I woke up on Friday, anxious to see what it looked like outside, as I knew I'd heard freezing rain hit the windows all night long. Yep - Ice everywhere. At least 2" inches thick. And no, not snow, not mushy, fun, let's go play in the white stuff... Just pure layers of ice. Throughout the day we took a few breaks to slide down the driveway and the front yard on cardboard boxes, but there was no way we would be able to run. It was just too dangerous. Saturday rolled around and the temps ranged from 18 to 25. We woke up at sunrise, bundled up, and began our trek to the gym 1 mile away. The only negative to living in our neighborhood is that we are on top of a very high hill, and the only way to enter or exit is to use a very steep hill. We brought our cardboard boxes on our walk and slid down the hill, which worked great. The walk back was a little more challenging! The trip to and from the gym was our only time out of the house on Saturday. On Sunday, we bundled up, planning to make the 1 mile trek to our gym again (took us about 45 minutes the first day), but we only made it a block and half in over 20 minutes. The roads were super slick as the ice was covered in a thin layer of liquid. Lots of slipping and sliding. We carefully made our way back and waited until the afternoon to make the trek again. At 3:00 we set back out, this time with success getting there and returning home! Temps will drop below freezing again tonight so the roads will re-freeze, but I am hoping to be able to drive to the grocery store tomorrow afternoon. What a wild weekend!! If there is one thing we learned - We need to stock up on non-perishables and purchase a treadmill, haha!
Here are a few pictures and videos from our weekend!
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| Jake attempting to make a path in our driveway on Friday afternoon. |
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| Cars stuck on the hill entering our neighborhood... Four days after the ice storm. |
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| This is what we woke up to the first morning. It looks fun, but it's all ice! Here's a clip of us sliding down the steep hill. Here's a clip of us as we started our trek on Saturday. |
Sunday, December 8th
7M with 3M tempo. I had to do my tempo from last week today due to the ice storm. It actually worked out well because I still got in my long run (yesterday) and my full mileage last week. Four mile warm up was in 8:07 pace with 30" surges in the last mile. Three mile tempo was 6:31, 6:27, 6:19. It felt surprisingly very good and I was so thankful! I have a lot of aches and pains right now that a bit unsettling to me, but I am thankful for how my fitness levels have been progressing. My workouts have all gone well and my mileage is slowly but surely increasing.
Monday, December 9th
Rest day
Tuesday, December 10th
8M with 4x1M @ 6:20 pace, 400m jog recovery. I waited until 5 to run because that was going to be the warmest and least windy out of my options of 6am, noon, and 5pm. It ended up being low 30's, but thankfully low wind. Regardless, I now know I have some serious winter gear shopping to do. This time I actually "prepared" and wore tights + sweatpants and 4 long sleeve tops to warm up, then stripped to two long sleeve tops and tights to workout in. Even with all the layers I still FROZE! My fingers, legs, and arms were not happy with me at all. Anyways, first mile was 95's every lap for 6:20 even. On each 400 recovery, I slipped on my zip up jacket and ran a bit quicker than last time just to minimize my chances of getting cold. Next three miles were 6:17, 6:15, 6:10 (?) for a 6:15 average. I'm really guessing on the fourth mile. The first lap was 90" and felt so easy that I decided not to look again until I finished. I actually "kicked" the last 200 of it and was pumped to see my time, but the watch had gotten messed up. By the time I figured it out and got it fixed and back to the timer screen, it was already up to 6:20. I would be shocked if this was slower than 6:10 though, so that's where I'm pegging it. Another sub-par winter workout though, in my opinion. This week and last week both. I hit my goal times both weeks, but felt so miserable from the cold that I don't feel like I ran to my fitness level in either one.*Side note for the day is feet pain.Bottom outer portion of left foot, and top of right foot, similar to where the 2011 stress fractures were.
Wednesday, December 11th
7M easy. I'm not exactly sure that I got in the full seven miles today, but I do know that it was very close and my HR averaged 163. I'm calling it a mission accomplished. Super bad pain in my shins (particularly one spot on the left leg), so hoping it was just a weather and unstable surface thing. Wasn't beat up or fatigued before or during the run at all, but this afternoon and evening I've felt rather run down.
Thursday, December 12th
7M, 6 strides. I ran the same loop as yesterday and the mud has gotten worse (probably due to people like me running on it). I had to step onto the banked grass along the path at several points, which got old after the first few loops, haha. This run seemed to go by much quicker than yesterdays. I also allowed myself to let my HR go a little higher as well. I still tried to keep it very under control, but I let it sneak into the lower 170's. My left shin and the outside of the foot weren't as bad on the trail today, though they were a bit more noticeable when doing strides on the pavement. I've also got to roll and take care of my right hip. For some reason it got really tight on this run. The strides were nice though.. I felt very strong and quick on them.
Friday, December 13th
7M with 5 alt miles (6:30-6:45/ 7:00-7:15). Youch! So many pains this week! :( I've got pains in both feet (different places in each), my shins, and my right hip/hip flexor. What a mess! Aside from that, however, this was a picture-perfect workout. First mile was 6:31 and felt great. Followed it with a 6:56 mile just cruising. Next up, dropped it back to 6:28 - This was my best mile of the whole run... completely even paced, start to finish. Followed that with 6:53, still feeling good. Lastly, brought it in with a 6:21 mile. Averaged 6:38 pace for the five miles and felt great doing it. I really liked having the moderate miles in between the tempo miles. Kept the run nice and easy mentally.
Saturday, December 14th
4M, 6 strides. Nothing exciting to report. Trotted through my four mile shakeout on the grass/turf inside the SMU track. Went through a (very) short set of drills and then knocked out my six strides with the wind at my back. I felt very uncoordinated, choppy, and out of balance on the strides. I'm wondering if maybe I'm out of alignment and that is contributing to the strong hip/hip flexor pain on my right side.
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