I didn’t post on Friday. The scale was up and I was pissed and just couldn’t even. I didn’t have anything to say, let alone anything positive or thoughtful. I know that I have a bad week after a good week. I know the fluctuations are normal. But I was pissed and I needed to be pissed and do some soul searching and get through it. And now I’m over it and I can talk about it. I’ve said for weeks that I need to change things up, and now I’m finally actually doing it. The universe has sent me some clear signs and I’m listening.
I’ve been doing the same thing as far as food since this whole endeavor started. It worked fine at first, but now it’s not working as well. And after the third podcast said that sometimes the answer is to up your calories, and I finally admitted to myself that I’m always hungry, and that balancing the current calorie load with my more intense workouts and runs is stressing me out I decided to take a step back and re-evaluate. So I’m going to trust my body and trust the process. I’m going to eat what sounds good and what I want. I’m still measuring my portions and recording it, but I’m making the point to make the decision and eat first, then enter into MFP later. I want to see what happens when I’m giving my body what it asks for instead of forcing it to stay within somewhat arbitrary constraints. I started this weekend, guess we’ll see what the scale says on Friday. I’m giving it a solid 2 weeks, if not a whole month. Might set me back, but I somehow doubt it.
Got new running shoes this week–my beloved New Balance Minimus are too hard to come by, so I’ve branched out to the New Balance Zante v2. LOVE. THEM. Glad I read reviews, they run small so I ordered up half a size and they’re perfect. More shoe than I’m used to, but they’re still super light and I think the little extra cushion is good for me at this stage in the game–my joints are thankful for the shock absorption.
Running is going spectacular. Still completely blown away at how I’m progressing. So happy. Did the Flyby 5k at Pittsburgh International Airport on Saturday with the goal of beating my PR. And I crushed it. Previous 5k PR was 35:30. Saturday I managed 34:12. My big goal is to get my 5k time under 30 minutes, hopefully next July if not before–which sounds like a lot of time, but I set the PR I just broke 3 years ago, cutting more than 4 minutes in less than a year is a big goal. Lots of work ahead of me, but I know I can do it. This was the first year for the Flyby and it was a great event. Well organized, lots of fun, nice shirt (wore it for my long run yesterday), and a medal (they had me at medal). Definitely an event I’d do again.
(This is my PR face)
With just about a month to go to the EQT Pittsburgh 10-miler I need to get my long runs back in order, so I went out for 10 miles yesterday. I’ve been using KT Tape on my IT bands for my long runs as of late and wondered if it was actually helping me physically or if it was a psychological thing. Found out yesterday it’s definitely helping my physically as I had forgotten to tape and was struggling by the 8 mile mark. Lesson learned. Got my 10 in though, and all things considered, the time wasn’t awful–2:15:30, especially since I walked the last two miles back to the car. Goal for the EQT race is under 2 hours. Still need some work but I feel like that’s totally doable at this point.
Happy Monday, friends. Make it a good week.