6 weeks til Utah

Monday

5k pup run

15 min ruck strength

20 min pup ruck 

Nice Monday routine - little bit of everything, trying to beat the heat!

Tuesday

6.3 mi @ 8:56/mi XC #10kTuesday

Went out for a double XC loop for 10k Tuesday, and ended up realizing I was doing a progression around mile 4... so I decided to keep at it and push the last 2 miles even faster. Great workout considering it was a bit cloudier/cooler than I'd expected!

Just look how pretty that is 🤩

Wednesday

2 mi pup run

Post-run hydration

1.1 mi pup ruck w/ 20#

Got too hot for the little gal for much more than a mile at lunch so we kept it short and sweet.

Thursday

20 min ruck strength

Did a little strength routine in the morning before heading to the office. 20# ruck, did chest press, squats, shoulder taps, rows, and crunches with ruck overhead. Started with 20 reps then reduced by 2 until I got to 10 reps. 

5.23 mi @ 8:59/mi 

Midday run was quiiiite warm, goal was to keep a good but not too fast pace and after a 4 mile progression (oops) was able to drop it back for the last mile. 

Got an email tonight from Tushars Mountain Runs that the course has been changed based on permits by the park service... so now we won't be going up to the 12,000ft peak, but instead climbing two 11,000 ft peaks. Overall ends up with about the same elevation just split into two climbs instead of one. 

Friday

3.24 mi @ 9:10/mi 

Just a short and sweet 5k in the midday heat, made myself go up the River Bend hill climb (just once though) for good measure.

Saturday

4x loops at Paris Mtn (9.1 mi total) @ 12:21/mi avg

Did a little combo training for Utah trail runs + Carolina Reaper challenge. The Sassafras Trail loop at Paris Mountain State Park is 2.3 miles long and climbs about 400 feet per loop. This seemed like a good one to try to do at 45 minute intervals, with the balance of non-running time as static rest (mimicking the format of Reaper). I also wanted to test out some hydration pills (salts & electrolytes) as well as making sure I fueled with every loop. 

Overall, I'd say this was a successful training session! I felt like I kept it steady, not too conservative, but definitely sustainable pace per loop. It helped that the shade of the trees made the temps feel not so bad, although it was definitely humid. I let myself push a little faster on the final lap which made it my fastest.

I started feeling less great later in the afternoon, but not sure if it was due to the morning heat, the salt pills, the glass of prosecco + heavy stout I had around 2pm, or the time laying in the hot sun at the pool from 4-5pm... or maybe some combination of those factors. 

Sunday

short walk + 1.5 mi run with kiddo and pup

Took the pup and kid to Unity Park in the morning figuring I would run with pup while D played on the playground. Seemed that he wanted to hang out with me instead, and even suggested a run around the park! He said he wanted to do 3 laps, but we made it about 1 and some change before all 3 of us decided it was a little too warm for that and headed home. Still was a nice little lap!

7.4 mi @ 10:52/mi 

Got home and felt oddly ambitious... so decided to do 7 laps of the neighborhood with some heartrate control goals. Again, aimed to keep it under 160 bpm, and if I hit that limit, I would walk until it recovered to 150 or lower. It got more and more difficult as the laps went on, with basically zero shade or cloud cover and minimal breeze. Still, really happy to get this run done in the heat of midday!

Another week close to 40 miles (38 miles, to be precise) - feeling good and strong!

7 Weeks til Utah

Ok, almost caught up on blogs! This is from last week...

Monday

2 mi pup run 

Didn't have to take D to camp this morning, so ran with the pup around Furman instead.

2.26 mi pup ruck

20# pack, rucked to the horse farm trails at lunch

Tuesday

7.03 mi @ 8:27/mi #10kTuesday

Early miles with the downtown crew... was gonna stop at 6.2 but decided to go for the full 7.

Wednesday

5k pup run & coffee date

Met with Megan after camp drop-off for a 5k through Cleveland Park followed by a coffee date! Lovely morning. 💚

Thursday

6.1 mi @ 9:19/mi avg Altamont run

Back to the mountain we go! For this week, at least... 

