A series of weekly updates on my plans, how they are going, what’s working, what’s changed, and what I’m loving right now.
For this I had set some goals to keep up the 2 week strength on-ramp I had started in week 2, continue meal prepping to make fueling easy, and had hoped to increase my run mileage and do two bike and two swim workouts. I had also wanted to keep increasing my average protein and stabilize my calories.
As with any best laid plans, things started to go awry by mid week. Though I had time set aside for two workouts a day, I found myself a little drained coming to Wednesday and talked myself into taking a rest day when I probably could have easily done at least on if not both workouts. I woke up Thursday just totally unmotivated and feeling really sluggish and a fair bit sore with the delayed onset soreness from Monday and Tuesday and extended the break to a second day. While I was a bit disappointed I also recognize that as I’m getting older, I need more recovery time than I remember needing before and if I don’t take it my body might make me.
On the weekend, I tried not to feel pressured to cram it all in, but I ended up still doing more volume anyway. I managed to get in almost all my workouts but ran out of time for a second swim and snowed again so I swapped out my last weight session for a back and shoulder workout shoveling wet and heavy snow for 45 minutes. It was a good jumpstart but I’m not loving my lifting plan so next week I think I’ll try mixing it up and looking for something different.
My meal prepping certainly made it easier to keep eating well even when the days were had and I was tired. It’s frustrating because I’ve put back on some of my initial weight loss despite the calorie deficit but Im not really going to focus on that. I’m actually concerned that I’m not eating enough, now that I’ve increased the volume but I’ve got an appointment for nutritional counseling at the end of the month to refine my plan so I’m just going to keep going as I am for now and focus on practicing fueling before/during/after the workouts and races.
My run training group also started up this week but the course was so icy and I was going to have to cut it short to get to an appointment that I decided to just skip it and will make up the long run with a Monday 10 k on my day off next week.
I changed my hydration strategy to using a slightly larger 24 oz clear shaker bottle that I aim to fill and drink at least 5 times. I set up the left columns on the right side of my planner to let me check it off 8 oz at a time, one row equaling 1 bottle fill. I’m also alternating plain water and an electrolyte mix, or if I’m working out, a carb mix. It helps remember which bottle number I’m on, tastes better, helps me focus and get more nutrients in, and ensures I’m not at risk of side effects of consuming too much water.
Finally, is it too petty to be regretting color choices? I really like this tracking adjustment but I wished I’d used the blue for the water not the sleep. That’s one change I will definitely make for next week. I also feel like the layout needs more color in general so maybe I’ll play around with that going forward.
Training log;
