front of me. Regardless, it was a really great way to end my first week of training. I got home and scarfed down two giant pieces of pizza and a couple cookies the kids had made, and still had plenty of time to relax before bedtime :)