Category Archives: marathon training

2019 Berlin Marathon Training: Week 2

16 June 2019

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Slowly getting into the grove of things with week 2. To be honest, I was feeling a bit down all week, so it felt good to get out and run it out. Here’s what training looked like the second week of June:

MONDAY

Rest day!  

TUESDAY

Back to Body Pump. I’m going to try and go every week until the 19th & L Gold’s Gym closes. 

Since Tuesday was the second Tuesday of the month, it was also Track & Shack. We had a *huge* group out of the 14th street Pacers store!!

I opted to do the three miles run (5.36 km) since I had already worked out in the morning and it was super fun running with Tammy (she’ll be running Berlin in September as well) and meeting Myles the Doodle (and his owner Susan) IRL. It was also a bit of a bittersweet night because it was the last night I got to see Corey before he headed out on his super fun Viking adventure (he’s running the Ragnar in Sweden and I’m super jealous!) and we got into a weird fight 😦 

WEDNESDAY

The weather was perfect for a run, sunny with low humidity. I was still upset over the stupid fight with Corey and dealing with other things at work so I also really wanted to clear my head! I ran to summit to Soul on 8th Street (3.5 km) and then joined their running group for a three mile loop around the Capitol (total 8.4km). I did feel better afterwards.

THURSDAY

I’ve been running with Pacers Pentagon City on Thursdays since that’s the group Corey leads. But no Corey means no need to go to Virginia (no offense to all the other fun runners in the group!) and instead, I joined Pacers Navy Yards for an almost 5 miles loop (I cut it a little short at 7.7km). It was awesome having two runners at my pace for the whole route… I’m usually all by myself in the back. Since I’ve been basically alone in the office these days it was nice just having a little company for a change. We had drinks at Bluejacket next door afterwards and it was also nice to feel a little social for a bit. 

FRIDAY

Shaw Yoga was offering a free restorative class at 5PM so I squeezed that in before heading out to Silver Spring for my friends Kevin and Julien’s going away party. Since they couldn’t ship out their opened bottles of liquor we all volunteered to help them finish them …

SATURDAY

…. ouch! I remembered why I don’t go out that much anymore. I was signed up for a 90 minutes OrangeTheory class and it was rough. I mean 60 minutes are hard enough on a good day. 90 minutes with a bad hangover did not feel good 😦 Laying by the pool reading a book afterwards did though. It was a beautiful day in DC!

SUNDAY

Sunday officially kicked off my =PR= DC  Distance Training Program (known as =PR= DC  DTP from here on). My group meets at 6:30AM on Sundays (le gasp!) at the Georgetown waterfront. The route for this week was Rock Creek Park and I “only” had to do 6-8 miles. I ended up doing 12.6 km / 7.8 miles.

Bilan de la semaine: Overall it was a good week. I ran four times for a total of 37.4 km / 23.2 miles. For cross-training I did bodypump, yoga and OrangeTheory. I’m a little mad at myself that I wasted a good 90 minutes OTF class though.

What I’m watching/reading/listening to:  I watched Ava DuVernay’s new Netflix mini-series “When They See Us,” about the 1989 case in which five black and latino teenagers (the Central Park Five now the Exonerated Five) were wrongfully convicted of the violent rape of a jogger. I knew nothing about the case or story prior to watching the four episodes (and Oprah’s interview with the cast and Korey, Kevin, Antron, Raymond and Yusef) and it’s a devastating watch. The final episode which focuses on Korey Wise’s story (Korey was slightly older than the other boys who were sent to juvenile detention centers. He was tried as an adult and send to Rickers.) was particularly difficult.

I read this article (in French) about a journalist that faked a runner’s instagram account, bought 15K followers and fooled brands (and the city of Montreal!) into wanting to enter into sponsorship agreements with her. Fascinating read!  (<click to read!) As far as books are concerned, The View From Flyover Country: Essays by Sarah Kendzior turned out to be THE perfect, if slightly depressing, companion for my solo runs. I finished it in two days mixing paperback and overdrive and I definitely wish it had been longer!

