Shifting Focus

11/19/2014 by She's Going the Distance 12 Comments

Monday: 45min upper body

Tuesday: 5.6m “race pace” workout

(^ Race Pace progression workout. 1 mile warm up 9:05, 1 mile marathon pace 8:45, 1 mile half marathon pace 7:35, 1 mile 10k pace 7:08, 1 mile 5k pace 6:40, half mile cool down. Very fun workout I pulled from a RW magazine. Very interesting to feel pacing for different distances.)

I still haven’t picked out any races, but i can say that I’ve enjoyed taking the stress out of running right now. There’s always pressure to preform well during a race, especially to hit time goals. I might run a 5k for fun this winter, but honestly i’m ready to put in the time to cross-train and build mileage to set up for a healthy spring. Winter is all about maintaining…and pumpkin pie.

I would love/like/hope/willsitonsantaslapandaskfor a sub-20 5k and a 1:30 half marathon next year. Hitting these goals in the past has been difficult since I’m constantly training for several races at a time. Just because we “run” doesn’t mean we can run well at each distance. I think somewhere along the lines of blogging and personal expectations we forget that the 5k, 10k, half and full are completely different races with different training cycles.

The Chicago Marathon was the kick in the grass I needed to realize that if I want to qualify for Boston and run a marathon 15 minutes faster in the upcoming years, I need to solely focus on marathon specific training. Elite runners don’t run every distance well, how am I supposed to? LIke I said, I think we get caught up in seeing everyone on Instagram or blogs and think we can do it all. Chances are we can’t, especially when running isn’t our full time job.

little baby deer from my run Sunday

I’m not trying to be a downer here, just trying to remind myself to take one race distance at a time and put the effort toward one goal at a time. If I want magic to happen and goals to be met in 2015, I need to focus on one thing at a time.

this guy crossed right in front of me

So far, and this can change on a whim i’m sure—I’d like to focus on my 5k goal in the spring and the half goal in the fall. That way I’m not squeezing several goals into 2-3 months just to buy into a race. The 5k will be a different type of training for sure, but I can take a few go’s at it since recovery is faster. Then after my normal June low-mileage month, I can focus on 1-2 fall half marathons, again to have more than one shot to hit my time goal.