10K – Check!

The day had come. My clothes were laid out and I had the bib I had made for myself, all set up with the pins and I was wide awake well before I felt like I needed to be at the gym. Losing an hour of sleep thanks to daylight savings time didn’t seem to affect me as I am usually up around 5ish but I figured I’d wait until closer to 7 to get started. It’s funny…I’m usually all nerves before a race. I am usually in a porta potty, standing in a porta potty line, coming out of a porta potty or looking for a porta potty in the hours before a race. But today, I was fine. And I tried my best to treat this a a race, as Jeff had suggested.

There was no one in the gym when I started out but Gary was awake when I was heading out and he wished me luck. I spent a few minutes warming up and doing the various stretches we did in yesterday’s training session and I took a few pictures. I really tried to treat it as a race…

I got started and immediately got into a pace I consider pretty steady and easy to maintain. I used a different treadmill than the one I’ve been using in my training since this one has a fan and it also has a virtual run to follow, which made the time go by a little faster or so I thought. I did listen to Jeff and taped a piece of paper over the pace and time markers so I wouldn’t get caught up in the numbers but by the time I had gotten bored from the virtual paths, I was at two miles.

I had four miles left…so I did what I could. I moved my way around, increasing the pace but not quite sure what it was exactly and I had no idea of the time, which was actually great for me mentally. I knew where I was distance wise but I ran as fast as I could manage and held back a bit when I felt I needed to. I was feeling a bit depleted just before I was getting to mile 5, feeling tired in my legs and doing more of a jog than a run but I knew there was no way I would stop short. That was when I pictured Aliza and I thought of her resilience and her strength and how she managed to be at so many races for her son, as sick as she was. I felt her with me in that moment and told myself I am doing this. I got myself back to that steadier pace and then I sprinted for the last half kilometer. 1:03:26 It was my fastest Jerusalem Marathon 10k (even if this one was virtual) and this one had a whole different meaning. I worked hard in my training and made it work in spite of a few weeks of traveling back and forth and the last few weeks had me doing my runs inside But I made it about something. I made it about something more than myself. And it turned out to be everything I could hope for and more!

One Week To Go

March 27 is getting closer…one week from now, if you want to be specific and then it’s 10k day!

With my three mile run done earlier this morning, I have one more run to go and it’s tapering time. Truth be told, this past week has been something of a taper as well, as my runs on Monday and Wednesday were back to three miles each after last week’s increase in mileage. My training sessions with Jeff this past week have been just as intense but not as focused on the lifting and a little more attentive to mobility and bodyweight strength.

As I go into this last week of training, I am feeling good about where I am headed. This training plan and all of these past several weeks have prepared my body to step on the treadmill next Friday and run the 10k distance, while also preparing me mentally and reminding me that I am not only capable of getting it done but also pushing myself a little harder to get it done beyond anything I could hope for.

A Change In Plans

I won’t be doing the Jerusalem Marathon 10k a week from Friday. The race has been postponed until mid April and the new date falls out at the same time I hope to be celebrating my twin grandchildren’s sixth birthday.

I will be doing my own 10k a week from Friday though. On the treadmill..in the gym…it will look and feel very different from the race experience I would have had if the race was still happening but I am still going for that 10k. I will be doing in memory of my dear friend Aliza Steinberg, who passed away a few months ago and I will also be honoring my mom as it’s her birthday and she has been recovering from a broken ankle and I want this run to send more healing vibes her way.

Am I disappointed about the race being postponed? For sure, yes. I have put in the training and I have worked hard to get myself ready for this race and I was really looking forward to showing up on race day after a three year hiatus. I could very well say to myself that this whole thing with training has been a waste but it was anything but that. Every single one of those runs and training sessions and walks meant something. I needed these last three months to work for something…and work really hard at it….to have something to focus on and make myself accountable. It wasn’t always easy to get the runs and workouts in…especially when I was traveling and especially these days, when an alert or siren can suddenly go off and interrupt my momentum. But I am here today..nine days away from March 27 and I am going to run a 10k and as I wrote earlier, it will look a lot different and it will feel a lot different but it will be just as meaningful and the accomplishment will be just as felt. I might not get a medal when I finish but I know there is a different kind of reward for showing up, for taking those first steps and for pushing until the finish.

