A Massive Week
Reflecting today on what was a big week, both on the track and off.
Aside from the 14 hours of running, I had a pop up shop fundraiser on Saturday, my son flew out to Europe and we had some sad family news to process. But putting this aside I ticked each session of one at a time.
A highlight on Tuesday was running with my coach, it was a nice catch up to debrief on how I am going and what his thoughts were on my progress. Wednesday I had 100 minutes, which I took inland for a change, I felt really good on this run, but how quickly it can turn.
Thursday was a struggle, I didn't sleep well and headed to the gym not feeling my best. My head was not in the game, everything felt hard and I was dreading the 80 minute run home after gym. This run home was straight into a head wind, great for training but not so great when your head is already struggling. I ticked it of and locked it away.
Friday was a quick 50 minutes, but then I spent a few hours setting up the Pop Up shop at our friends business premises, then back home to cook dinner for our son before getting him to the airport for his flight to Europe. It was an emotional day sending our son off, I was excited for him and his mates, but also nervous as not only will I miss him badly but the world is a crazy place at present. I did not sleep so well Friday night, which wasn't ideal leading into Saturday's run.
Saturday I was up early as I had 3 hours to run before heading to the Pop Up. I headed out at 6am, making my way to Grange, going inland and then back along the coast to home. I set of thinking that if I get 25km done today I will be happy, that is where my mental space was sitting, so to hit just over 28km I was pretty happy. I then headed into the shop for the rest of the day, probably did far too much standing, considering I had 6 hours to run Sunday, but we raised over $2,000 in sales towards Stillbirth Foundation Australia. By the time we packed up, I was home around 5pm to eat, recover and rest before the next day.
Sunday arrived, Tim dropped me to Seacliff for a 7am start. I was going to follow my Day 1 route, which is basically uphill for 30km before it provides some gentler running elevations. at the beginning of the week my goal was to reach Hahndorf (approx 46km) but due to my mental fatigue, I secretly told myself if I reach 40km I can cope with that.
This is where the consistent training I have done this past 39 weeks is showing up when I need it to, as I reached 44km, just 2km short of my original goal, and to be honest if I didn't get lost and lose some time bashing my way through the bush alongside the Mt Barker Road, I would have made it.
The biggest fail was my phone going into emergency mode for over an hour so I couldn’t use it. This meant my planned stock up at the Crafers service station didn’t happen because I couldn’t pay for the food and drink. It was also was the reason I couldn’t check my maps, hence taking wrong turn onto Mt Barker Road. Next time I’m going old school… credit card and paper maps!
However this has been my biggest week at 124 kilometres and I have been able to take a lot away from it. I have proven that if the head is not in it the legs will just keep ticking over until I tell them they can stop.
And keen to know how I have pulled up today..... I just went for a 5km walk, had some physio and I feel good.
39 sleeps to go!
Thanks for reading x