I don’t know about where you live, but it has been an absolutely beautiful weekend here! The perfect fall weather.

I have officially made it to the end of week 14 of my training plan. This was a bit of a tough week, but I pushed through. It wasn’t an issue of my body not being into it was more of a mental thing. Has anyone else had those weeks when mentally you just couldn’t get it to click.

Before I get more in depth, here is a breakdown of my workouts and runs this week:

Monday (10/20)

8 miles easy

 

Tuesday (10/21)

1.5 mile warm up
6 x 1 mile repeats (400 recovery)
1 mile cool down

10 miles total

 

Wednesday (10/22)

7 miles easy

 

Thursday (10/23)

1 mile warm up
9 mile progressive tempo (3 miles at 8:06, 3 miles at 8:00, and 3 miles at 7:53)
1 mile cool down

11 miles total

 

Friday (10/24)

Off

 

Saturday (10/25)

8 miles easy

 

Sunday (10/26)

16 mile long run

 

I switched my long run to Sunday this week, so I’ll have to report that one back to you later next week! However, I can tell you this week was all about mind games.

 

Running has always been more of a mental sport to me. When I am mentally strong my runs go great, but when I have off weeks or other stressors going on it makes it hard for me to mentally handle runs sometimes.

Monday and Wednesday aren’t much to report on. When I have easy runs I simply put one foot in front of the other and just finish. I go as slow as I need to make it happen. I did have to break out my tights on Monday’s run, which was the first time in quite some time!

During my workout on Tuesday, I felt okay just had a lot on my mind and struggled to get into it. Thankfully since it was mile repeats it helped to keep interesting.

Thursday I KNEW that if I was going to make it mentally through my tempo I had to change things up. My husband helped me come up with the idea of the progressive tempo.

After my warm up I progressively changed it a bit faster every 3 miles. It was a simple thing that really helps me to stay mentally in the tempo run.

Friday came and I opened it with open arms. Saturday the weather was perfect. I knew I was doing my easy 8 that day so I just set out with no plan but to ENJOY it. Sometimes I think we forget that we just need to relax and enjoy it when we get into training.

8 miles that made me feel like I finally had my groove back! Some weeks are just off and you just have to learn to push through and make the most of it. Sometimes we have to come up with tricks to get us through it.

I spent a good amount of time rolling my pesky calf after my run and felt so much better. It was the reset that I really needed it.

I am keeping my hopes high that today’s 16 miles will go just as well!

 

I don’t think there is much point in going into my best and worst run of the week. It was just kind of an “OK” week though so far my best run was the Saturday run. Hoping I get my mind back into it next week!

 

How did your week go?

What do you do to help yourself mentally get into your workout?