Day 291, 74 To Go

October 18, 2013

Oh glorious Friday, why have you forsaken me by taking so long to arrive!  Alas, now that you are here, I don't know what to do with myself!  My Honey is busy with party planning for my son Derek's 5th birthday party, and she has no time for me or to go out.  I must amuse myself with TV, rest, and endless diaper changes for my constantly screaming and pooping triplets.

I really have nothing exciting planned for this weekend, so I guess I will just take it easy, catch up on some reading and empty out my DVR.  This is both good and bad.  On the one hand, I could be traveling the globe, exploring all that this bountiful earth has to offer.  On the other hand, I'm tired and want to sit on my ass and rest.  Given the wherewithal, I would certainly choose the former, but reality has left me with the latter.  Oh well.

I do need to recover from a hard week, just as you need to recover from a long race.  Which brings me to #21 in the 22 Essential Pieces of Marathon Training Advice from Active.com.

Recover Well After the Race

Immediately after the race, take a contrast shower: Alternate between cold water and hot water on your legs—one minute hot, then one minute cold. Then, have a nice protein-rich meal and get a good night's sleep. The next day, you take the day off from running, right? Wrong. You've got to get moving the day after the marathon. Do something to get blood moving in your legs to facilitate the healing process. —Jay Johnson

I'm pretty sure I didn't follow any of these rules after my marathon.  Maybe the shower part, but other than that, I pretty much did everything wrong.  I didn't know.  Now, you don't have that excuse if you read the article linked above.  I was pretty burnt out after my marathon and since I was living in the Northeast at the time and the Marathon was in early November, it was easy to just take off a lot of time afterwards.  I couldn't ride my bike and it is damn cold at that time of the year and I didn't want to run outside.  So, I didn't.

Took me a while to get back into the swing of things.  One of the first pieces of advice this article gives is that you should go for a brisk walk or easy run the next day.  I could barely walk the next day!  If I had gone for a walk or run, I probably would have recovered faster.  

Here are my numbers for today:

Time: 30:00

Distance: 3.55 miles

Pace: 8:27/m

Max Pace: 6:37/m

Calories: 388

Avg HR: 138

Max HR: 154

I would have loved to run that fast for a marathon.  I have run faster for a half marathon, but those days seem to be behind me.  Seem...I haven't given up yet!  I have big plans for next year.  Big!  Stay tuned!

Run for Life!!