Hall of Fame Marathon Training : 2

What a great week!  It seemed like everything clicked into place for week two of training (I'm sure having a Monday holiday helped a lot) and it's making me so excited to continue on.  I managed to swim twice this week, try out a new class, and do my daily TRUE yoga challenge, while getting in my regular mileage.  I'm getting into a routine that feels good!

Here's a look at how my week went, complete with lots of snowy pics:

Monday

7 miles / 9:55 pace

I typically take a rest day on Monday, but I had to get this run in!  It was the last day of the Strava/Lululemon challenge, and I was only 11km away from my goal.  Since my long run on Sunday didn't register, I had to go out (plus, I had off work which helped!).  I just went around my neighborhood and going up and down every street for 7 miles.  I even got to run in a blizzard (the roads were all bare when I went out and had about an inch by the time I was done-)

900 yard swim / 18:00

Earlier in the day I went to the gym to get in my swim.  I started week two of my "couch to mile" swim program, and today's plan was:

200 yards...rest for 12 breaths
4 x 100 yards...rest for 10 breaths between sets
4 x 50 yards...rest for 6 breaths between sets
4 x 25 yards...rest for 4 breaths between sets

The workout went pretty well!  I need to work on not swallowing as much water and not getting it up my nose..anyone have advice?

Tuesday

Rest Day!

Wednesday

5 miles / 9:29 pace

I did this workout on the treadmill, and plugged in the "rolling hills" workout.  I warmed up for a mile, then did 3 miles of hills and did a mile cool down.  I got a visit from Annette while I was running which helped distract me in my last mile of hills!

Thursday

Rest Day!

Friday

6 miles / 8:51 pace

Today's workout was 1 mile warm up, 4 miles at marathon pace (9:00) and 1 mile cool down.  It was a beautiful day outside, and from the beginning I felt so great!  I was trying to keep my pace right at 9:00, but I ended up going faster than that (first mile was 8:45 and fourth was 8:20..ended up being a nice progression each mile).  The good news is that the paces felt really comfortable and I felt like I could have kept going forever!  Bad news is I can't pace myself, so I have to work on that.

Saturday

TBC / 1 hour

I visited a nearby barre studio for a morning workout- TBC or Total Body Conditioning.  Instead of a traditional barre class, this was HIIT style that rotated between cardio and strength segments.  The hour absolutely flew by and it was a ton of fun.  The studio itself was really awesome and everyone was so friendly.

 Hiking / 1 hour

It was such a nice day out, so as soon as I got home from class, I grabbed Selma and went to the park for some hiking.  Everything was snowy but the sun was shining and it was a great temperature!  I was worried about Selma's paws getting cold in all the snow but every time I tried to stop she kept pulling me towards more trails.  We ended up walking about 3 miles!

Sunday

12 miles / 9:14 pace

I love those runs where everything feels like it clicks, and that's exactly what this one was.  I turned my display so I only saw overall pace and turned off notifications for each mile, so I really just wanted to run this by feel and not have a pace dictate how I ran.  The weather was perfect (minus a little freezing rain at the beginning) and my body felt amazing!  For the first half of the run, I listened to podcasts, then decided to follow a guided run on the Nike+ Run Club app (which featured Shalane!).  I wanted to keep going!

1000 yard swim / 20:00

I can definitely tell that I'm getting better at swimming and getting more comfortable in the pool (plus my 100 yard pace is improving on each swim!) but this is still really hard!  For some reason, 100 yards of swimming feels harder for me to do than 12 miles.  But, I pushed through and set a new personal distance record in the pool!

What's your favorite way to cross train?

Anyone have swimming tips?