My first week of half marathon training didn’t feel much different than my last week of base building. It actually felt a bit easier in some ways, yet more challenging in others. Allow me to elaborate.
Since returning to running in mid-April, I’ve been incorporating running on three days per week. I’ve consciously avoided running on consecutive days which by default meant that I would only run three days in a given 7-day week.
I needed to be certain between running days that I did not have pain. Also, I had developed very tight calves and sore shins, which can be a sign of muscle weakness. It can also be a sign of tendon overload, so I needed the extra time between runs to treat these issues so they did not become an actual injury.
It’s taken a couple of months, but I finally have the shin pain under control, although I continue to monitor that area and perform exercises specifically for shins, feet and calves.
My half marathon training plan calls for running 4 days per week. So, I am incorporating an extra running day.
In this first week of training the overall volume was exactly the same as my previous 5 weeks of running on my own. I had been running 14 miles per week as follows:
Tuesday: 3 miles
Thursday: 4 miles
Saturday: 7 miles
In the first week of the “Get me to the Finish Line” half marathon plan my weekly mileage looked like this:
Monday: 3 miles
Wednesday: 3 miles
Thursday: 3 miles
Saturday: 5 miles
I was so pleased that I had no pain or residual niggles between my Wednesday and Thursday runs!
Strength Training
No master’s womens (AKA women over 40 years old) training plan would be complete without a strength training component. I do an upper body strength workout on Monday and a lower body workout on Thursday. Both workouts contain a bit of core work also.
I do what I can in these workouts but my time is very limited in the morning. Getting in just 20 minutes of work can be hard on some days.
On Sunday, I crosstrain. Lately, I’ve been getting some easy cardio in on the spin bike. This week I incorporated a suspension trainer (non-branded TRX system) into my warm up routine that I pulled from the Running Rewired 2nd Edition book.
Whew! Push up’s with your hands on a suspension strap is quite a different experience. I nearly fell flat on my face in the first rep! I went down without a problem, but as soon as I tried to push back up, my body kept going toward the floor! I put my knees down and caught myself before impact but I was humbled.
I backed off the range of motion for the next couple of reps until I got the feel for the motion. Oof! I think I’m going to feel that in the morning.
Energy Levels & Physical Health
At one point during the week I thought I was starting to come down with an illness. I had a very low grade fever (99.5) and I felt overall, just ill. I’m pretty good at warding off illness if it hasn’t taken a full hold yet. So, I kicked my self-care routine into high gear by drinking lots of lemon water, boosting my supplements and getting extra sleep.
By the time I woke up the next morning I was feeling better. The fever was gone and my energy had improved slightly. It was a rest day, so I did not have a workout that day.
By the time I ran the next morning, I was feeling much better.
I notice that when my blood pressure falls, I start to develop seemingly unrelated symptoms but my intuition tells me they are related. I am not a medical doctor or any type of medical professional, for that matter. However, I’ve been to my medical doctor for my low blood pressure and I’m told it’s low due to my healthy lifestyle.
Interesting that my healthy lifestyle leads to something that makes me feel so ill sometimes that I can’t perform the activities that make up my healthy lifestyle.
So far, I haven’t missed any workouts due to the low blood pressure. However, my workouts feel like they take a lot more effort to get through than they should.
As I mentioned earlier, I’ve been running 7 miles as my long run on the weekends for several weeks. However, this week’s 5 mile run felt hard and I welcomed the mini breaks I took to test my posture. I continue to monitor my blood pressure but medical doctors have assured me that if I’m not passing out or having “symptoms” then it’s nothing to be concerned about.
I feel like there must be other runners with similar issues. I’d love to find a specialist or practitioner to have as a guest on my podcast to talk about this topic. If for nothing else, my own personal interests. We hear so often about the dangers and challenges facing individuals with high blood pressure but I believe low blood pressure has an impact on many people as well but is not as well understood or properly considered.
In the meantime, I’ll continue to monitor my health markers and energy levels and take breaks when needed. Thankfully, I developed this training program with 2 complete rest days, so there is more opportunity to allow my body to recover between workouts and runs.