And so it begins

After the end of October, I decided to take a month or so break. I took two weeks completely off, and then ran "when I felt like it" which ended up making my two weeks off into about 4 weeks off. Yeah. Apparently, I didn't feel like running at all. This is basically the reason why I have a coach - if it was left up to me, I would be a lot less diligent about my training.

The time off was nice though, and with the time change, it was nice not to have to go out running in the dark by myself. I ran some Saturdays and Sundays, but nothing substantial...so I guess I did do a little bit of running. After 11 months of basically non-stop training it was nice to just relax, and just let my body and mind recover. This past Sunday (Dec 9th), I did 10km for the first time since October, and it was a good run, but man, am I feeling it today! It's like I ran a race! All these muscles that I haven't been using since my running sabbatical are none to pleased today. The legs felt fast, and didn't want to do an actual 'long run pace', but I felt pretty good. I could tell I lost some cardio, but that should come back.

My first goal race of the season is Around the Bay, and it will be the first time I'll be racing over 21.1 km. So that will be exciting. I'm looking forward to it and if I can stay healthy I think I can do ok. I'm want to be under 2:40, hopefully around 2:35, but we'll see how the training goes, and how the body feels.

Recently I've added a daily reminder on my phone to keep me stretching and doing some strength exercises that I'm supposed to do. So far, so good! I may not do them every day, but I'm doing them multiple times a week so that's a start. Anyone else have an idea to do those things that you don't really like doing?

Overall, looking forward to the upcoming season!