Eat Rest Run Panic Repeat

The final week of training.  Tapering and relaxing should be key but I've had my odd panic attack!  I had all my last runs planned out this week but then I changed it.  Then I changed it again.  I checked out some schedules and spoke to some other marathoners, including my CRC friend Sarah who smashed her first marathon in an incredible 3.31 on Sunday, and I changed my plans again.  I was the instructor on the rota for spin both on Sunday and Monday, although I tried to keep my resistance low(ish) but also ran before and after each session.  I also realised I had ran or at least exercised every single day for weeks.  Panic.  Have I done too much?  Should I be doing less mileage?!  I decided to take a rest from running on Wednesday (although I did swim and take combat) and do my last 3 miles on Thursday.  But then some plans say to do 2-3 miles in race kit the day before.  Panic.  Should I do that?!  Answers on a postcard please.   

My reading this week of VLM magazine along with antibacterial handwash that has been applied every hour!

From the weather forecast London was set to be hot at 22 degrees for Sunday!  PANIC!  Although that seems to have calmed down to 17, still at least 10 degrees more than what we're used to so and with my history enough to make me panic! Vest or tshirt?  What should I pack?  Panic.  The bug and the cold is rife in my family and around town with a few relatives having projectile vomit episodes in the last few days.  Panic.  So my daily dose of vitamins has been upped again - not taking any chances!  Few wee niggles and pains in my legs, paranoia?  Panic.

I'm also extremely nervous about the book launch which just so happens to be the night before we travel to London - I've never been to one so not really sure what to expect, what to wear or what to say.  More panic.

Baked healthy oatbakes to keep occupied - oats, skimmed milk, dried fruit, sunflower seeds & mashed banana - yum.

However, all that panicking aside I am extremly excited.  Not just for the run itself but for the whole weekend.  I've got some of my closest family and friends coming to support me at the launch and the marathon so it will be a blast no matter what happens.  And I'm not actually as nervous or pressured as I was that very first time I attempted the marathon 3 years ago. Yes, I'll put it out there, I would LOVE to get a sub-4.  It would be my dream.  But hey, I understand that London may not be where it happens.  The heat, the congestion etc But I'm positive that I will do that one day, I will do another marathon (I hope).  

I am going to be sensible (honestly!) and re-evaluate my race strategy on the day - if I feel ill, sore, tired or it's hot then I'll go slower, take on more water and/or gels.  Getting a good time is a bonus, getting to the finish line is more important.  And even if that doesn't happen, it's not the end of the world - there will be other marathons, other races, other weekends away, that's what it's about.

05/04/2014	Breakfast	Snack	Lunch	Snack	Dinner
Sat	Pre - soreen.  Beetroot juice	Toast with pbutter + jam and tea (protein shake with blueberries)	Carrot & coriander hmade soup with bread.	Green tea.	Lovely meal at royal with besties - chicken tenders (grilled this time!) and pasta prima vera with chicken.  Eton mess.  Ate far too much but totes amazeballs
Exercise	12 miles easy		Horrible wet and windy day but enjoyed run with Joc and Katie.  Kept it completely flat and fought temptation to do more or hilly.
Sun	Green tea and yoghurt with raspberries		Toast & scrambled eggs.  Slice toast with pbutter and jam	Green tea.	Hmade tomato based chicken curry with rice & pitta.  Dessert pot - oats, manuka honey, raspberries, lf yoghurt & hazelnuts.  Tea and oatcakes
Exercise	Spin.  3 miles easy.  Core/kbells.  20 lengths swim		Horrible wet and windy morning but cleared up in pm.  Took it easy in spin and run.  Met up with the gang to plan London - woo hoo!  Went a lovely walk with Maz in evening as beautiful and needed to clear my head - getting stressed with launch and london anxiety!
Mon	Toast and activia yoghurt.  Vit water.	Green tea	Carrot & coriander hmade soup with bread.	2 ricecakes with nutella & banana. Green tea.	Baked salmon with lightest philli & basil.  Boiled potatoes, brocolli & beetroot.  Chia tea & special k biscuit.
Exercise	5.7 mile run inc 3 mile tempo at 8 m/m. 5 mins core. Spin.		It's taper but last speed session and lower mileage than usual - thanks Jen for keeping my pace up for tempo!  Took spin, hot and sweaty but I toned down the resistance and sprints.  Getting nervous - not sure what other runs I should do this week?!
Tue	Toast and activia yoghurt.  Vit water.	Oatcakes & green tea	Carrot & coriander hmade soup with bread.	Green tea & homemade oatbake (oats, banana, dried fruit, apple sauce & pumpkin seeds).	Thai chicken stir fry with mixed veg & egg noodles.  LF greek yoghurt.  Chai tea & special k biscuit.
Exercise	5 miles easy (45 mins)		After much deliberation I went out with club but just did 5 miles easy on my own.  Legs felt tight so actually happy to keep short.  Good rest day :-)
Wed	Toast and activia yoghurt with raspberries & chia seeds.  Vit water.	Green tea	Fresh tomato soup & tuna sandwich.  Tangerine.	Green tea & hmade oat bake.	Hmade shepherds pie with carrots & beetroot.  Chai tea & special k biscuit.
Exercise	32 lengths swim.  Combat/piloxing.		Nice day, wanted to run but resisted!  Productive day organising mokrun.  Slept in until after 8 - first time in ages! Swim was horrible - it was 34 degrees, felt like a hot bath :-(
Thu	Toast and activia yoghurt with raspberries & chia seeds.  Vit water.	Green tea	Fresh tomato soup & wmeal bread.	Green tea & hmade oat bake.	Plan - curry at book launch!
Exercise	Easy 3 miles		Last run before the marathon!  Travelling up to Glasgow for book launch tonight then heading down to London Friday am…. Nervous.  Excited.  Anxious.  Excited!!
Fri	?	?	?	?	?
Exercise	0!
Mileage	29

