tronning indochina: The North Face 50M: Week 7

Oops.? I am done with week 8, but gotta recap week 7 first!

Week 7 was a cutback week for me.? It worked out well because it coincided with a trip to my parents house for my sister in law?s baby shower (I am going to be an aunt!).? Plus, after 3 weeks of building my miles, my legs and body were ready for a down week.? I knew it was going to be hard to get as many trail miles in as I would like this week, but I did my best.

Week of September 10th

Monday
no running
1 hr yoga

I am still kind of struggling to find a natural way to fit in yoga and run.? Mondays are the day I like to do yoga, but?I am also?tired from the weekend?s long runs and usually I just want to sleep and not run!? This Monday in particular I was wiped out from the race the day before and knew I needed a day off of running.? Yoga felt so good though.? I figured, especially since it was a cutback week, that 2 rest days from running would work!

Tuesday
am: 8 mile road run
pm: 5 mile trail run

I met up with my running group at work for an 8 mile road run.?

8.0 miles/1:15:39/9:26 avg

After work I hit up the trails for a beautiful evening.? After the first mile, my legs felt bouncy and fresh and I had so much fun running around the trails.? It?s like the dirt gives?them life.? I saw a ton of deer that night (including a buck!) and a bunch of turkeys!

5.5 miles/54:30/9:51 avg/569? gain

Wednesday
11 mile road run

I met up with my early morning friend for 6+ miles, then tacked on a few more to get my mid-week double digit run done.? I did not feel great on this run, but got it done.?

10.5 miles/1:40:30/9:33 avg

Thursday
7 mile trail run

So happy to be on the trails with my friends!

7.0 miles/1:16:27/10:55 avg/896? gain

After work I loaded up the pups and drove down to my parents house, and got?there pretty late.? I had plans the next morning?to meet up with my friend Jessica to run a new route so I got to bed pretty quick after settling down from the drive.

Friday
16 mile trail/road run

I picked up Jess around 8am, happy to get to sleep in a little bit and excited for a new route.? It?s so nice getting to run somewhere where you don?t have to get up super early to beat the heat.? It was a standard foggy day in Santa Maria and we drove out to Pt. Sal, a little hidden local gem.

I hadn?t been there since I was a kid, but have very strong memories of hiking there with my dad and brother and getting run down by my yellow lab as I tried to run around a big rock at high tide.? It looked a lot different than it did in my memories, but it was still gorgeous.

We had to run up hill for?a couple miles, where we got above the fog for a little bit.

Then we had to run all the way back down to get to the beach.

Pretty much the only way you can get to this beach is on foot.? It was high tide so we couldn?t get around the points on either end, but after some rock scaling we made it down to the beach.

We ran on the sand (which proved to be kind of difficult) to the other end to check it out.? We also stopped to look at the tide pools (starfish!).

It took a few minutes to figure out how to get back up out of the beach, but we figured it out.? We ran back up and over the hill again and were back at our car around 12 miles.??We decided to just add the other 4 on by running on the road out and back instead of running all the way back up again.? The road portion?ended up being downhill and tailwind for the first 2 miles, which meant uphill headwind on the way back.? Wee!

16.0 miles/3:09:18/11:49 avg/2234? gain

Saturday
~11 mile road/trail run

Baby shower day!? We had to?leave for the shower?pretty early, so I got up and was out the door at 6.? I ran to meet Jess again and we hit up some local trails at the other end of town.? My garmin died .2 miles into this run, so I just had to let it go because I had no time to deal with it.? It was about 2.5 miles to Jess and 2.5 miles back, and we ran about 6 together.? I was gone for 2 hours, so I called it 11 for the day.?

~11 miles/~2 hours

The baby shower was in such a fun, beautiful setting out in San Luis Obispo, and it was a perfect day for it.? We spoiled Erika and my little nephew to bed, and it so fun to be there.