I also finished I Miss You When I Blink (hardcover) which I had started a while back and is one month overdue at the library (oops) and started When in French (mix overdrive + hardcover). So far it’s a snoozer.

What I’m eating/drinking: not much fun to report here though I did make this amazing Seared Beef with rice vermicelli from Mark Bittman’s latest cookbook “Dinner for Everyone.” I am really loving that cookbook!

What I’m looking forward to on week 3: I’m off to Montreal on Thursday so I’m definitely looking forward to that trip and to hanging out with my college besties. Of course,  traveling is always a bit disruptive to one’s routine BUT I’m also super stoked to run through my old city (I lived in Montreal for four years) and I’m already trying to figure out a good route for a 10-12 miles run! I’m thinking Canal Lachine but if anyone has some good Montreal recommendations (running related or not! Girl’s gotta eat too. And drink.) please share them in the comments!! 

What I Talk About When I’m *not* Talking about Running

12 June 2019

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Spoiler alert: not much 😉 Seriously, it’s starting to feel like I have nothing to talk about beside running…

Until recently at least I could always fall back to talking about books. But guess what? I’m currently reading Haruki Murakami’s  “What I Talk About When I Talk About Running” so even that’s no longer a safe space lol. 

It’s particularly upsetting because I wouldn’t even call myself a runner. Sure I run a lot, but I’m not really good at it so I think of myself more as someone who runs than a runner per se (something along the line of drawing versus being an artist I guess…) I always knew marathon training would take a toll on my social life. That was kind of the point anyway. I wanted to go out less, add more structure to my life. Mission accomplished on that 😉 But I don’t think I was quite prepared for that feeling you get when you start turning down invitations and even worse when you’re no longer turning them down because, well, no one is inviting you to hang out anymore.

Since my divorce, I don’t have anyone beside my cat to come home to. I don’t have any family here. My friends are my only support system so I was determined to hang on to them and chase that elusive run-life balance. I mean, there had to be a way to prioritize exercising without turning into a complete running hermit right? I got creative. I squeezed in some run-mutes home so I could catch the tail end of happy hour. I got up earlier to catch a spin class before work and free up an evening. I make 8PM dinner plans on Thursdays on the red line so I can go there straight after track. I had friends over to my pool on Sunday so we could be lazy together after my long run. It wasn’t easy but I eventually found some kind of marathon training – social life groove.
But then I ran into a different issue. I couldn’t seem to put running out of my head. I became that person who can only talk about one thing: running. What have I have been up to? Marathon training. What was I doing this weekend? Running (duh, did I mention I’m running a marathon?). That’s cool(ish) when you’re around other runners but not so much everyone else. And it didn’t get better after the Marine Corps because obviously I had to make sure everyone and their mother knew I had just ran my first marathon. I was prbably the world’s most boring date… until I started dating a runner. Yeah, we could talk about running together!  On the downside though we both had to fit each other around our running schedules which sometimes meant that yes, we went on a group run on Valentine’s Day. So romantic 😉

I learned a lot last year training for my first marathon. I learned a lot about myself, of course. What I can endure, how strong I can be. TBerlin mrhat was kind of the point. But I also learned a lot about the training cycle and I have a better idea of what to expect this time around. I am keenly aware that I turned into a bit of a marathon-monster and deeply appreciative of the few friends that stuck with me as I turned down fun plans and bored them with running-talk when we did get together. At times marathon training sucked. But clearly not enough for me not to want to do it all over again.  Now I just need to figure out what to talk about instead of only talking about running. All tips are appreciated …. 

2019 Berlin Marathon Training: Week 1

10 June 2019

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The 2019 Berlin Marathon is 110 days away and since it’s not going to run itself, I officially kicked off my training this week. And while I tried to have fun in May and do a ton of non-running focused workouts, I was definitely getting antsy and I’m thrilled to get back into the routine of marathon training! Here’s how week one went down:

MONDAY

Rest day! I had ran two races over the weekend, a 10K trail race in Rockwood, New York and a 5-miler in Central Park. My body needed a rest so I met up IRL with my insta friend Anja for drinks at Le Diplomate. She lives in Berlin, so it was sorta marathon related 😉 

TUESDAY

I hadn’t been to Body Pump in ages so I went back to Gold’s Gym for a morning class… and found out that the L and 19th street location is closing at the end of the month. Sad. I loved that class and it was just 3 credits on Class Pass. 