A True Endurance Run

This morning, I did the last of my longer distance runs as part of my training plan. A long easy five mile run was what Dr. Jeff ordered and I readied myself up to get it done. I had my clothes laid out. I had a 60 minute endurance run workout from Peloton picked out. I did a bunch of stretches beforehand. My body was ready and my mind was ready.

The funny thing about the Peloton runs when you’re doing them on a different brand of treadmill is that you’re not necessarily in sync, data wise. I start the treadmill a few seconds before I start the workout and there’s always this one minute warmup that doesn’t get included in the workout itself. My watch didn’t start tracking right away and I could see that as I was getting into my run, there was a good quarter of a mile discrepancy that I would want to make up by the end of the run. The run itself was great. I figured that I could get five miles in within the hourlong run but I could move things along according to feel when I wanted to. I love Mariana Fernandez as a running coach and the hour went by pretty quickly. I stuck to the higher end of the pace targets and I just about made it to the full five miles according to the powers that be at Peloton. The treadmill however said something else.

5.37 miles. An hour and a minute and eight seconds. That is including that minute of warmup that didn’t get included in the 60 minute workout on Peloton but hey…I know that I put in the work. Of course, I started to say to myself…you’re already at 8.95 kilometers…maybe you should just go for the full 10 and say you did it. But I didn’t go for more. This run was about endurance and building the stamina to go the distance I was told to go (plus or minus .37 miles!) and getting myself ready to do the actual 10k distance in two weeks. I felt great when I was done…like I could actually go for that 1.05 kilometer but this morning’s run was the longest distance I’ve run in two months and I am celebrating it for what it was.

Another Checkmark On The Training Plan

This morning, I did a four mile all out effort run on the treadmill and it went really well, especially considering that I came up with the workout. A few minutes of warming up and then easing into a nice, moderate pace for my baseline and doing that every two minutes, followed by a 60 second speed burst. Not quite easy peasy lemon squeezey, as Jeff likes to say but it was very doable and it helped me get through the four miles in under forty minutes.

So I checked today off my training calendar and that race day date is getting closer and closer. Two weeks from this Friday. I start to wonder if it will really happen as we are currently experiencing a war and they are keeping crowds to a minimum, whether you’re inside or outside. I don’t know if this 10k is going to happen. I’m thinking that it will probably be pushed off to a later date but knowing my not so great luck with the marathon dates over the last few years, it will probably be postponed to a date when I’m not here.

I told Jeff yesterday that no matter what, I will be running a 10k on Friday, March 27. It might not be on the course that has been designated for the participants and it might be on the treadmill in our apartment complex gym but I am going to run that 10k. I am going to run for my friend, Aliza, who passed away a few months ago and in whose memory I am doing this run. I am going to run because I have been working long and hard in following this plan that Jeff put together to get me race ready. I am going to run because of how far I’ve come with feeling like I want to and I need to, rather than I have to. I could very well not run a 10k on March 27 but I truly want to do it because I can. I could very well not run a 10k on March 27 but I truly need to do it because right now, I need that run to focus on something other than all that is going on right now. There might be a starting line with a horn blowing away for us runners to start or it might be just me, showing up at the treadmill but no matter what, I am going to do this and I will have that checkmark all set with a few exclamation points to mark it!

Was It Trickery Or A Test?

Over the last few weeks, I have been interviewed on a few podcasts to share my fitness and running story and spread the word about my book. One of the questions I have been asked…and I’m sure, I will continue to be asked…is how did I get into running.

As the story goes, I shared a goal with Jeff at our very first meeting in July of 2014 when he asked me what was the one thing I wanted to do fitness wise, if I could. I said I would love to be able to run and then I shared all of the reasons why I couldn’t — I would undoubtedly trip and fall. I would look silly moving around as I run. I would look fat in my clothes. I would get into running and wind up breaking a hip or a knee. That conversation only lasted a few minutes and I never thought much of it but a few months later, I suddenly found myself adding a minute of a jog to my treadmill walking workouts that Jeff had me do as a part of our training session. And after a few months of my doing that and realizing I could run a ten minute mile pace without any issue, I heard those words — you need to sign up for a 5k.

