Ashley D /

Listen to Your Body When Training for 26.2

Happy Wednesday!! This week’s Marathons +Moderation post comes from a BRAND new marathoner!! This rockstar pushed through her first marathon just this month and therefore I was thrilled when she was willing to share her thoughts. I hope you all enjoy her post as much as I did! 

Hello, readers! My name is Kristin from Sassphalt Runner (@SassphaltRunner on Twitter) where I blog about my running experiences with a specific focus on believing in yourself. I’m excited to be participating in the “Marathons & Moderation” series as a newbie marathoner. Thank you for contacting me, Ashley!

First, let me start with a brief, somewhat sporadic running history for you. I ran in college for exercise and it wasn’t until 2005, well after I graduated, that I started entering local 5Ks. I was completely content with the occasional race and I left it at that.

My running came to somewhat of an abrupt stop around late 2007-2008 when I became increasingly exhausted.  In 2008 after a visit to my doctor I was diagnosed with thyroid disease. Correcting my abnormally low thyroid levels was key to me getting back on track (no pun intended).  Always listen to your body, friends!

This was an eye opener for me. Now that I was getting back to normal I started to believe in my capability again. In 2010, I made a pact with myself to run my first half marathon. I trained alone through a brutally warm summer. I educated myself on the do’s and don’ts of long distance running. And, most of all, I listened to my body and believed in what I once thought was the impossible.  On October 10th of that year I finished my very first half marathon in 2:12:45. I have now run a total of 4 half marathons and recently, the Rock n’ Roll New Orleans marathon on March 4th.

Never in a million years did I think I would be interested in running a marathon, let alone think I would be able to cover 26.2 miles. But, why WOULDN’T I run a marathon is what I really began asking myself in early 2011. I was healthy and fit and most importantly, I had the time.  By October 2011 I had shaved off 13 minutes from my slowest half marathon time. I could do this. I had the drive and the vision of me crossing that finish line at the end of 26.2 miles. So, here’s how I did it in moderation and here’s how YOU can do it, too!

1. Listen to your body (as I’ve already mentioned). If you are hurting, that’s clearly a sign. It’s ok to take a rest day. I took many of those over the course of my training. Some of those days I didn’t exercise at all and used the time to rest and foam roll. On other days I hopped on my bike trainer to loosen up my sore muscles.

2. Run to have fun. We place so much attention on our pace, splits, and finish times that I think we sometimes forget why we’re out there pounding the pavement day in and day out. Sometimes it’s ok to just run for the fun of it. Leave the GPS at home, tuck the headphones away and just enjoy the time you have to be outside. The term “junk miles” is thrown around a lot. In my opinion, I don’t think there is such a thing. We are all so lucky to have this incredible gift – the ability to run and be fit – let’s not forget it!

3. Find motivation wherever you can. For me, it’s in outlets such as Facebook, Twitter, my blog and my local running club. Runners are inherently supportive and I think that there’s an immediate bond that you don’t find in other sports. It doesn’t matter if you’ve run one marathon or 20, we can all learn from one another. Ask questions and don’t be shy.

4. Find a plan that works for you. I loosely followed the Jeff Galloway/Hal Higdon plans. When I say loosely, I mean it. While I am very goal-oriented and a big list checker, I’m not good with plans, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t be. I feel somewhat restricted by them and I’m apt to get upset if something gets in the way. I mostly run based on how I feel and I increase my mileage accordingly. I’m not sure that this is very advisable but it has kept me injury-free so I’ll be sticking with it.

5. Never, ever, ever give up. This is the most important of them all. You see, RnR NOLA was NOTHING like I expected and didn’t even come close to how I planned it. Running is kind of funny in that way since months and months of training come down to the span of a few hours. So, what DID go wrong you ask?

I tripped and fell…at mile 3.

There was nothing I could do about it but continue on. I was mad and upset at myself and yes, it took some time to get back into the proper mindset. But, I was there to finish – bloody knees, hands, and all. I was in pain but it was ok. I didn’t travel all that way to throw in the towel after three miles. I kept believing in myself and my training and knew there was nothing keeping me from that finish line. Nothing should stand in the way of your goals. If I learned anything from this first marathon (aside from the fact that I clearly cannot stand upright for 26.2 miles) it’s that I can persevere during the tough times. That’s what really made RnRNOLA memorable for me.

Enjoy every moment on your marathon journey and don’t be shy about showing that medal off to everyone – you earned it!

 

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Ashley D /

Getting Through Your First Marathon

Today’s Marathons+Moderation guest post comes from Abby, an inspirational runner and doctoral student. Abby loves sharing her fitness journey with others through personal training, run coaching, and her blog. She shares her workouts with readers while also inspiring even the busiest person, whether they live in Iowa or New York City, to just get out and move! If you’re a local New Yorker, you can find her at the Lululemon East 66th store inspiring others or tagging along with the run club in her spare time. I hope you enjoy this week’s installment as much as I do!