Tapering Paranoia

The tapering phase of marathon training has started and I have to admit that I am not enjoying it as much as I thought. The aim is to be well rested and ready for race day - decreasing the mileage but keeping up some speed sessions, adding in some threshold pace runs and tempos so that marathon pace will feel easier.  However, I couldn't resist adding in some extra miles this week. Hopefully that wasn't a mistake!  Next week with very little mileage is going to be a challenge!

With less mileage I also need to TRY to eat less.  Anyone that knows me or reads this will know that I LOVE my food and the extra miles during marathon training has allowed me extra calories but over the next 2 weeks I need to be careful I don't put on weight.  This week hasn't went without temptation - dining out, leaving dos and cakes all around.  I baked some 'healthy' carrot cake cupcakes for a little treat by substituting the sugar with stevia natural sweetener and no margarine.  The only 'bad' ingredient was in the icing - just a little icing sugar and flora light with some lightest philadelphia cheese with some vanilla, topped with a walnut.  It was a bit runny but tasted good.

Celebrating with the inlaws for Cammy's 30th birthday

The paranoia of illnesses and injuries has also started to plague me.... every second person seems to have the 'bug' or a cold and I'm starting to think I'm getting it, I hope not!  I even got my Dad to do a drug run for me this week... I ran out of echinacea and thankfully my sister and Dad came to the rescue delivering me some to work in a plastic bag for me to down - looked very shady!  Every niggle I'm petrified it's going to turn into an injury that will prevent me from running.  Every news story about London gets me scared about their pollution levels or humidity or temperature.  At this point I just need to just RELAX.  It's easier said than done, believe me.  After 4 months of hard training I would hate to not to even get to the start line.  

My novel, 'School Daze' is also getting launched next week - argh!!  I never thought my novel would get published!  Exciting but really quite anxious and a little embarrassed about it all.  I love to write and wrote it as part of my 'bucket list'.  It's a complete random chick-lit fiction book about 3 young teachers and their love lives aka easy beach reading.  It's nothing serious so don't expect to be riveted by intellectual plot lines but I hope that some people may read it for the light reading entertainment that it's meant to be.  If I had more time I would have given more effort to it (I'm not making excuses for it being poorly written honest!) but maybe my next one....   

I received more good news this week too that I'm going to be a Baton Bearer for the Commonwealth Games representing Argyll and Bute!  Eeek!  Exciting!  I'm going to have to persuade my Aunty Patsy to join me as she was nominated too at one point and as the Toon folk say 'Patsy is a legend'! ;-0

A huge GOOD LUCK must go to Sarah who is competing in the Manchester Marathon this Sunday, her first marathon!  She has done a power of training over the last few months, being one of the most improved runners in Campbeltown Running Club in recent years and I'm positive she's going to do brilliantly.  Go go go Sarah, we're all rooting for you!