Much of this journey has been about doing things that I thought were too hard or even impossible. Jeff would tell me to do a certain movement or exercise in our training session and I would look at him with wonder and amazement that he would even suggest such a thing. But then I would do that thing and wouldn’t you know it…it wasn’t so hard and it wasn’t so impossible. That first 5k. That first 10k. That first half marathon. The Spartans. Getting back into a swimming pool after decades of sitting on the sidelines. Conquering my fear of heights to run on the trails. I have sometimes said that Jeff tricked me into running or he snuck it in but when I really think about it, I realize that he set it up for me to do because he knew me better than I knew myself and he knew I had it in me to do it. Of course, I will still say he tricked me but it really was more of a test…a way of allowing me to come out of this fear and worry that I had about myself and my ability to accomplish something that was hard but also doable.

Sunday Mobility Day – Let’s Take Two

I’ve been following this great 10k training plan that Jeff wrote up for me to prepare for race day in less than three weeks and I thought I could say that I was following it 100%. I’ve been doing the runs and I’ve been doing the cross training and my virtual training sessions with him have been great. I’ve been pretty good about taking Saturday as my rest day and even when we were traveling, I made it a point to get a workout in, however I could.

This morning, I had finished my five mile easy long run which was on the plan for today and I was checking out the Peloton app to find a 15 minute bodyweight workout to do later for the strength part that is called for on the training plan. For some reason, I decided to take a peak at the calendar and noticed that it said ‘mobility’ and it had said ‘mobility’ on all of the previous Sundays of this periodization plan and it’s on there for the next few Sundays. I had been doing bodyweight strength workouts…and loving it, I might add…but that is a lot different from doing a mobility workout which is meant more for a recovery workout.

I found a whole slew of mobility workouts that I will be able to do over the next few Sundays so that I am doing this plan right but the truth is that I have no regrets about having done it ‘wrong.’ Those bodyweight workouts that I was doing ‘wrong’ were meant to activate the muscles and joints, get stronger without using any dumbbells and build up endurance. It certainly didn’t hurt to do the squats and lunges and core moves but after doing that mobility workouts this morning after a five mile run, I realize just why Jeff wanted me to do it. Mobility workouts help with movement and improves range of motion and while it isn’t as much of a calorie burner as a bodyweight workout, it helps me as a runner with getting rid of the tightness and focuses on the recovery part which is so important.

From ‘I Have To’ To ‘I Need To’

My running story really has been a journey. When I first started out, I just went out on a run and it felt effortless and uncomplicated and it felt great until it didn’t.

The ‘didn’t’ part came a few years into my journey. I suddenly found myself describing a run as something I had to do. I used to say that I had to run, which I hadn’t said in those early years. I had to run three or four miles or I had to go out for a run or I had to get my run in on the treadmill. I used the words ‘I had to,’ not even realizing what it meant. Looking back, I realize that there was a certain pressure I must have been putting on myself to do it or a certain expectation that I was putting on myself to get it done. Whenever I used those words before a run or about a run, that run, for some reason…unbeknownst to me at the time…ended up feeling not quite as good as my usual runs. There was a certain detachment in my focus and my drive but I wasn’t seeing it as it was happening.

About a year and a half ago, I had a conversation with Jeff where he pointed out how he noticed that I had lost my drive for running. I had had a hysterectomy earlier that year and coming back to running took time but when I was able to run again, I doubted my ability and lost that mojo, as we like to call it. To put it simply, I had gotten to a point where I lost all confidence in myself to just run and I put myself in this category where I was too slow or too tired to handle what used to come so naturally to me. Jeff encouraged me to ‘find her…’ that version of me who had the drive and motivation to run and to find the joy again. That conversation led me to go out for runs where I went according to feel and became more aware of what I was seeing and what I was feeling as I ran and to do everything I could to not think about my time or my pace. I learned how to appreciate the opportunity to run and I shifted my focus to a point where ‘I get to run.’

