Breakfasts
Monday: breakfast potatoes and eggs
Tuesday and Thursday: breakfast burritos
Friday: cereal bar, string cheese, and fruit
Saturday: homemade waffles via the man of the house
Lunches
Monday and Thursday: the leftover orange beef that I made last weekend. I'm still 100% neutral on this one. I won't make it again obviously but still I didn't hate it, it's a solidly OK meal. There's another serving waiting for me in the freezer.
Tuesday: a treasure from the freezer. The sausage and mushroom pasta that I'd forgotten about and it was a welcome find. I have a few more servings tucked away and they're going to get eaten ASAP.
Wednesday and Friday: lunch from work catering, nothing exciting.
Saturday: snacks
Sunday: veggie burrito
Dinners
Monday and Tuesday (family meals): tacos. The only thing of note that I have to say is that I've started using Flatout wraps for my tortillas. They're a good size, lower calorie, higher nutrition, AND acceptable taste compared to regular tortillas.
Wednesday (date night): Cheddar Bacon Ranch burgers
Thursday (fend for yourself night): snacks
Friday (date night): my husband had a craving for Shepherd's Pie, so we went out to an Irish Pub to scratch the itch. As soon I saw the menu I came up with my own powerful craving for fish and chips. We both left happy.
Saturday (date night, lazy style): my husband was still full from Friday's dinner and I just wanted something easy. He had canned soup, I had a quickie flatbread with pesto and cheese.
Sunday (family meal): family lasagna
Meal Prep
We have plenty of lasagna to tide us over and I made another batch of breakfast burritos.
Workouts
Eh, I'm not sure what to say besides things aren't going as planned. 19.25 miles of running, the week started hard, got worse, and then got better.
You know what is going as planned? The Weekly Run Down! Head over to Kim and Deborah to check it out.
Here's what's up with my running:
- This summer I did a speed program that really clicked with my body. Then I finished and I haven't found the next "thing". My plan for after the speed program was to return to running All The Miles but faster and to kick some half marathon butt. Unfortunately this has played out in a bad cycle of running too fast for my level of fitness and then following that with a few days of sluggish, burned out runs. The workouts that I'm attempting aren't wildly different from the speed program but my body isn't happy about something.
- I may or may not be ready to run my 2nd half marathon in two weeks.
- It's officially too dark to run outside in the mornings now. Knuckle lights are great but they're not everything and I had a pretty bad fall this week.
- If my body doesn't want to Run All The Miles right now, then I'm not going to. Lots of folks in the real world run half marathons and do it well on less mileage than I run. I'll run as much as I want, it that's 6 days a week, great, if that's 4 days a week then so be it.
- I'm a newbie to the half marathon world, there's no answer to whether I'm ready or not besides to run the race. And two weeks out there's nothing I can do to change the path that I'm on besides to keep running.
- I'm not messing around with the dark anymore. All of my weekday runs will be on the treadmill from here on out. I adore going out into the dark when it's just going to be for 10 minutes and then daylight, but having to run for 30 minutes before there is any hint of light is just downright depressing.
Monday: three easy miles that just didn't feel good. I started doing hill sprints at the end which felt all kinds of wrong, so I bailed. Weights at lunch.
Tuesday: 5.25 miles. I had ambitions to do a speed workout and my body wasn't interested. So I did it anyway and felt defeated when I couldn't keep the pace on the last rep. This was the day that I fell. I came home with a bruised knee, a skinned palm, an aching glute from trying to break the fall, and a ton of gratitude that it wasn't worse.
Wednesday: no running, weights at lunch.
Thursday: Hey treadmill! I just did three miles to ease back into things and left the workout feeling good and energized for the day which was a welcome change from Monday and Tuesday. The irony is that I run much faster on the treadmill than off it, so it was both an easy and a race pace run.
Friday: my glute was still sore, so I skipped my run just to be prudent, weights at lunch.
Saturday: I've been increasing my long run by a mile each week but I could not get my head around 11 miles. Darkness wasn't an issue so I was back outside and did 8 miles, with three of those miles being very hilly and difficult. I went into a negative tailspin and had every kind of "I can't" going through my head when I got to the first difficult mile and then out of nowhere I went into The Zone and before I knew it the difficult miles were done and I was flying.
Sunday: off.
P.S. my glute is still sore but running doesn't seem to be aggravating it so all systems are go.
