Heartland Series Training, Week 9 (AKA maybe a comeback?)

So not only I am coming back from my injury, I am battling week 4 of this stupid coughing cold.  Here is how the week went down!  Sorry, get ready for lots of pictures of stella ella because I don't take my phone on the pool deck.

Monday:  Planned 1 hour in the pool.  I had a super light day at work, which was a good thing, because one of our old grad students dropped by with her family.  We ended up taking a long lunch and taking  her boys to the park to burn off some energy after lunch.  A new place opened up in Aggieville called PieFive and it was really yummy!  I can't wait to take my boys back to try it out.  Basically, if you haven't ever been, it is a subway for pizzas.  They build the pizzas while you go down a line, and then cook it super quick.  It was fresh and yummy, and I loved it.  Since I didn't get to the pool, post wearing the dogs out, and playing some baseball with the kiddo, I got on my bike trainer and did 30 minutes of intervals at an easy gear, and then did three rounds of strength.  Since I wanted a shorter strength training session this time, I just did 3 exercises x 3 rounds.  I tried to do an ab exercise, an arm exercise, and a shoulder exercise every round.  I was one pooped mommy post that work out.

Tuesday:  Planned 3 easy miles on the road.  This run was just kind of weird.  I didn't have pain per se, but my foot felt like it was just not 100%.  Like everything in my foot was trying to figure out what the hell was going on.  I also concentrated on my foot the entire 3 miles, which isn't good.  My running partner is battling some issues right now, so she wasn't with me to distract me.  It's really hard not to freak out about every little thing.  I certainly did not have any pain but it just felt off.   3 miles total

Stella was pretty stoked about our run.  While i have been getting my exercise on in the pool or on the bike, she hasn't gotten hers in other than catching the frisbee

Wednesday: Planned 1 hour in the pool.  I almost didn't get to go.  We are on spring break, so everyone's schedules are crazy.  I ended up finishing up my experiment, just in time to head over for the last hour that the pool was open.  I got to share the deep well with the Manhattan High School Diving team.  Was kind of fun watching these young ladies dive, instead of staring at the walls for an hour.  I did decide to try some intensity and do a pyramid workout that my coach had given me for the elliptical.  It was killer, and post jog I felt like jello.  I think the waves those girls were creating diving while I was running made it a perfect work out.  I should add that when I woke up this morning, my foot was sore, but no more sore than it has been.  That is my bench mark that has been given to me to know when I have hit too much.  If the pain is same or less, continue.  If it is worse, stop.  I am still kind of scared about this, but the good thing is, my foot was sore all over, not just in one spot.  Kind of like "hey you haven't used this in a while sore", even though I use my dang foot every day.

Thursday: Planned 4 easy miles on the road.  Of course, Kansas decided to blow it's wonderful spring winds gale force on the day I needed to get outside.  That and the fact that I still have this cold and cough (it's been four weeks now) didn't help my plight of testing my fitness and my foot.  Luckily my running partner was able to meet up with me and distract me, so I didn't think about my foot for an entire 4 mile stretch.  My biggest issue was my cough.  It had previously only been showing up at the end of my work outs, but today for whatever reason, it randomly showed up during the whole run.  I am trying allergy medication now, because I can't be coughing and hacking during a whole race, if I decide to run next weekend.  No one wants to hear that for sure!    I am happy to say that other than the coughing, my run was wonderful!!! No pain during or after. I can still tell my foot is adjusting, and I must add that I had another session with my bringer of pain that surely helped as well.  At this point, barring any issues next week, I am leaning towards running my first half marathon at a super slow pace.  4 miles total.

Friday:Planned 1 hour in the pool.  Again spring break so schedules were all over the place, so I didn't get to go. The good news is I hadn't had an off day really all week, so I decided that this would be the day.

Saturday: Planned 6 miles.  I had aspirations of heading out at 7 am with the group run from our local running store.  They were sponsoring a stunt puppy run complete with door prizes.  That didn't happen, as I slept through my alarm and even slept till 8 am, whoops:)  I decided to hit my normal running route, even though we had high winds and just gut it out.  My foot felt good the whole time, just a little sore in places, but nothing bad.  None of the injuries in my foot are hurting, but I am experiencing soreness from using it again in running.   I had decided to wear compression socks and that didn't feel great, as my foot still seems to not like compression.  Noted, I will wear compression sleeves on that leg for sure next time.

Sunday:  Planned 2 hours in the pool.  I was really dreading this work out to be honest.  I got in the pool and started running and had multiple visitors that made the 2 hours go by quickly.  I made the mistake of not bringing fuel and I am pretty sure I needed it after 1 hour.  Oh well, I learned.  The best part was that I run in the diving well and a dad and his daughter came in to dive.  She had not ever dived off of the diving board and for an hour I watched her try and get her courage up.  Finally she dove in and that was all she wrote!  She was so proud and we all gave her a standing ovation (or a floating ovation in my case).  She even got brave enough to jump off of the high dive.  She and her father were a great distraction to get me through this long run.  I hope I don't have to do many more of these but I am super lucky and thankful I have the opportunity to get to an indoor pool and use it to my advantage.

I still haven't made my mind up about Wicked.    I know I can do it at this point, but it is a matter of should I.  I am totally waiting till the night before to decide.  I am also trying to figure out what combo of drugs gets rid of this stupid cold.  My only symptom is a cough and it typically rears its ugly head first thing in the morning, when I try to lay down at night and when I run.  Overall, I am very, very thankful to do some pain free running this week.  I am looking forward to a few more runs next week to decide if I am running or not.  Decisions, decisions.

Total miles for the week 13 plus whatever I am getting in the pool.

I leave you with this picture (just to prove I do take pictures of other things than Stella).  We bought a bag of balloons for 2 bucks.  He pretty much played with, blew up,

and popped balloons all day sunday.  Best.Present.Ever.  Who knew?  

Have a great week!