Richmond Marathon Training: Weeks 4-6

Weekly Recap or rather ReCRAP:

I do not know why, but it has been quite a struggle updating this blogs...as well as some other online/social media things. For instance, I'm still haven't written a review about Eurovision 2024, which occurred during the 2nd or 3rd week of May. ;)

While Richmond Marathon training is going ok, motivation has been a bit of an issue. I'm fine with getting in my long runs, but the speed or weekday runs have been a bit of struggle. I think it has something to do with my sleep patterns and scheduling. Most days, I'm too tired to do my speed run 1st thing in the morning (or rather it's too dark outside). I'll tell myself that I'll do my workout after work, but I'm far too tired or have little to no interest in running after work. Actually part of the limited interest is due to intense hangry.

It's kind of funny that I will complain about doing a 5 am weekday run, but I do not have a problem waking up around 2 pm on a Saturday or Sunday to prepare to start a long run by 4-5 am. To be honest, I have to say that I've really been enjoying my really early weekend runs because: 1. there is hardly anyone outside (maybe that's more of a bad thing); and 2. it's a nice feeling to get a large chunk of a long run done before the sunrise.

Well, I will admit that I get little skittish because we have deer in the area.

I think there was something off with the deer in the picture. I crossed to street because I did not want to disturb it. However, it did not move for like 5 minutes.

From my understanding where ever there are deer, there usually will be bears. The news did mention increased activities of male bears in the area, but they should be heading to the western part of the state to do what ever they do in western Maryland. I guess western Maryland is like Las Vegas...what happens in western Maryland stays in Western Maryland.

Long run milestone:

This weekend, I did something a little crazy. Since I have not run a race since last march (I think), I signed up for a local 8K, but I decided to incorporate it into my 18 mile run.

For this excursion, I ran 10 miles as a long run, 5 miles for the race, then 3 ish miles back home. Actually, I walked 1.5 of the 3 miles going returning home. Overall, I thought the run and the race went well. However the race really made me think that, perhaps, I'm taking my easy/long runs TOO easy. My pace for the 8K was 10:45 min/mi. While that is not an amazing time for an 8K/5mi run, I thought it was a decent pace for me AFTER running 10 miles. To be honest, I actually had to force myself to slow down after running he 1st mile.

Perhaps, I should start trying to run the majority of my long run miles in the 11:50 min/mi pace range. Another options, try to push myself for 4-6 miles during the long run and finish the run with a slower place.

Retail Therapy:

I finally got my life together and bought a new pair of running shoes. You know, I think it's a bit of a disgrace that some running stores do not have a treadmill so you can try out the shoes and do the thing for which they were intended...like RUNNING. At least this store give your 45 days to try out the shoes.

Actually, I lie. I originally purchased a pair from Joe's New Balance Outlet - my go to store because they tend to carry wider shoes. But, when they arrived I realized that I ordered a regular, not a wide. Since I did not feel like waiting 2+ weeks (shipping the shoes back and waiting for a new a pair), I decided to go to a physical store to purchase a pair.

I decided the keep the regular size ones because I like the color. I can use these for non-running activities. Either way, I was long overdue for a new pair because…

Weight Frustration:

Ok, I know that I'm not the healthiest of eaters, but I have been gaining way too much weight. I guess that I'm getting to the point in my life where my metabolism is slowing down. In my opinion, I don't think that I'm eating any more than I have in the past. Hell, nowadays, I barely drink booze during the well. Ok, I might have one or two beers on a week night, but it's not like I'm doing an all you can drink beer for $10 excursion at the Hook and Ladder bar. Unfortunately, the numbers on my scale keep going up and up. I don't get it (well, yeah I do), I run 10+ miles during the weekend, go to the gym 3-5 times a week, and do some HIIT workouts 1-3 times a week. I get that exercise is only 20-30% of weight loss, but I shouldn't be putting on so much weight. Over the last couple of weeks, I have been doing better by meal prepping and portion control. We'll see if anything changes with my next weigh in on the 1st. Another annoying piece of the puzzle: my sleep schedule has been way off. Sometimes, I'll fall asleep on the sofa around 9 - 10 pm, wake up around 1-2 am, go to the gym around 4 am, remain groggy for the the rest of the day.