Hi there! I’m Abby from Run Stronger Every Day. I’m a personal trainer, run coach, lululemon Ambassador, 20+ year running veteran, and a doctoral student at NYU’s Steinhardt School for Physical Therapy. Ten years ago, I ran my first marathon in New York City with 30,000 of my closest friends and P. Diddy. Since then, I’ve run eight more in four difference cities and served as a guide for a blind marathon runner. I’m looking forward to hopefully running my best marathon this fall at the Marine Corps Marathon and love the challenge that every training season brings, but I’ve never forgot my first.

Without a doubt, I am always a little nervous (ok, more than a little) at every start line. Along the way, I have learned tricks and tools to get me through the hard miles and to the finish line.

#1. Know why you’re running. For yourself, for a charity, for a family member. Whatever the reason, it had better be a good one that will motivate you when you want to give up. I run for Team Fisher House because my husband was a Marine for ten years and it makes me feel like I’m helping in some small way. I remind myself who I am running for when the miles get hard and it never fails to get me through.

 

 #2. Train smart. Too much and you’ll risk injury. Too little and you may not make it through the big one. Get a coach or a trusted friend who knows their stuff to mentor you and follow your plan.

 #3. Test drive every aspect of your marathon: food, drink, clothes, gear, music, bathroom breaks, everything. Once you figure out what works, stick with it for race day. Practicing takes the guess work out of what to do on race day when you’re too nervous to think straight.

 #4. Tell everyone what you’re doing. You’d be surprised how motivating it is to have people as how training is going. Even better, they’ll be the ones cheering the loudest for you as you take to the road on marathon morning. And everyone needs cheerleaders!

#5. Have a post-marathon plan. A lot of runners experience depression after the marathon. You can avoid this by having something else to look forward to in the weeks and months after the race. A trip, a shorter race, a new goal to conquer, anything to keep you going after the big day.

If you are thinking about running your first marathon, do it now! There’s nothing like crossing the finish line at your first marathon; you will remember that feeling forever. Be smart, train hard, and have fun. Now go out and run!

What are your tips for getting through your first marathon?

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How to Survive Training for Your First Marathon

We are Teal & Beth from Life is a Run and we are thrilled to be featured in today’s Marathons+Moderation guest post.  Who knew our acquaintance type friendship back in 2006 would turn into running buddies?

Teal is a teacher whose desire to get back into shape like the girl she was in high school who was active in every sport propelled her back into running.  Beth is a paralegal who was never very good at organized sports and found her own success through running despite being on and off with it throughout the years. When Teal approached Beth about running a half marathon in 2010 little did we know that a seed was planted and Life is a Run would be birthed!  We are passionate about our running, staying in shape and trying to stay healthy while having fun at the same time!

 How marathon training worked for us

When we set out to run a marathon for the first time we really didn’t have any idea what it would really consist of except for the fact that we would of course be running.  We are also not sure exactly how we would handle the running and our busy lives.  Whatever we were going to do we knew we would figure it out and do it together. We set up a running schedule and worked around what we knew would be happening in our lives – Birthdays, dinners, weddings, vacations, all those things come up! Our biggest thing was making sure we could and would fit in our long runs around each of those things that come up. We planned months in advance and worked out all the kinks so that every long run would be done together. When we knew we wouldn’t be able to run together we would swap long run days to make it work so if there was one we couldn’t do together it would be one we could for sure make alone.  We copied our plan below so you can kind of see just what mess we had to deal with. 

 When the time came to run we planned! That is the best advice we can give. Grab your calendar, list of commitments and lay it out so there is no guess work involved. We ran our midweek runs typically by ourselves in the mornings and the long runs on the weekends. We cross trained as well. Many times runners think that the weightlifting aspect is not needed, but we 110% believe that it is. We both stayed consistent and trained at least twice a week with our trainers doing weight training and also spent numerous days in the yoga study. The balance is needed and your body craves it.

How To Survive Your Training

So you saw our schedule and here is how we made it through the training.

  1. Foam Roller: If you don’t have one, GET ONE and not only get one, use it! If you are not sure how, like we were, there are a ton of videos on Youtube about what to do and how to do it on everything from the IT band to calf, to lower back.

2.  Calf Sleeves and Compression Gear: Yes, you may look crazy, but it actually helps. We would typically wear our calf sleeves after long runs to sleep it or wear under our pants to work the next day.

Calf sleeves for the win!

