Big Sur Marathon Training--Week 0

This week, I wrapped up my base building workouts and today I officially kicked off my marathon training for the Big Sur International Marathon. I didn't know what else to call the week before marathon training starts, so week 0 it is.

Like I did for Chicago, for Big Sur, I'm following a 12 week training plan. While Becky didn't develop this exact plan for me, I followed the plan she made for Chicago and tweaked it a bit. I reviewed my training plan with her, and made some adjustments based on her feedback. Right now, I'm feeling fairly confident that I've got a solid plan that will get me to the finish line intact.

That is if my plantar fasciitis behaves itself. I've gotten a ton of advice from everyone including my dad, who eventually became so frustrated when he had PF, he finally took a mallet to his heel. While that somewhat extreme solution worked well for him, I'm not so sure I want to try it on myself. Not that he hasn't offered to do it for me. What has seemed to work for me is the night splint aka my faux Strassberg sock, my Feetures compression sleeve (affiliate link), heel lifting, calf stretching, heat in the morning, and wearing shoes to work with a low (not flat) heel. I tried orthotics, but all they did was make me feel like I was 80 years old. Experiment=fail. I didn't like feeling old. I took the orthotics out of my running shoes and that's that. I'll use them in my work shoes for now.

So how did week 0 aka base building go down? Besides lots of yoga? The SweatPink #FlexandFlow yoga challenge continues, and I haven't missed a day! The challenge wraps up on February 5, and while I'll miss posting daily yoga poses, it's time to focus on the task at hand: the Big Sur Marathon. But you know there will still be yoga happening for me. I just won't bombard you with all my poses.

Monday: yoga class at the studio. This was an amazing class with one of my favorite instructors. She devoted the class to the full moon and we did moon salutations. She also introduced me to my new mantra, "Chill out or Burn out". Repeat as needed. Which I did all week.

Pose of the day was one legged chaturanga

Tuesday: 4.55 miles easy in the hood. I was glad to be done. It was blustery and cold. 8:45m/m.

Pose of the day: Upward facing dog

Wednesday: Mile repeats x4 on the treadmill. Last week I struggled with pacing, but this week was much better. I'm pretty sure my treadmill needs to be calibrated, because my splits were slower than I expected. I chose to focus on consistency and not pacing. Splits were 8:24, 8:16, 8:16, 8:34 (oops!). After I finished, I went to yoga for another studio class. The theme was hips and hamstrings. Perfect.

Yogi's choice inversion--I chose handstand at the wall. I used superphoto to edit this. My face kind of freaks me out. I look like a cyborg.

Thursday: Cycling x 1 hour. Thanks to the magic of YouTube, I rode in Thailand. I promised Becky these rides would be all about endurance and this one pretty much was. There were a few "harder" efforts but nothing too taxing. The video itself was kind of a turd. The cyclist would randomly stop to wait for his friend to catch up. Meanwhile, I'm pedaling away, just staring at his tire. This happened several times. Dude, ever heard of hitting the pause button? Guess I got what I paid for. This really was the first video that disappointed me. Looks like it's back to Italy this week. Anyways, I rode 13.75 miles/1h.

Pose of the day was lizard lunge. Felt great after riding. My ITB thanked me.

After that, I went to see Becky. She had me do some work on the GHD machine, reverse back extensions and traditional back extensions. Holy hamstrings! I did barbell cleans into a front squat followed by deadlifts, both with increasing weights. We finished up with some more hamstring exercises. And my foam roller got some attention that night.

Friday: rest. Pose of the day was tripod headstand. I have never done this version of headstand, and I had a nice surprise! You just never know what you are capable of, do you? What a great way to head into a long day at work. Pun completely unintended!

I was going to stay in half tripod, but my legs went up!

Saturday: 4 miles easy in the 'hood. The January thaw felt great! 8:45 m/m.

Pose of the day was humble warrior. I just love this pose.

Sunday: 8 mile "long run". This was my first long run since I ran that half marathon in November. It was 50 degrees, which felt great for January. Unfortunately, it was pretty gloomy out there. My foot felt pretty good most of the time but started to hurt towards the end. When I looked at my Garmin, it read 6.66 miles. Coincidence? I think not. Anyways, I finished up and stretched it out. 8:45m/mile

Pose of the day was reclined hero pose. This is a great hip opener and quad stretch. Take it slow. And yes, my eyes are closed. A moment of quiet for me in the middle of a run. Reflecting on how great this pose feels and gratitude for my body that lets me do hard things.

It's been a pretty good week off the road too. Uneventful for the most part. How about you? Any of you yogis ever done moon salutation? Anyone else doing the SweatPink #flexandflow yoga challenge? It's the final week!

I'm linking up with Holly and Tricia for their Weekly Wrap! Check out what everyone else has been up to!