Ranting aside, I decided to make an appointment with a registered dietician. Perhaps, she can provide some tips or additional resources that I can work with. I'm the fattest that I have been in my life, and I don't like it one bit. Getting older sucks.

Goals for the week:

-No fast food during the week.

-Find a fitness-related book to read. Hmm, maybe I can find one in Spanish since I'm working on re-learning the language.

-Start apartment hunting even though our lease is up in June.

playlists:

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Richmond Marathon Training: Weeks 2 & 3

2024 KM in 2024:

Looks like I'm about 60% into my 2024 km in 2024 goal; however, it does not look like I'm going to make it this year...again. ;) Ugh, I even had 366 days, instead of 365 to get er done. Oh well.

While I more than likely will not cross the 2024 km mark by December 31, 2024, we'll see how close I can get.

2024 KM in 2024:

Week of Aug. 25

So, I pretty much scraped by this week for my Richmond Marathon training plans. To be honest, the only highlight was completing my 13 mile long run. I guess that I'm officially half half way through a marathon...in terms on long runs. You know, it's kind of weird that I look forward to my long runs rather than my speed runs. I guess that the long run as a distance that can complete without much effort since these runs are supposed to be long and slow. However, I would have to put in actual work for the speed workouts.

Since I've made it to the halfway mark for a marathon, I treated myself to a delicious Slurpee.

Week of Sept. 1

Ok, things went a bit more smoothly because I nailed (well completed) my three weekday runs (e.g., easy and speed runs) and managed to hit the gym for most of my strength training. I'll say that I really enjoyed my long run this weekend, which was 15 mile tour around my city.

While I'm proud of myself for completing 15 miles, I'm even more proud of myself for starting my run around 4:30 am on Saturday morning. For me, it's somewhat liberating to complete a good chunk of my run completed before sunrise. The only problem with this plan: In order to start the run by 4:30 am, I "had to" wake up around 2:30 am. Normally, I have to take 2-3 poops before heading out for my long runs. Technically, I guess that I don't have to take so many poops before leaving, but want to make sure my system is clear.

However, for this run, that plan didn't really work because I had to drop by a 24/7 Planet Fitness to take a dump. Funny thing, I once I arrived to the gym, I didn't have to do my business, but better safe than sorry.

Once again, I treated myself to a Slurpee. ;)

General health:

As some may know, I'm on a yet another trek to quite smoking. A playlists for one of my long runs was this audiobook.

You know, I think this is the first time that I've listed to an audiobook while running, and I have to say that enjoyed it. Maybe I enjoyed it because I was really trying to get something out of this book, which forced me to listen while running. That said, I think the book is working (more or less). I have been without a cigarette for four weeks and without nicotine (via nicoderm patches) for two weeks. Ok, this time period may not be a great feat, but I had a very intense routine that I followed while smoking. For instance, I "needed" to have a smoke after waking up (and another one after my morning poop), and this routine was kind of life of death for me. I will be honest and say that I do miss that 1st smoke of the day (oh and 1st smoke immediately after leaving the office), but the craving (or monster) is getting weaker and weaker. To be honest, I do not know what it is about the book that is working for me. I guess the author just explains things in simple terms with a side a depreciation. LOL at a couple of lines from the book: "Face it. You are nothing more than a slave to nicotine. Nothing more than a miserable, pathetic drug addict."

Training Plan:

So I can save myself from disappointment, I think that I'm gonna change my target time from a 4.5-hour marathon to a 5-hour marathon.

Goals for the week:

-Find and make an appoint with a dietician.

