Bring on the Taper!

Marathon Training Week 18 Recap

It's taper time! This is the week I've been looking forward to for a long time...rolling back my mileage, savoring the road I've been on for the last 18 weeks, basking in the excitement of the weeks to come. Like taper...this recap will be short and sweet (besides work is INSANE right now, so I can't believe I even have time to think about writing this...much less actually sitting down long enough to do it!)

Monday, was recovery day. I had my 20 miler on Sunday and I half expected not to be able to get out of bed on Monday, but my legs felt surprisingly good today. I did a little foam rolling, but that was it. I of course told anyone that would listen that I ran 20 miles the day before, I mean, I couldn't go a whole day with out at least TALKING about running, right?

Tuesday was hot and humid, a taste of the weather that will soon be commonplace around here. I was supposed to do five miles today, but see above about this week being insane at work, I was lucky to squeeze in four. My legs started out feeling pretty heavy, remnants of the 20-miler still lingering on them. But by the 2.5 mile mark I felt really strong and finished the run fast, averaging 9:15 miles. I was surprised by how fast this run was, and it gave me a lot of confidence that I could run so hard just two days after the long one!

Wednesday had eight miles on the schedule that just weren't going to happen. I was in the throws of getting our meet organized for the weekend and just simply ran out of time to get it done. I hate missing runs, especially my mid-week distance runs. But I had to let it go. I'm pretty confident with where I am and I know that missing one run is not going to derail me at this point.

Thursday I met Katie for another one of our 5:00am 5-milers. This was my second week in a row getting up this early for a run, and I have to say it was a little easier today. I was also excited because the day before my new "toy" arrived in the mail!

I wasn't sure I was ever going to bite the bullet and get a GPS watch, but when Active Gear Up sent out an offer for the Soleus Vibe for only $59, I decided it was a sign (if you aren't familiar with them, go there now, you can thank me later! LINK) Of course, by the time I got home from work and swim practice on Wednesday night I didn't have time to charge it and set it up before bed, so I was winging it on Thursday morning. As you can guess, it didn't work. Oh well, I was okay with it as Katie runs with a cool TomTom GPS watch, so at least I'd have some stats. We ran the same out and back route as last week and talked more about running goals and summer plans. I can't imagine runs this early in the morning being as fun without a buddy. We kept a nice steady pace and I when we finished Katie told me this was the fastest five miles she had ever run. It's pretty unbelievable to me that just a year ago I was so afraid to run with someone else because I was sure I was going to be slowing them down. Now here I was being the person who pushed someone to go faster than they had before. The community and confidence created by running with a partner is a pretty amazing thing!

Friday was going to be swim day, but Logan really didn't want to go to the Y-care so I could get my laps in during Kayley's practice. So he and I played in the pool and on the splash pad, and I had another lesson in letting it go. Being a mom will always trump training. However, this might be the only instance when I look forward to the day that my kids don't like hanging out with me so much (or looking forward to the day they want to train with me!)

Saturday was the first day of our big meet and I knew I had 12+ hours of of work ahead of me. I got to the pool at 6:00am so I could get my run in before the meet referee wanted to get going, which would be around 8:30. I had 12 on the plan, but figured depending on my pace, I might only do 10. I had finally figured out how to work my new watch, so I was excited to try it out. I stood perfectly still for about a minute, and sure enough, that little guy found a satellite, so I was off! Today was also my wardrobe test, I was wearing exactly the outfit I plan to wear on the marathon, so I was also excited to see how everything felt. I decided to run out and back on East River Parkway, my old standby. The weather was perfect, and there were plenty of people on the trail to keep me company. I felt great, in fact, it was the best I had felt in a long time. I held a nice steady pace on the way out, and was happy to hit the 6 mile mark at just over an hour. As long as I kept this up, I would make it back in plenty of time for a shower before any meet personnel showed up. I took some energy gel here and stretched a minute and headed back. I got a great burst of energy at mile 8 when I encountered a woman wearing the same Badass Mother Runner shirt I was. We gave each other a big smile and I said "nice shirt". She said "you bet" (like any good Minnesotan would) and we were on our way. I was starting to fade a bit at mile 10 when I heard a shout of "Hey! Way to go BAMR!" when I got closer to the woman who was cheering me on, I realized it was Laura, one of my "Strava Friends". We've been following each other on the app for about a year, and we met briefly at the Another Mother Runner party a few weeks ago, but this was the first time we had crossed paths on a run. I was tempted to turn around and run with her for a bit, but I knew I had to get back to work, and I reminded myself I was on taper, no extra miles allowed! This little surge was enough to get me back to my office in the fastest two miles of the day. It was a great run to top off a busy week of working, running, and letting it go! Two weeks left, I can hardly believe it. I'm looking forward to dialing it back even more next week and working on my mental preparedness now...the next 13 days are going to fly by!