Run focus week = DONE

It has definitely been a tough week of training. Actually, the increase in volume was very subtle until the weekend, when it got poured on. The rest of the week just had slight increases. Yesterday's transition run was a mere 10 minutes longer than usual. But today the running amounted to a grand total of three hours, split up as two 90-minute runs with a 2 and a half hour bike ride in between. I am no stranger to the 3-hour run, as I used to do a couple of them leading up to my ironmans, not split up. Of course I never had to bike that day, I only had to scarf down pancakes when I was done. But I'm doing things differently now.

So I got up fairly early this morning, not exactly the 4:30 of yesterday, but 6:15 is still early. I debated staying in bed a bit longer, but I figured I might sleep a little later than I really wanted to, and I was also incredibly hungry. So after some more pre-race oatmeal for breakfast I was on the road a bit before 7:30. The weather today was incredibly unpredictable. It wasn't raining when I first went out, and I thought maybe it'd stay dry. Well, it didn't take long before the drizzle began, and then it wasn't long after that when it was just plain pouring. It very nearly made me physically angry. I don't necessarily mind training in the rain. What I do mind is training in the rain every single day! Is it honestly too much to ask for one little day of sun? It is technically summer, after all.

The rain did subside for about the last 15 minutes, and that was the worst of my weather woes for the day. But it did make for some soaking wet shoes which I would have to put on again not long later, so I continued the latest post-workout tradition of stuffing them with newspaper to help soak up some of the moisture. It'd be nice to finish a workout and not have to worry about that.

Oh, as for the run itself: Well, I actually felt pretty good. I always cringe a little bit when I first put my feet on the floor on Sunday mornings and wait to see what my quads feel like when I get out of bed. Not too bad today. Aside from the fact that I felt ok, I am still running astonishingly slow. It is honestly embarrassing at this point. I hear friends talk about their training paces for some recent run and wonder why it is that I just can't come anywhere close. I think I was good about being patient for a while, but it's just getting ridiculous now and I haven't seen any improvement lately. In fact, it seems like I'm sliding backwards.

I took a two-hour workout break as instructed, even though I probably would've rather just gone out and gotten the misery over as soon as possible. Plus, like I said before, it's starting the workouts that is the hardest part, and you eliminate that part when you just do them one after another without thinking about it. But at 11am, it was time to ride.

For about 10 minutes, I thought I'd be dry. Then of course the rain moved in again. It would rain, then stop, then rain, then stop, then be windy, then be calm, then the sun might pop out for a minute, then it'd rain again... it was a crazy weather day. Rain for 5 minutes, no rain for 10, rain for another 10... I almost prefer it when it just doesn't stop raining, because at least then you can sort of forget about it at times. The good news was that for probably the last 45 minutes I don't think it rained at all, which was definitely a nice change. Of course that's when the wind kicked up, but whatever, at least I wasn't wet anymore.

Ok, time to run again. Of course I was not looking forward to it. I tend to dread all of my runs lately, because each one ends with me discovering a more and more demoralizing pace. No matter how decent I might actually feel when I'm out there, I can't be that happy with it because I'm still way, way, way too slow.

The rain held off for my run, and the sun actually came out for a bit. This also exacerbated the fact that it was incredibly humid. So the end result was running clothes that were just as wet at the end of the second run as they were at the end of the first, rain-soaked one, it was just sweat this time. I started out feeling a lot better than I did in the first run and even managed to run faster. Not nearly fast enough, but faster. I ran the same out-and-back route and was hitting all of my landmarks earlier than the previous run, and got further along before it was time to turn around. That was slightly encouraging... until I got home and did the math and figured out how slow I had still run, even if it wasn't quite as slow as the first run. The last mile or so wasn't pleasant at all though, as I became desperate for water as I had drank my Fuel Belt supplies and I just felt done. But at least my nice little nearly-13-hour training weekend was finally over, along with my run focus week.

I am still waiting for my running to come around, but each time out just seems to be another exercise in futility. I'm doing the training, I'm staying in my heart rate zones, I've been paying close attention to my form and it's just not getting any better. Maybe it's because I'm still working on dropping weight and operating in a calorie defecit is really affecting my running. I don't know. I do however know that it'll be nice once I hit that target to actually feel like I can adequately fuel myself again.

Next up: the bike focus week. Gonna get to know that saddle really well over the next 7 days.