-Try to do intermittent fasting 3 days this week.

-With the exception of a work lunch, no fast food during the week.

-Add some races to my fall calendar. During my long run, I was annoyed that I saw this ad for a half marathon, which was to take place the day after my long run. Had I known about this half, I could have incorporated the half into my long run.

playlists:

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Richmond Marathon Training: Week 1

Regrouping:

Ok, I know that I'm supposed to be in week 4-8 of marathon training. ;) After returning from Spain (during the 1st week in August), it has been extremely difficult return to Richmond Marathon training. A few reasons:

The Olympic Games: I think the Olympics really did a number because I was staying up way too late watching them, which messed up my sleep schedule. It's really hard to wake up at 5 or 6 am when you go to bed at 3 am. Lol. I do not know what I'm going to do in a couple of weeks because I really want to check out the Paralympic Games. ;)

Post-vacation work: Vacationing from an American point of view is a double-edged sword. Pro: it is a great to get away for a couple of weeks. Con: catching up on all the work you missed, while staying on top of the new/current work, is a pain.

Quitting smoking...again: At the beginning of the summer, I told myself that I wanted to quit smoking by Labor Day. Since I finished my last carton of cigs ~2 weeks ago, I figured why not start now.

I went to my local Target and picked up a box of these lovely nicotine patches, which "worked" the last time I quit seven or eight years ago.

BTW, when the hell did Target start selling vibrators?

Unfortunately for me, the first couple of weeks on the patches is HELL. Although my body technically is still receiving nicotine through the patches, my body still has intense withdrawal pains. Most of my "pain" come in the form of INTENSE nightmares and literally sweating my ass off. Let's just say that a couple of nights, I sweated so much while sleeping that I did not know if I pissed the bed.

I addition to the patches, I have been reading (well listening to) Alan Carr's Easy Way to Quit Smoking without Willpower. Several folks have personally told me that this book worked for them. Something must really happens in the last chapter of the book, because I have been told that once you finish the book, you will not want to pick up a cigarette again. Right now, I'm about 64% through the book, but I do not feel any different about smoking...except extreme guilt for being a "nicotine-addicted slave to cigarettes." Eh, I guess we'll see. Also, sometimes, I wonder if it is better to actually read the book rather than (passively) listening to the audiobook while doing other things.

Ok, I'm getting way off topic because this was supposed to be marathon training update. Perhaps, I'll give a smoking cessation update once I hit 30 days.

Training Plan:

Since I'm staring my marathon training again, I'm not sure that I will reach my target time of 4.5 hours because I have downgraded myself from five to three months of training.

But, I guess I'll just power on. Since I can run 10 miles with little (well, with some) effort, I should be able to hit at least a 20-mi long run during these three months...IF I do not skip any long runs OR succumb to an injury.

I started (well, restarted) my training program with an "easy" 11 mile run. I was very dedicated because i was out on the road by 5:30 am. Let's hope this dedication will stick with me.

I did a "let your feet take you where they want" run, which took me from Wheaton to Silver Spring to DC and back.

Since my last long run was 2-3 weeks ago, I took this run very slow and walked 0.25 miles for each mile. While the run was very slow, I will say that I actually enjoyed it and realized that I missed running. I suppose those feelings are great because I need to work my way up to running at least 20 miles during a training run.

Courtesy of ChatGPT, this will be my training plan going forward.

Mondays: Strength training.

Tuesdays: Speed work, which will include intervals, hill workouts or tempo runs.

Wednesdays: Strength training or HIIT.

Thursdays: 3-7 miles, depending how I feel. For this task, I plan to run home from work along one of the bus routes. That way, I can hop on the bus for the rest of the trip once I become tired.

Fridays: Rest day or active recovery (e.g., walking, yoga, general stretching)

Saturdays (or Sundays, depending on the weather and my laziness): Long runs and an optional core workout.

Sunday: Rest

Goals for the week:

-Nightly stretches around 8/9 pm, and getting to bed by 11 pm.

