Sunday, December 6, 2015

Off-season Recap: Week Three

I know it's not related to running, but I would be remiss if I didn't start this post with the highlight of my week - Michigan State made it into the College Football Playoffs! 8 PM New Year's Eve with face off with Alabama, and I couldn't be more excited!


But back to my own sports (if you can call it that). This week went really well. I busted out the Zombies, Run and Nike Training Club apps to give myself a bit of structure. Zombies, Run is super fun! I'm always looking forward to my runs to find out the next part of the story. Are there any other immersive story apps like this? Because I want them all.

On the other hand, Nike Training Club totally kicked my butt! I wasn't expecting it to be easy, but I usually lay on the basement floor for a couple minutes after each one trying to catch my breath. Michael did a couple with me, and he agreed they were tough! I think it would be hard to do these during marathon training because they make me so sore, but they're great to build some strength for the off-season!

Sunday, November 29
Turkey Burner (South Chagrin Reservation), 5.3 mi

I drove about a half hour to the east side for this post-Thanksgiving hike. It was a beautiful day, and we hiked several different loops around the park, using the bridle trail to connect as needed. The only bummer was we didn't cover as much mileage as I hoped because of some pretty out-of-shape people that slowed down the hike. (I'm not trying to say at all they shouldn't have come out - I just wish they would've stayed in back with the sweeper volunteer, instead of hiking with the ranger and forcing her to slow down.)

Monday, November 30
Zombies, Run Season One, Mission One, 3.2 mi easy

What an action-packed intro! I was hooked on the app immediately.

Tuesday, December 1
NTC: Wipeout, 30 mins

This workout had a ton of arms, and mine felt like jelly at the end! I have to do this again this upcoming week, and I am scared!

Wednesday, December 2
Zombies, Run Season One, Mission Two, 2.9 mi easy

My legs were really sore from the day before, so it was nice to run for time instead of distance. (I know - who am I?!)

Thursday, December 3
NTC: Mean Machine, 45 mins

I roped Michael into doing this one with me, and I think we both felt liked Broken Machines at the end.

Friday, December 4
Zombies, Run Season One, Mission Three, 2.6 mi easy

I had a close encounter with some deer on this run. There is a long, narrow field that cuts through our subdivision where the power lines run, and a huge buck likes to hang out there with his two ladies. He's cantankerous at the best of times, and it's the tail end of rut right now. Luckily, my head lamp picked up their eye shine when they came bounding up, but I still waited almost a whole minute for the buck to cross. I'm glad I saw them, otherwise we would've been only a foot or two apart - scary!

Saturday, December 5
NTC: Circuit Challenge, 30 mins

This workout felt like the easiest out of all three I've tried so far, but it still got my HR way up! It was a good distraction waiting for the football game, however.

Run Miles: 8.7 mi
Hike Miles: 5.3 mi
Weights Time: 1:45
Total Time: 5:49

My total time was down a lot this week because I only devoted 30 minutes to being active each day, instead of 60, since I'm moving back to higher impact activities. I also hiked less, which makes up a lot of the total!

I'm really, really enjoying this break. It's also helped me discover how much cool hiking there is within 30 minutes of my house! Without even trying, I'm able to do a group hike for fitness at least once a weekend - and it's the winter season for programs! I love hiking, so I plan to incorporate it into my next training cycle. Everything I can find on the Internet says not to, but it makes me so happy, I'm going to find a way! (If you have any tips or ideas on how to do this, please let me know!)

We've also signed up for three marathons for 2016 - the Coastal Delaware Running Festival in April, Shires of Vermont in May, and Route 66 in November. We are planning to do White River in November as well, as a double with Route 66. It will be our first, and we're looking forward to it!

Northeast Ohio has also really lucked out with some very mild weather as of late, and it should continue. The lake isn't supposed to freeze for a long time because of El Nino, so once it gets below freezing, we're going to get more snow than normal, so I plan to enjoy this as long as I can!

4 comments:

  1. The Zombies,Run app sounds very intriguing! I may have to check it out. I'm also curious to know why it wouldn't be a good idea to hike, seems to be if you used it as cross training it wouldn't be the end of the world but I've done 0 research so don't trust my word lol. Hope you can figure out a plan to keep it in.

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    1. It seems like maybe people sometimes try to hike to replace the long run, which I get as being a problem. I couldn't find much other than that. Maybe hikers and runners just generally stick to their own sports?

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  2. I've heard about the zombies, run feature before and it sounds AWESOME! How does it work??!

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    1. You play "missions," and throughout the run, clips of the story will play, with the implication that as you run in real life, you are running between things happening in the story. You can also be chased by zombies, which you have to speed up to escape, but for some reason I haven't triggered any yet.

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