Training and nutrition diary for the week - 

29/03/2014	Breakfast	Snack	Lunch	Snack	Dinner
Sat	Pre: 2 slices soreen, beetroot juice.	During: water, Post: Toast pbutter + jam, protein shake	Egg mayo sandwich & fresh tomato soup.	Jasmine tea & 'healthy' carrot cake cupcake	Sloppy joe nachos, chicken fajitas then my banoffie pie and ice cream. Yikes!
Exercise	16 miles, averaging 9.03.  Windy!		Despite wind and rain really enjoyed morning run with Joc and Katie.  Good day of housework, baking, visiting the neices and meeting Chantal & friends in Black Sheep at tea time.  Had a wonderful sports massage from Ali too :-)  Had dinner at Lindsay and Craig's - delicious!  So starving and ate late so overate completely tho - whoops.
Sun	Toast & green tea.	Healthy' carrot cake cupcake	Goats cheese salad, roast beef & trimmings.	Cappucino.	Veg & lentil spicy pot & bread. (& slice of Stu's pizza)  Hmade cheesecake & icecream.  Tea & dark choc.  Double whoops.
Exercise	5 miles easy (with 3 on grass)  12 mile cycle.  Walk on Bellochantuy beach.		CRC's first Junior X Country competition this morning on Meadows - went great, well done all!  Some fast enthusiastic runners, great to see.  Was very windy but sun was shining.  Clocks went back so got little sleep, knackered.  Mother's day - had a lovely lunch at Argyll Hotel, Bellochantuy with parents, sis, granny and aunty Patsy.  Disappointed there weren't any fresh veg or eggs left in the farm 'shop'.  Stu and I went a nice walk along the beach  - what a beautiful setting, doesn't get much better than that.
Mon	Porridge & banana	Alpen bar & green tea	Ryvita & cottage cheese.  Apple.  Tangerine.	Ricecakes pbutter & jam.  Jasmine tea.	Venison meatballs with spaghetti in a tomato & basil ragu.  Slice hmade garlic bread.  Special k biscuit.  Tea.  Oatcakes
Exercise	32 lengths swim in am.  6 miles easy with 5 strides.  Hard spin session #sweaty		Tired but legs felt OK.  Great catch up with Jen on run and at dinner.  CD player packed up during spin but just did a track twice to make up for it ;-)  Stu away on a course so a bit lonesome but dinner date with Jen and phonecalls to the girls made up for it.
Tue	Toast, vit c water & blueberries & nat yoghurt.	Alpen bar & green tea	1/2 Tuna sandwich & lentil soup.  Tangerine.	Ricecakes pbutter & jam.  Jasmine tea.	Red chicken thai curry with rice & 1/2 wmeal pitta.  Special k biscuit & chai tea.
Exercise	6.5 miles at club inc 3 miles tempo (7.50s)		Beautiful day, had a great run.  Too tempting not to run more!  Stu away so had Mairi up for dinner and a good catch up.  Baked a cheesecake for brother in law's bday too - so fattening and delicious, can't wait to have a slice ;-)
Wed	Blueberries with nat yoghurt.  Banana bread nakd bar.	Alpen bar & green tea	LF cottage cheese & ryvita.  Peach.  Tangerine.	Banana.  Ricecakes pbutter & jam.	Harbourview grille - Chicken tenders + salad, chicken & mushroom risotto.  Slice garlic bread.  Green tea.
Exercise	1 mile swim.  5 mile easy run.  Combat and piloxing.		Lovely morning but soon turned into a dreich afternoon in time for 5 mile run.  It was ok, no major pain.  Had surprisingly lots of energy for combat and piloxing still going down a storm - gloves order came :-) Huge rush to get ready for going out for dinner for Cammy's bday but had a lovely night with the inlaws, just missed hubby (don't tell him that).  Dinner was ok but not spectacular - everything seemed more 'fried' than before.
Thu	Blueberries with nat yoghurt.  Toast.  Vit water	Alpen bar & green tea	LF cottage cheese & ryvita.  Peach.  Tangerine.	Banana.	Chicken curry with rice & salad (& small portion of veg lasagne!) Green tea.  Alpen bar (70 cals)
Exercise	6.2 miles steady (53 mins)  Only did 0.5 mile at x country.		Starting to feel 'ill' - paranoid?!  Cue panic buying echiniccea, vitamins and drinking litres of water.  Felt good on run tho with Joc before Julie's leaving do and parent's eve.  Resisted temptation in pub and had a water with a green tea chaser ;-)
Fri	Porridge & banana	Green tea & alpen bar	Leftover chicken curry and rice.  Tangerine.	Chai tea.  Green tea.	Spicy prawn rigatoni with red onion and green peppers.  Oatcakes, choc biscuit and tea.
Exercise	Spin.  50 lengths swim.		Still thinking I'm getting cold/bug - I hope it's in my imagination!  Last day of school for the holidays - yay :-)
Mileage	40!!!