Can I Get a Weekend to Recover From My Weekend?

Going into this past weekend I knew that it was going to be craziness. Part my fault because apparently I hate down time (that is a total outright lie. My favorite weekends are when I have NO obligations!).

If you would like to know everything NOT to do when you have a really long training run to complete (and you know, final one of your cycle – so one you really need as a final confidence boost) then do the direct opposite of everything that I did!

Friday night I had every intention of going home and chilling. Then I somehow wound up at happy hour after work. And then another happy hour after that (I consider anything before dinner happy hour…and I didn’t eat until like 10pm so yes happy hour went from about 5 – 10pm). It is funny how these things just HAPPEN. Good intentions killed.

I woke up Saturday morning 100% not wanting to run the 5K I was signed up for. It wasn’t even until 10am and about 1 ½ miles from home yet when I woke at 6:30 all I could think was I do not feel like it. It took a solid 2+ hours to man up to do it (since I realized I had to get the mileage no matter what and was crunched for time). Ran there, 5 minutes before the race grabbed my bib and pinned it at the start, ran the race (27:32 – started off racing then realized umm maybe a glass of water or any food before would have been helpful - cramping up like a mother and eased off) then ran home. Mission accomplished.

After I quickly had to eat, shower and get ready to head to the city to plummet to my death aka start off bachelorette festivities with a trapeze class.

 

Some of the fantastic ladies

Spoiler alert – it.was.amazing. This speaks for itself! Do it. Seriously. Go to Chelsea Piers for an awesome afternoon. I cannot wait to go back.

Then it was time to get ready for the rest of the evening – a later dinner at Café Espanol (it was fantastic) which unfortunately went until almost midnight and I turned into a pumpkin and started to feel crappy and headed home.

Short shorts, city nights ;)

Enter waking up Sunday for the Newport Half Marathon that I was running as part of my long run. It was gross out. I looked at the humidity – 96%. COME. ON. Took every ounce of willpower I had to get out of bed. But I did. Scrambled to put myself together and then was off to get some mileage in before it began. Dripping with sweat by mile 2. Showed up once again 5 minutes before the start, pinned my bib and was off.

Luckily I was running this super slow at LR pace or else it would have been even more dreadful. Not enough water. No bathrooms until mile 6 with a mile long line (took 11 minutes!) and realized that all the fuel I had for the run was ½ a cliff bar. Way to practice race day scenarios, G!

My shoes were actually squeaking they were so sweaty from it dripping down my legs. You could wring me out! Finished the race (and bumped into a friend with a couple miles to go so had someone to chat with – again this week for the 20 I didn’t listen to any music!) then grabbed a bottled water and banana and then was off to finish up. Garmin died around 15/16 so estimated the rest by time to get to 20.

And just like that – LONG LONG RUNS DONE AND TIME TO TAPER!

I did a little recovery (by recover I mean shower and sat around in my towel eating twizzlers for a while) then went to watch some football and to dinner. But when my head finally hit the pillow Sunday night I was never happier.

Amazingly – I woke up and did an easy 5 today and could have gone (easy) forever. I guess that means I am in pretty good condition. Hopefully peaking at the right time for Chicago!

But seriously – I need a weekend for my weekend.