Weight gain, burnout and falling off of the wagon

63 days until the Prairie Fire Half Marathon????

130 pounds is a great running weight for me

Did you notice that I put question marks?  I honestly do not know if I will be running the Prairie Fire Half Marathon.  This is because August ALWAYS does a number on my running.  It mostly has to do with going back to school.  You would think that being an Elementary School Library Media Specialist would be a stress free job.  It isn't!  I truly need my summer break to re-coop from the previous year.  Summer brings staying up later, getting up early for running and usually an afternoon nap taken while watching Dr. Phil.  A couple of things have really hurt my running program the first of which is weight gain.  

Me with Winston and Helaine

Barbara shared Three Reasons why you are not losing weight while marathon training. on facebook this last week.  Describes me perfectly.  When I look back at this picture of me from 2006 (yes I was 8 years younger) I don't think I used food to comfort my soul.  When I am exhausted, I eat, I run less and I gain weight.  Another thing that this picture reminds me of was my "less is more" philosophy with regards to running.  When I trained for my first half marathon in the summer of 2006 I only ran 3 days a week.  I honestly think

A well deserved beer after Prairie Fire Fall 13.1

that running 4-5 days a week is too much for me.  I am going to take a look at the S2F training a adapt it to a three day a week program.  Here is how I did it in 2006.  You keep the distance of your long run on Saturdays and the other two days you run half the distance of the long run.  For example if your Saturday run is 11 miles you would run 5.5 miles on Tuesday and 5.5 miles on Thursdays.  I think this is what I am going to do but also add in track night.  I might not PR using this method but I think it is what I need to do to get past the burnout and falling off of the wagon.  My friend Helaine has a great attitude about races and training as sometimes life does not let you know until the last minute if you will be able to run a race.  I am becoming more like her and waiting sometimes until the last minute to sign up for a race.  She, like all of us have moments in our lives where sometimes running takes a back seat.  Just like Helaine when I have those times that I fall off of the wagon I come back as a stronger runner.  So what I missed a week of running?  Is is going to kill me that I missed Saturdays 10 mile run?  NO!  During my Dad's stay in Hospice and his eventual passing I missed close to 6 weeks of running in December of 2012.  I came back in spring of 2013 to run my fastest half marathon to date.  If you are burned out, it is OK maybe a little rest is what your body is craving.  When my listing my workouts for the next week I am still assuming that I will run Prairie Fire 13.1, but if I don't it is not that big of a deal.  Sometimes you don't need a race and just need to run for the beauty of it.  

Workouts for the week of 8/11-16

Goal for the week: concentrate on nutrition.

Tired of weighing 145 pounds

Monday: The Firm Weights DVD

Tuesday: 5.5 mile run AM, track night PM

Wednesday: The Firm Cardio/weights DVD

Thursday: AM 5.5 mile run with negative splits

Friday: The Firm weight training DVD

Saturday: 11 mile run in Haysville.  Who wants to join me?