Half Marathon Forecast: is looking good, can someone please lock that in for me? (Context: my first half marathon back in May was a bizarrely hot day that came out of no where and no I'm not haunted by the thought that that's going to happen again or anything).
Watching
The good part of being back in the treadmill is that my TV watching is really going to take off. I had started Suits on my last treadmill run back in July and was happy to pick that back up.
For lifting, I was delighted to see that there's another season of Married at First Sight on Hulu (I have no idea why I find this show so fascinating, I certainly didn't get married at first sight).
In our spare time, hubs and I watched more RiffTrax because we are very mature people.
Reading
With my eyes: Still happily chugging away on Snap Judgement by Marcia Clark. I really like it and I'm in no hurry to finish.
With my ears: another audio book. The Sound of Gravel by Ruth Wariner, it's kind of akin to Educated.
I can definitely relate to your attitude about how often you're running and feeling prepared. What a win to have leftovers for the week!
ReplyDeleteAmen Sarah! I think I've been reading too many training plans and following too many high mileage folks, which is fine but it's just not clicking with my body.
DeleteI bet you will be surprised that you are in better shape than you think for your half! That speedwork has to pay off. Another week of good eats too. Thanks for joining us
ReplyDeleteThanks Deborah, and I cannot tell you enough how much I love catching up with everyone each week.
DeleteEchoing Deborah...I think you are far better trained for that half marathon than you think! When I first started doing halfs, the plans I followed all had a 10-mile run being the max, so that's what I did. For me, that's always been sufficient. That said, I don't run especially high mileage, so I"m a little laid back about things like that than some runners LOL It's great that you like your treadmill runs...that's a gift to embrace! I always feel slow on the 'mill and awkward (I blame my long legs and long strides), so it's just not a good fit for me. All of your meals look amazing, leftovers or not ;-)
ReplyDeleteKim, I saw all of those blazing fast races you did this spring and summer and you definitely got me thinking about lower mileage. It's harder mentally to stay on the treadmill but easier physically, so confusing.
DeleteI love tacos and have always eaten them with regular tortillas. I am bummed that it is still dark in the morning when a few months ago the sun was out at 6am. Honestly I do like running in the dark. There is something about the darkness and being in my own world that relaxes me.
ReplyDeleteTacos rock! I know the feeling that you describe, but where I live running there are too many cars and sidewalk cracks, it's just not a good scene.
DeleteI'm loving all of your eats this week - all the meals are making me hungry!
ReplyDeleteI have to agree with Kim and Deborah - I think you are very well trained for your half, and that speedwork is really going to help come race day!
Thanks Kim! I'm back in the zone now after a good run this morning.
DeleteI shouldn't have read this while hungry! Those meals look amazing! I think you are ready for your second Half even though it might not feel that way now. I've done 5 Half Marathons now and what I've found is you will learn something on each race - how to fuel, how to pace yourself, what to do and what not to do. So whatever happens on Race Day aim to have fun, and take all the lessons, good and bad! I'll be back for that Race Recap!!
ReplyDeleteThanks Shathiso! I am taking your advice to heart.
DeleteEven with TV I still can't seem to like treadmill runs (though I don't mind it for track like workouts...) Doesn't help that the TVs in my building gym NEVER work or are always stuck on a sports channel... maybe I wouldn't hate it so much if I could pick what I watch ;-)
ReplyDeleteUgh, bad TV is a treadmill deal breaker for sure. I do kind of bribe myself by having special shows that I only watch on the treadmill.
DeleteI just screwed up two different comments - I accidentally deleted one and wasn't connected to my hotspot on the other (we're driving home from my half in NC). Anyway, I was talking about how most of my weekday runs are in the dark pretty much all year long and that I kind of like it because it keeps me from realizing how boring my 1/2-mile loop through my neighborhood is (where I feel safe at that hour).
ReplyDeleteI hope you have a great week of training that makes up for how you felt about last week!
That's such a great way to look at it! I'm happy on the tready for right now, but if I ever get a day where I can't face it, maybe I will go out and do loops around my hood. I can't wait to hear about your half!
DeleteUgh, sorry about the fall :( I hate this time of year and it seems like we lose the light so fast. I had the same thing happen a couple years ago where I fell during a early am run in spite of my head light. Since then I've just been too nervous to run in the dark.
ReplyDeleteThat's exactly how I feel. It would be nice to be outside, but the risk of falling just isn't worth it.
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