Good Monday morning to you all!  It’s a snowy one here in Colorado.

Was anyone else disappointed with the commercials during the SuperBowl?  I always look forward to hilarious commercials during the game.  Yesterday – not so much! Thank goodness for the E*Trade babies – it seems they were the only ones with a hint of comedy!

Welcome to “Marathon Monday“!  As I mentioned in last Monday’s post, I’ll be making a weekly feature now through mid-May where I’ll keep you up to speed on what I’m doing to train for the Colfax Marathon.

The plan for this weekend was 10 miles.  I realized Saturday afternoon that I could only count on 2 hands the number of times I’d run 10 miles in the past, at least from what I remember.  One hand for the 5 half-marathons I’ve completed, and the other hand for the 5 ten-mile training runs I completed leading up to each of those half-marathons.

I was up before the alarm clock at a little after 4:00 and had a cup of half-caff coffee.  I had my usual pre-run fuel at 5:30:  one slice of Ezekial toast with raw organic almond butter, organic unsweetened coconut flakes and a drizzle of raw local honey.

We were meeting at 7:15 and I wanted to be there a little early to get in a good warm-up.  I’ve found that when I really take the time for a proper warm-up my heart rate throughout the entire run stays a little lower which makes the run feel less exhausting.

It was a BITTER start to the day again:  foggy and damp, 18 degrees with windchill.  We did an out-and-back route on a dirt trail, which ended up being frozen ruts with a lot of ice on it.

This time I was smarter and kept water OUT of the tube for my hydation pack so it wouldn’t freeze.  So I didn’t drink as early as I would have liked, but I was holding off until I really needed it because I knew once I suctioned the water into the tube there was a good chance it would freeze quickly.

At the five mile turnaround, I ate my homemade exercise fuel, a date stuffed with coconut oil.

I had a second one with me but didn’t feel that I needed it.  However, at mile 8 I was really starting to feel beat, so maybe I misread my need for energy.

Right at the 10 mile mark, we took off in a sprint for a tenth of a mile to wrap it up.

I did a few stretches before getting in the car to head home, and  I drank my glutamine drink.  Once at home I went through a longer stretching session and ate a post-run meal of 1/2 sweet potato with a sprinkle of goat cheddar, and a side of hummus with crackers.  I knew a green smoothie would be a better choice, but I was SO COLD that I just didn’t want anything that would make me feel more chilled than I already was.

Next it was time to soak!  I put a wetsuit on my Kindle:

And added some Epsom salt to the water:

The best part of any run is the stretching and soaking afterward!

Last week I felt GREAT after our 9 miler.  This week, I felt totally DRAINED and ACHY.  My knees were really unhappy the rest of Saturday and most of Sunday (and I’d even taken my ginger root caps!)  I tried to determine what I had done differently:

  1. The terrain was much more bumpy (so maybe that affected my gait/cadence enough to irritate my knees?)
  2. I didn’t have two dates and a Starbucks decaf soy latte, like I had last week

Those were the only differences between the weeks.

I won’t lie – it was disappointing because it affected my level of productivity for the remainder of the weekend.  So I’m toying with the idea of doing next week’s long run on Sunday instead so that I can still have a very productive Saturday (including getting the dogs out for their walk), with Monday being an upper body strength day to let the legs recover while I’m sitting at my desk at work (as opposed to letting them recover while being a bump on a log on Sunday).   The downside is that means I’ll most likely be without my running buddies.

Other adjustments I’ll keep in mind for next week’s 12 mile run are:

  • bump up the size of my pre-run meal (two pieces of Ezekial)
  • ice my knees directly following the run to combat the inflammation

Well friends, it’s going to be a LONG drive to work this morning thanks to the snow so I better scoot!  Have a marvelous MONDAY!

– Shari B. =)

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