If you’re new here, welcome to Run the Shoes, a newsletter about the simple pleasure of running.
Usually I send one newsletter a month, but in June, I plan to send a few more. Why? Because June is the month of the big ol’ marathon I’ve been training for, Grandma’s Marathon in the great state of Minnesota. (!!!! I’m so excited to see Minnesota !!!!) Instead of a monthly recap, I’m going to publish a series of three newsletters approaching the marathon from three angles: before, during, and after. Today’s is the “before,” where I’ll talk about my peak week of training. The “during” will be more of an “immediate before”; I’ll write it a few days before the marathon when all of my training is done and I’m just sitting on my butt, wearing compression sleeves and eating bagels (sneak peak: the subject of that newsletter will be carb-loading.) The “after” will be a race recap. My goal with this series is to not just give you a glimpse into my training but to share insights that you can apply to whatever you’re training for, in running or in life.
So let’s get to the BEFORE!
I’m at the point of marathon training where I’m feeling very burnt out. Last week marked four weeks out from race day and was my peak week, which is what it sounds like: the week when one’s marathon training peaks. I clocked the most miles of the build, had the hardest workouts, and ran my longest run. Whenever peak week comes around, I prioritize running a touch more than I usually do. Peak week is a mindset, and I envision a set of controls in my brain where I switch “running” to the highest setting. Some examples of how that plays out: I don’t procrastinate getting my runs done, I work from home as many days as I can, I try to go to bed as early as I can. Peak week is really just a series of micro decisions that enable me to approach each run with 100% effort.
Here’s a recap of how it went:
Monday: Rest day. I was supposed to cross train today but it was Memorial Day and the logistics were too complicated since I no longer belong to a gym and I didn’t have childcare help because my mom/my parents’ Peloton was out of commission due to a pink eye outbreak in our family. Yada, yada. Cross-training is a hard pill to swallow.
Tuesday: 8 miles easy with 4x20 second strides. This is the run that usually gets pushed to the end of the day/skipped altogether because I go to the office on Tuesdays. I worked from home today and ran during the time I’d otherwise be getting ready/commuting/buying a $7 coffee drink.
Wednesday: 12 miles with 4x2 mile intervals at ~10ish seconds faster than marathon pace with .25 mile jog between. I don’t really have any words for this because it was so hard.
Thursday: Planned rest day, yay.
Friday: 8 miles with 5x1k at 10k pace with .25 mile jog between. Since I have summer Fridays, I turned this one into an adventure by taking the subway to the track when I got off work at 1 pm, running in the dead middle of a hot day (#heattraining), and then going to a plant nursery in Harlem and riding the subway home with two giant planters and a bag of soil. I was tired.
Saturday: 6 miles easy. I usually take the baby in the jogging stroller for my Saturday run but she’s been hit-or-miss with it lately, so I went during her morning nap.
Sunday: 20 miles. Woof. My husband and my mom split the childcare duties for this one. Twenty milers are so brutal. I listened to a 3-hour podcast about the history of Hermès. Pretty intéressant.
All in all, a good peak week. I did all my runs and hit all the paces, and I didn’t have any bathroom emergencies (always a win). The mid-week 12-mile run really took it out of me, physically and mentally. I usually listen to music during my speed workouts but in an effort to mimic race day conditions, I didn’t listen to anything during the intervals. I try to think about people who I hate when I’m running at a hard effort and let that hatred fuel me, so I thought about some old bosses and coworkers. Kinda never fails.
Before we part ways, you should know that I really didn’t want to do the 20-miler. As I wrote about last month, it’s not just the long run itself that takes up time, but the mental prep before and the physical exhaustion after. (I literally lied on the floor while the baby played around me on Sunday afternoon.) Not to sound like a Peloton instructor, but something I remind myself of when marathon training just feels so hard and tiring is that it is SUCH A PRIVILEGE to be able to move your body. This time last year I was 39 weeks pregnant and it took me all day to walk 3.5 miles, but now I can run 20 in a morning. Crazy. Quick screenshot below of my “running” log this time last year; it felt important to keep up the guise of training.
That’s all for today. See you in two weeks.
Elaheh
Solid week! Enjoy your taper!
This is great Elaheh but next time you talk about hate-fuel NAME NAMES.