         3.   Ice Baths and Icing: It is horrible at first, we are not going to lie but worth it! A few tips to make ice baths better – wear spandex, wear a sweatshirt, wear a hat and gloves, get in and do something to keep your mind off of it (i.e. catch up on blogs or tweets) and drink a hot drink! Whatever it takes for you to stay in there for 10 minutes. Icing is easier and really a bag of mixed veggies are the best because they form to your body.

4.  Stretching: Duh, do it. Yoga helps big time with this!

5. Rest: when you feel like you need it – do it!  Your training will suffer more if you don’t.

6. Have some wine: Yep, we mean it! Go out with your friends, drink a drink, laugh, have fun, and don’t get caught up so much in what you are doing that you don’t know your friends anymore.

Drinking with your training buddy is always a good choice!

Trust your training when you are out

So as you can see, we went in to our marathon confident that we had done everything we could. We trained and we did all of those things to not die and we were race ready. Race day approached in Dallas and we were fairly sure that we were going to have good weather. It had been dry but cold, and by dry we mean we were in a record setting draught dry. It hadn’t rained all year.  We tracked the weather like crazies and then we saw that it was calling for upper 30’s to 40’s and heavy rain.

We had both bought jackets that we honestly thought we would end up taking off and we had also read a blog about wearing a poncho in the rain and NOT taking it off.  We were very much prepared for light rain and cold but not for what we ended up with. The rain held out for the start but as soon as we made it to the start line it started to rain, not just a light mist but actual downpour. We maintained a very good pace and stayed close to the 4:15 pacer. We both felt great despite being wet and around mile 8 or 9 Teal had decided to take off her sopping wet gloves. Biggest mistake ever! By mile 13 she was so cold and shaking because she had lost feeling in her arm. Beth had a hat on and kept her gloves either on her hands or would put them in a pocket but never threw them away, which we think now made one of the biggest differences.  The only thing that really helped us was we knew that we could run. We trained up to 22 miles, we missed very few runs and we were in shape. We knew that our bodies could get us there it was just a matter of our minds staying with us. Smiling and cheering with the crowd really helps. Seeing familiar faces does too. We were lucky to have friends and family out there who would give us that boost when we didn’t feel like we could make it.pic

Our marathon was no were near what we wanted, expected, or trained for. Neither one of us had really done that many rains in the rain and especially not in the type of ran we got on marathon day. At the lake part of our course there was one point the raindrops were so big they hurt. It was freezing and you would pass people in medical tents completely out of it. It is hard to keep your muscles loose in that kind of cold and wet and we were tight. The only way out of it was to keep running and we did but nowhere near a pace we had hoped to complete our race in. Both of us had set a goal of a 4:15-4:20 finish for our first and ended up Beth at 4:29 and Teal at 4:40. While this doesn’t seem like much of a disappointment, the race in general kind of got to us. We had accomplished something many don’t do in horrible conditions and still finished very well. We will very much take what we learned from this race and try again at our next marathon.

Marathons are crazy and it is important to respect the distance and to not get caught up in what does not go right!

At points we couldn’t get our food open to eat.  Ask a volunteer to help you!

We had taken off our gloves. Do not completely throw them away! Stuff them in a pocket.

We both stepped in too many water puddles (yep, still makes a difference even when you are already wet), but we never took off our ponchos, we stayed on the course, and we finished.

There Is Always Marathon #2

Just the other day we saw someone say that you won’t be prepared for your second marathon until you have forgotten the first. Almost as if your body knows what is coming. We aren’t sure how we feel about the forgetting part but we are sure about learning from it!

What We Have Learned

  1. Things do not always go as planned and you have to be flexible
  2. Prepare for more than you think. We had listened to people say- you don’t need that, you don’t need this, etc and really no one knows what you need but you – listen to yourself!
  3. Like we said early, we just followed a plan and ran. We never altered our pace and we really didn’t do hill, tempo, or speed work. We have learned much more about these different types of runs and would very much suggest using something like the McMillian Calculator to help find your paces for the different types of runs. We have recently started altering pace, speed, and elevation and have already seen a difference in our endurance and strength.
  4. You HAVE to stay on top of your flexibility and stretching. Teal ended up developing Plantar Fasciitis at the end of training and it got worse after the marathon. Don’t ignore pains and stay on top of stretching even if you don’t want to.
  5. Be a part of the running community- use twitter, start a blog, get a running group, get a coach, get a partner. There is SO much information and support in the running community! It really has helped us learn as much as we have and it also helps with motivation.
  6. Track what you are doing! We use Runkeeper and Daily Mile. It is awesome to look back on tough weeks and too see how far you have come. It has also helped us to see how the types of runs mentioned in #3 have helped us.

 

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