Weekly Running Recap

First off, Happy Halloween!!!  This past week was a decent running week post half.  I can't believe it's only been a week!  I've been so excited about running and training this week and I think it shows in ALL of my runs this week.  I've even started looking at runs for next year and have started putting runs I hope to register for in the 2012 part of my "Races" tab.

Weekly Mileage:
M- rest (at home squats/floor workout)
T- 4 miles
W- 1 mile warm-up run + weights/floor workout w/Katie
Th- rest
F- 5 miles
S- rest
Su- 6 miles (meant to do 10... then ran out of time)
Total miles: 16


Not as many miles as I wanted for this week, but they were three solid runs that I'm very proud of... So, I'm going to quickly talk about them.  My main goal after the half is to finish my runs stronger, and I'm proud to say that ALL of my runs this week finished with a faster mile than they started.  Big improvement for me already!

Tuesday (4):  My calves were still really tight from the half, but I decided to run up to campus and check out Mirror Lake and the Oval.  After starting, my goal was a sub-12 pace, and (even with a few walk/stretch-my-calves breaks) I pushed myself and got a 11:51 pace overall.  Woo!

Friday (5):  Didn't want to run at all.  Jon and I stayed in our PJs until far past a socially acceptable time, but I got out there, and I'm really, really thankful I did.  I started out with a quick(er) pace and felt really good, so I headed to the Olentangy Trail and dared myself to keep up this good 11:16 pace for the whole run, rather than tiring myself out and slowing down like I usually do.  It was hard, but I pushed myself and was ASTONISHED to see that my overall pace was 10:56, with my last mile in 10:31.  I checked back in my Garmin logs and I've never run ANY distance with a sub-11 pace.  I actually might have teared up a bit when I realized that.  Puh-ro-gress.  Felt AMAZING.

Sunday (6):  I had a fun 9.5 mile loop planned out, but then got nervous about not having anywhere to use a potty mid-run and hadn't had the necessary trip pre-run yet, so Jon and I decided to drink some coffee and clean the apartment for the Mary Kay party I had today BEFORE leaving for the run rather than after.  It took a bit longer than expected to get everything clean, but we got out there and ended up having to cut the run short to make it home in time.  That said, it was great running with Jon on this beautiful day and he really pushed me to stay fast.  The pace overall was 11:34, but we stopped to take these photos of the gorgeousness here in Columbus (which brought our pace down):

He pushed me and I often looked down at Mr. Garmin and saw a 10-minute (or even high 9:xx) pace on my current pace!  The last two miles were 10:57 and 10:47, so I am really proud of this run, and, most importantly, I got to spend some quality time finding new places to run with my honey.  ;)

Oh, and we also got home in time to shower and look presentable so that I could host a Mary Kay party for my friend Chris, who's a new consultant:

Doesn't she look official?  

I stole this photo from Bailey since I'm lame and forgot to take one.

(And my baker's rack needs some organizational love)

All-in-all, a really great running week post-half.  Instead of beating myself up over my short "long" run, I'm choosing instead to really celebrate how much I was able to push myself on ALL of my runs this week.  Can't wait to see what the next week of training brings!  Plus, it looks like we might have TWO 5ks in November, so maybe I'll even be able to set a PR!

Have a great Monday!!!

PS- Have any of you seen that new TV series on ABC "Once Upon A Time"?  Jon and I started watching it this weekend and we're hooked!