This week of training was a little bit different and I definitely didn't follow the schedule since I had a half marathon at the end of the week. In order to make sure I was ready to go for the race, I took a few extra rest days and moved the days of certain workouts around. In the end whatever I did worked because I ended up having a really great race.

My Training So Far:

Week One
Week Two
Week Three

Week Four:

Monday: 8 x hills

I'm really starting to value the hill training I've been doing. It paid off big time in the half marathon. The first half the course was rolling and there were some serious hills toward the end of the course that didn't feel that bad to me, and I can only credit that to the hill work I've been doing.

Tuesday: Unplanned Rest Day

My legs were insanely tight and sore and were pretty much begging for a rest day.

Wednesday: Quasi-planned Rest Day

I debated for a while if I wanted to run on Wednesday or not. My legs were still really sore, but I felt guilty for taking another rest day when I was supposed to be training. In the end though, I pushed the guilt aside and spent some time stretching and foam rolling to help loosen things up.

Thursday: 3 miles

I could tell my legs appreciated the rest days. They were still a bit tight, but started to loosen up about half way through the run.

Friday: Planned Rest Day

Normally Fridays are my long run day, but since I had the race coming up, I bumped my long run to Sunday.

Saturday: Tailgate and then sick on the sofa

I got sick Friday night with a fever and a headache. I was a miserable shivering mess buried under about 15 blankets in my bed and still couldn't get warm. By Saturday morning I felt a little better, so I went to the tailgate to hang out with my friends, but skipped the football game to come home and spend the rest of the day in sweats on the sofa eating the chicken noodle soup one of my friends brought over.


Sunday: Half Marathon and Football



Despite getting over sickness and not being trained for this race at all, I completely kicked butt and smoked my PR. I'm hoping this means great things for Philly if I stay on top of my training. Playing football an hour after crossing the finish line of a half marathon was actually easier than I thought it would be. My legs were tight and sore, but I felt really good after the race and I think moving around playing football helped flush some of the lactic acid out.

Total Mileage: 18.1-ish. I never remember to calculate the mileage on my hill workouts.


Goals for Week Five:

• Recover well from the race
• Attack the rest of training with a renewed vigor.