WEDNESDAY

Wednesday was Global Running Day and I did a couple of things to celebrate. I went for a run, of course. Courtney organized a morning run around the monuments (I ran to and from home as well so it was a 9km run for me / 5.6 miles) and it was super fun to meet some new gals and snap lots of pictures. We also bumped into Kevin Plank at the Lincoln Memorial so I was glad I was wearing Under Armour shorts! I also bought new tennis shoes! Sticking with Brooks but went with the Ghost this time around… 

And I signed up for two 2020 races: the Charleston Half Marathon which will be the day after my birthday in January and the Washington, DC Rock’n’Roll Half Marathon in March. Busy day! 

THURSDAY

I joined Corey and the Pacers Pentagon City group for a 7KM / 4.3 miles run in the evening. It was really hot and there was a really big hill but it was a good run. 

FRIDAY

I have not been sleeping well lately (I tend to fall asleep very easily but then wake up after 3 hours as if my body doesn’t need any more rest… which it definitely does!) and I finally had a great night sleep so I had a lazy morning and a kick-ass spin class at FlyWheel City Center with Christine, one f my favourite instructor. I don’t know about you but I *love* closing out the week with a post-work Friday workout, followed by a nice relaxing evening.

SATURDAY

So Saturday was another rest day… since I had a double workout day scheduled for Sunday (more on that in a sec) I decided to take it easy. I could probably have done a yoga class but I was spending the night at a friend’s near Annapolis so I skipped working out altogether. 

SUNDAY

My friend Tammy is fundraising for Team for Kids ahead of the New York Marathon in the fall (she’s running Berlin as well too!!) and she had organized a donation class at Orange Theory Tentleytown. I’ve actually taken many of her classes and I wanted to support her so I signed up. But I also wanted to do a long run that day, so I knew I was up for a little more than I should. But that’s ok once in a while… I was worried about doing that long run since I didn’t know the area where I was staying but it turned out the B & A Trail was right there and it was a great running route! I cut my 10 miles run a little short at 13.3km/8.3 miles since I know I would get a few extra miles on tread later on, which I did. I ran 2.6 miles on the treadmill in class which round up my day at 10.8 miles and my week at 33.5km/20.8miles. 

I think it was a good first week. I’d have liked to do an additional run and maybe a yoga class to force myself to stretch but I also think I properly listened to my body and took some appropriate rest day. Next week will be the first training run with my long distance training program on Sunday and I’m definitely looking forward to that! Not looking forward to waking up at 5AM 😦

What I’m reading/listening to:  this week I finished Joanne Ramos‘ The Farm (in hardcover) and Pete Buttigieg‘s The Shortest Way Home (on Overdrive) and started The View From Flyover Country: Essays by Sarah Kendzior (mixing paperback and overdrive for this one.)

I think I definitely found my sweet spot for books to listen to while I’m running and that’s essays (celebrity memoirs are pretty great too!). The View from Flyover Country was the perfect companion to my long run! I’m hoping to be done with that book tonight so I can (finally) finish Miss You When I Blink. I’m doing that one on hardcover from the library but I think it would have been a great one to listen to. 

What I’m eating/drinking: I really struggled with how to properly fuel my runs and my recovery when I trained for Marine Corps last year and nutrition is definitely an area I want to work on this time around. That being said, I don’t have much to report on that this week though I did *love* sipping DC Brau‘s Lavender Lemonade Berliner Weisse by the water in Annapolis. The brewing company teamed up with local author & illustrator Marcella Kriebel to design the prettiest cans for their purple beer! And the beer is actually really good and refreshing too! 

What I’m looking forward to on week 2: more of the same really. I’d like to run at least 4 times this week though and maybe find a way to squeeze in a yoga class somewhere…. stay tuned!