Getting in the mileage

In college, I always felt that I had to fight for academics to take precedent over athletics. Not the normal college experience, despite going to a school where athletics wasn't exactly a top priority to the institution.

Now, I am finding myself in the opposite extreme, where a career takes precedent over running. The hardest thing for me to learn was to be flexible. I have always been used to controlling my schedule. If I was efficient, planned out my work schedule, and got work done then I would have time for what I needed to do. But I can be as efficient as humanly possible and it won't stop an assignment from coming in the door 20 minutes before I'm supposed to meet up for a track workout, or sleeping through a run because I had to work on an emergency project till 2am the night before.

I've had to learn the consequences of not getting up out of laziness in the morning (then being in the office till late and missing a run). I've discovered how to do an 8-miler during lunch and not appear too desheveled for the rest of the day after a quick clean up in the women's bathroom. I've accepted that tempo runs on the treadmill suck, but sometimes there are no other options when the work day wraps up at 8pm.

Life has been busy, but lately I've managed ok.

April 12-18 - 40 miles

w/o #1: Tempo cutdown - Treadmill
w/o #2: Fartleck 6x (3min on 2 min off)

April 19-25 - 45 miles

w/o #1 - First attempt at Hills. Ouch.
w/o #2 - 4 x mile w/ 400m recovery

Back to the grind...

Have you ever had one of those mornings where you wake up and just feel stressed out for no good reason? The sound of rain outside and the memory that it was supposed to clear up and be sunny this afternoon kept me in bed till the last possible moment before needing to get up for work. I instantly felt stressed. Every little thing was stressing me out. The dirty dishes in the sink, the fact that I hadn't responded to several overdue emails, strange dreams from the night before, taxes, even the fact that my shoes were disorganized in my closet. The uneasiness carried through to work this morning, and is only now beginning to disapate as I look at my to-do list and silently remind myself I am not overwhelmed; it's under control.

This weekend was a good one for running. Got a solid speed workout in on the track. Not as fast as I would like, but a good start. Again my mantra of patience kicks in.

Spent all Sunday morning at the C-bad 5K. Got to hang out with some people that I hadn't seen in awhile, watch some other friends kick butt in their races, and ran my longest distance run (8 miles) since my achilles injury in January. Other than soreness from the speed the day before, things are feeling good.

Weekly Mileage: 33

Sickness

March 27
Sick - bagged workout again. 4 miles.

March 28
LA all day. Not feelin' great. No run.

March 29
5 miles. Blah.

March 30 - April 2
SICK. No running. Lots of nose blowing. Very sexy.

April 3
Treadmill in Las Vegas - 4 miles. Not great but felt good to atleast run.

April 4
Treadmill in Vegas - 5 miles. Feeling much better today. Think sickness has finally run its course, at least physically.

Weekly Mileage = 14
You win some you lose some.

April 5
Off. Tired from trip + full day at work + desire to just go home, make dinner, and watch the NCAA game with Marc = no run.

April 6
Track - 3x (600 w/ 300 recovery, 400 w/ 400 recovery) 2x400 w/ 400 recovery. Total miles = 7-8

Worked in to Katie's workout. Body felt WEAK, not too shocking. But my original plan was to do 4x 600/400 so the fact that I almost managed to make it through should make me happy, considering my recent illness and lack of running. Time to do this.

April 7
5 miles easy before work.