Friday

3.1 mi Hot Fish Run Club 5k Friday

An odd random run group at work that we've started a tradition of a 5k on Fridays... nice way to ease into the weekend!

Saturday

14.05 mi trail run (~3 hours)

Had to get some long trail miles, so got to Paris Mountain right as they opened and did allll the loops... lake loop at the bottom, new Sassafras loop, then the Sulfur Springs switchback climb up to the top. Did the upper loop in the opposite direction I typically do (Brissy > Pipsissewa > North Lake > Kanuga > Firetower > Sulfur Springs) and shockingly (🙃) it was not any easier. Was glad I decided to knock out Sassafras early instead of tacking it on at the end because that would have been very difficult to convince myself to do after all that... to run past the car and do another ~2 miles. Legs were definitely feeling it by the end but man I felt happy with that run!

Sunday

5.05 mi @ 10:28/mi avg

Intentionally slow and steady. Went in the middle of the afternoon, did loops around the neighborhood targeting keeping my heart rate under 160bpm. If it went above (as it often did when I started climbing The Hill at the end of the neighborhood) I would walk until it dropped and recovered to 150, then run again. This felt like great training for heat and keeping the pace & exertion under control!

Warm, but still moving!

Hit 40 miles running for the week... feeling super strong!

8 Weeks til Utah (and a Beerlay)

A few weeks late writing this... (and back-dated)

A large focus of this week was completing the 80th Anniversary D-Day Rucking Challenge. The challenge consists of 2 distance rucks and 4 workouts to all be completed June 1-8. Completed one of the distance rucks on Sunday June 2nd, and the rest of the workouts and ruck done this week.

Monday

1.57 mi pup run

D-Day Rucking Challenge - 82nd Airborne workout

Dead on the sandbag in the afternoon

Pup run in the morning

The workout was quite tough but felt great. Oddly the lateral jump over the sandbag during the burpees was one of the more challenging tasks! 

Tuesday

6.23 mi @ 8:53/mi #10kTuesday

Did loops around the neighborhood for 10k today since Scott is traveling - told D the night before that if I'm not in the house when he wakes up, that means I'm running around the neighborhood. He stayed asleep though and I got the 10k done before 6am! 

(The rest of the morning did not go to plan, including forgetting to feed my child breakfast before camp... but it started off with a strong run at least 😅)

35 min D-Day Rucking Challenge - 101st Airborne workout

Did the rucking challenge workout at lunchtime on the fitness course at work. Distance ended up being closer to 1.3 miles just due to getting to/from good places for the exercises. Squats got spicy!

Wednesday - Global Running Day!

1.74 mi pup run

Short morning run with pupper around the park.

Post-run smooches

20 min D-Day Rucking Challenge - Operation Overlord workout

Got a little dusty with the sandbag

3 mi run for Global Running Day - Run In group run

Took D to Run In (local running store) for their Global Running Day group run sponsored by Hoka. I got to try on some Hokas (I don't remember what kind) and D and I wore our matching Run Squad shirts (a gift from running bestie when D was little). I hadn't planned on doing much more than a mile with D, but he was doing so well that we decided to keep going and we run/walked the full 3 miles! It was such a happy time together!

Hokas

💜♥

Thursday

2 mi easy run

Early miles around the house, legs are tiiiiired.

GORUCK D-Day Challenge - Gold Beach D-Day Ruck
Did another distance ruck today at work during lunch. Had to hustle to get in 5 miles at lunchtime but was able to make it work and rucked 20# over 5.1 miles.

Friday

42 min D-Day Rucking Challenge - 80th Anniversary workout

Did this one around the park on Friday morning and ended up doing the workout portions near the veterans memorial just by coincidence. 

1 mile run

Just enough for the streak.

Saturday

1 hour Power Vinyasa 

BFF from out of town visiting, so we went together to the mid-morning hot yoga class and boy was that a challenge! We sweated our little behinds off but what a great workout!

