Whoops, I took a cutback week.

Monday: 10.5 mi, road
Tuesday: 6 mi, road
Wednesday: rest
Thursday: 7.1 mi, road (including Fartleks)
Friday: 6.2 mi, road + trail (Lester Park + Superior Street)
Saturday: 7.1 mi, treadmill
Sunday: 5.1 mi, treadmill
Total: 42 mi

I complained last week about my training and wished for a cutback week. My wish was granted, by me. It’s always great when that happens.

Monday I got drenched. It sprinkled a bit when I was about 6 miles in and then the final 2 miles the sky unloaded. Also there was lightning and thunder, which I really have to stop running in. I also got a side stitch at the end and had to slow down in the pouring rain. Sigh. My shoes were wet for like 5 days, because nothing dries here.

Tuesday I just dragged my butt through 6 miles on London Rd and salivated at the upcoming rest day. I wish I could do 2 rest days a week but I don’t have the time to spread those miles over the rest of the week.

Wednesday was great. I spent the evening with my grandparents and otherwise enjoying not running.

Thursday, I went out to Park Point and did some lovely unstructured fartleks. Unfortunately my legs were still tired and I was a bit frustrated by how slow my surges of speed were. I get that the point of training is to acquire some cumulative fatigue and my legs should be tired, but I still had emotions about it.

Friday I ran the ski trails at Lester Park. It’s a gorgeous area but so much of the trail system is ungroomed. All I could think about was ticksticksticksticksticks but fortunately I found none on me. I ran down Superior Street a ways in order to get in the mileage I wanted to for the day.

Saturday it rained and I ran on the treadmill and hated it. Sunday it rained kind of off and on, so my plan was to run a short treadmill run and then a medium length road run. I visited my grandparents again and then my dad stopped by to pick something up, so I got my treadmill run started mid-afternoon. I really didn’t want to do the second run, but I managed to get off my butt and get dressed and — remember when I said nothing dries? Even though I had put my running clothes in front of a fan to try to dry them off, once I had a cold, clammy sports bra and shorts on, I was done. So very, very done.

The bright side here is that 42 miles is still a decent week for me. 42 miles when I skipped a long run? That’s a long way from where I started. I’ve screwed up just about every other aspect of this training (diet, strength training, planning, etc.), but I’m pretty excited about how I’m getting in higher mileage week after week, and now a cutback week is what a normal week used to be.