Things have been a bit stressful lately so when I am able to work out or to get a run in, I am all the more appreciative of that opportunity. I still feel that feeling that ‘I get to run’ but a lot of my runs lately have been about how ‘I need to run.’ I need the clarity I get when I run, whether it’s in a 45 minute interval run or a 30 minute tempo run or a four mile easy run. That time is precious and I am so much more grateful when I finish because that run provided me with the chance to detach myself from the real world and focus on the run as it’s happening and make myself and this ‘me time’ a priority. I have to run. I get to run. I need to run. It is sometimes something that is all encompassing at times yet something I have learned to use as stepping stones in this wonderful journey.

Running In The Rain

I went out on my run this morning, all layered up for a four and a half mile easy run I’d be doing in 43 degrees. After all of these years, I still don’t know exactly how to properly layer for a run but I did the best I could — long pants, a long sleeve quick dry shirt, a running jacket, a cap for my head and running gloves for my Raynauds ridden hands. From the time I had peeked at the forecast for this morning until I headed out the door, there was absolutely nothing mentioned about that layer that I would really need…rain protection!

Yes, it rained about two miles into my run. As someone who will opt for an indoor run when there is so much as a sprinkle predicted, I chose to embrace it on this particular run. There was nothing I could do about the rain. It was coming down (thankfully, as more of a drizzle) whether it had been expected or not. I had a four and a half mile run to do and I was going to get it done! I kept on running, feeling my clothes starting to feel a little bit damp but hey…it could be raining four weeks from today on race day and I can’t let that stop me. I tried to be a little more aware of my surroundings…a little more careful on the wet stony pavement and sidewalks.

Though I tried to stay focused with the music playing in my AirPods, I thought about an interview I did a few nights ago with Dr. Carrie Pagliano about my running story and upcoming book. She had asked me what got me into running and I shared how upon meeting Jeff, I had shared with him my one wish to be able to run and then told him all the reasons why I couldn’t — I would stumble and hurt myself. I would look like Phoebe from Friends when she took up running. I would mess up my knees and hips. I would look terrible in my clothes. I had so many reasons for not being able to run but when I went out on my very first run 12 years ago, I forgot all about those reasons…or were they excuses? And as I got more and more into running, I was afraid of running in the rain. Of getting soaked. Of slipping on wet pavement. Of I don’t know what else but there was always some excuse…some reason to opt against running in the rain. This morning, I ran in the rain and it wasn’t all that terrible. It was a bit drizzly and I noticed the drops as they went from being oh so light to a little more steady and I thought about my clothes and hat getting wet and then shrugged it off as I focused on the run and how I wasn’t all that afraid. I didn’t melt. I didn’t slip. I finished the run with something of a proud feeling..like, ‘hey I did that.’ I embraced the rain. I embraced my inner athlete. That’s what it’s really all about.

Back To The Original Programming

I have spent the past six or so weeks, traveling back and forth between Israel and Florida and back to Israel and a few short trips to Cleveland in between all of that, finishing it all off with a wonderful weekend spent in Los Angeles with lots of family for a bar mitzvah. When I had first mapped out my training plan in early January, I put a whole bunch of days in aster signs and bold letters, signaling those days when they seemed iffy with getting the workout or run done. There were lots of days spent traveling on airplanes and lots of days spent in Walt Disney World with my kids and grandchildren and somehow, I was able to check off each day.

Not every workout was as lengthy in time when I was on the go but I was able to find bodyweight workouts on Peloton that worked well with limited space and time. Most of my runs were done in the wee hours of the morning when I knew I had a full day ahead but I made them happen. All I can say is that I did the very best I could and I made it all work.

Training for a race is not a simple task. You’re dealing with differing weather conditions and you’re dealing with different circumstances that can make it challenging. I am grateful that I have something to hold me accountable and that I have a plan to get me ready to be as ready as I can on race day. With the challenges of traveling back and forth behind me, I can focus more on what lays ahead and embrace that inner athlete.