Cottonmouth Beerlay - solo division (~7.5 miles)

So, this was a ridiculous event. The concept is made to be a relay of up to 4 people, each one drinking a beer then running a ~3k lap. The event can also be done as a solo runner/drinker where you drink the beer and run 4x. That's the path I chose and boy was it an adventure. 😂

The event started at 5pm with the first beer (ok it was my second beer... gotta warm up properly!) and then off we went on our adventure through the ~1.8ish mile loop through grass and trees and plenty of little hills up and down. 

The run part was not bad, the beer drinking was enjoyable but slow, and the full belly of beer made the running a bit uncomfortable by the 3rd and 4th lap. All that being said, it was quite a hilarious and fun event!

Making new friends

Silly group pic, I don't even know half of these people

Probably on the 4th lap 😏

I won third female for the solo division!

Stickersssss

Sunday

1.3 mi run

Recovery run and nothing more.

9 Weeks til Utah

Fell off the blog wagon again... 

Monday

Ruck Murph in 1h05m

1 mile ruck

100 sandbag rows

200 pushups (slick)

300 ruck squats

1 mile ruck

20# ruck /40# sandbag

1.2mi post-Murph run

Tuesday

6.28 mi #10kTuesday

3.31 mi Rockers Run Club

Hawaiian Shirt night!

Wednesday

20 min yoga

1.5 mi run

Thursday

7 mi run

35 min gym

Friday

3.13 mi run 

Saturday

Wicked Revival 50k race

Sunday

5.6 mi ruck + 1 mi run

First event of the 80th Anniversary D-Day Ruck challenge. Rucked with the dawg for 5.6 miles with 20# + water. 

5.6 mi Gold Beach ruck

Race Report: Wicked Revival 50k

Yeah, I randomly ran a 50k this past weekend with basically no training. 

I signed up for this free "fatass" 50k a while back when I saw it posted on facebook and thought "sure, free race, why not... no big deal if I don't show up." (Note: a "fatass" race is the term for races that have minimal organization, no awards, no aid stations, basically all self-supported but there will be people there to loosely keep track of finishers and report results. Don't come at me, it's just the colloquial term used.🙃)

Spoiler alert: I didn't train for it, but I went and did the event anyway. 

I spent most of the week prior debating back and forth with myself, convincing myself whether it was a good idea or a bad idea (I swung both ways throughout the week). I finally decided I'd show up and do what I could, knowing I could DNF and I would have still gotten a good run for the day.

The event was at a mountain bike park in Gastonia, NC so I left Greenville early on Saturday morning, arrived in time to get my bib (which at first they couldn't locate but eventually found), get my chair and cooler and gear set up, then head to the start line. 

Started off conservatively, and also forced to be so because of the crowd of folks at the beginning. There were people doing the 50k (10 laps) and the 10-miler (3 laps) and all started at the same time. It was enjoyable to be around folks for a bit, make light chatter here and there as you went by, get into a grove behind someone for a while on the single-track where you couldn't pass. 

The second and third laps sped up a little bit without the crowds in front. Paused at the chair for a few gummies here and there but no major food. Started to get hungry on lap 4 and then regretted not stopping to get real food before lap 5. Finished 5 and paused for a bit, sat down, grabbed lunch food (sandwich, chips, maybe part of a beer), and then kept going. 

Path through field of daisies

the lake in the middle of the trail loop

Despite feeling better after taking in a good amount of food, the speed never really came back to the legs in the second half. The crowd had also thinned significantly so there were many times when I never passed another runner during a whole lap. I started listening to music on Lap 8, and that definitely lifted my spirits and resulted in probably a faster pace than I should have been running because after that lap I was completely toast. I did run into a friend on the trail (more like LEAPED over it because I saw it at the very last second).

Ended up grabbing a (very long) stick and shoving him off to the side of the trail so he didn't surprise any other runners. 

Finished the race in under 7h 30m total (somewhere around 7:23) and felt tired but not in terrible shape. Was definitely happy to sit down for a good while and enjoy post-race beverages with the small group that was still there watching the final finishers. 

Splitsssssss

Overall, really pleased with how this went given the serious lack of training/preparation, and it gives me confidence going into the summer with a few other races coming up on the schedule!