-Pack my food and clothes for the next day by 6-7 pm.

playlists:

Running Topics: What running stories do you tell over and over?

What running stories do you tell over and over?

How did I get into running?

During my postdoc years, I used to ride my bicycle ~4 miles to work. One day, both of my bike's tires were flat. Since I did not feel like changing the tires, and I was already wearing my athletic clothes, I decided to run the four miles to work. After a few runs, I started adding more distance to my morning runs going from 4 miles to about 7 miles. One of my coworkers took notice that I was running to work and asked if I was training for something. Although I told her that I was not training for anything, she mentioned that if I ran X number of races and joined New York Road Runners (NYRR), I could run NYC Marathon in the following year. Also, she mentioned that racing was a great way to monitor my progress. The funny thing: at that point, I had lived in NYC for about nine years, without having any idea that NYRR (or any other organizations) hosted weekly races.

The one time I missed my half marathon goal by four minutes.

Ok, so a lot of people miss their running goals by a few minutes, but this one was for a dumb reason. For a NYC Half Marathon (I think 2013), I set a goal to run a 1:45 half. For this course, half marathoners did a full loop in Central Park, ran through Times Square, then down West Side Highway to Battery Park. Before the race, I had the feeling that I needed to poop, but I just thought that it was pre race jitters. Plus, I really wasn't in the mood to poop in a porta potty. However during the Central Park portion of the half marathon, I told myself that I better poop before leaving Central bc I would not know when I would see another porta potty. Unfortunately, I waited in line for about 4-5 minutes, and I don't remember how much time my poop took. Since I knew that I wasn't going to make my time goal, I decided to take it a bit easier during the race, which meant taking selfies in Times Square. Hey, Times Square is closed to automobile traffic only two times a year: 1. New Year's Eve and 2. NYC Half Marathon. I guess that I made up some time while running (or my poop break wasn't as long as I thought), because I finished a lot closer to 1:45 (I think it was like 1:49) than I had anticipated.

Sometimes, I wonder that if pushed myself harder after taking my poop during the race and skipped taking photos and selfies, maybe I would have met my goal of 1:45. Hence my McKayla Maroney "face" from above.

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Random thought while looking for pics from this half marathon: I remember thinking that I was so chubby back then. Now, I would "kill" to be this size again.

Crapping on myself

A few years back, there was a trend of taking ice baths after running (or any intense workout). I think folks still do this because I still see a couple of videos/reels on social media. Peer pressure got the best of me, so I figured why not. While sitting in the my bathtub full of ice water (after a 15- or 18-mile run), I took a fart...no biggie right? Next thing I know, the water in the tub starting to turn brown. The funny thing: During those days, I would treat myself to a Slurpee after my long runs. So I guess the only thing that my body processed before my ice bath was water, gatorade, Gu, and the Slurpee. So my shit water had a "pleasant" smell of Sour Patch Kids (the flavor of my large Slurpee).

Since then, the smell of Sour Patch kids always reminds me of that incident. Also, I never took an ice bath after that incident.

Running NYRR's New Year’s Eave (NYE Run for the first time

Like I mentioned above, NYRR has a program where if you run nine races and volunteer for one, you can gain a spot in the upcoming year's NYC Marathon. For whatever reason, I struggled to fit in all nine of my races in a calendar year. I have a feeling that I might have been injured or maybe a lot of NYRR races conflicted with my weekend teaching schedule. So the NYE Run (4 miles) is the last race of the season where you can meet the nine-race requirement. It just so happened that my 1st year running this race was one of the COLDEST winters that I experienced in NYC as a runner. I think the temperature was around 13F, but it felt like 7-8F with the wind chill. For the this race, there's sparkling cider at the 2 mile mark. While there was sparkling cider, all of the cider was completely frozen...not that I was planning on stopping to have sparkling cider toast with my fellow runners.