Month: March 2018

March Runfession 2018

/ Anna @ Piper's Run / 27 Comments

I can hardly believe that March is ending this weekend. For some reason, this month felt REALLY long for me. Big work events at the beginning of the month, march break with my kids with LOTS of activities, then two weeks of busy work and half marathon training officially starting.

Winter came at us again last week with lots of snow but I’m done with it and now enjoying watching all the snow melt.

Runfession #1: Though I’m done with winter, I’m really not loving the muddy season. Mud is everywhere!!!! I kinda wish we could skip this stage and just go right to full on beautiful spring!

Runfession #2: I skied a lot in March and ran very little. The same could be said for January and February but I’ll be honest, I’m okay with it. I love skiing, skating and snowshoeing and my girls love it too. I’d much rather do an activity with them then on my own, therefore running sure took a back seat and I have no guilt!

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Runfession #3: I’ve stopped using my phone before bed! Yes, I was one of those people who would sit in bed right before going to sleep catching up on social media. NO MORE! I leave my phone in the kitchen and if I need to check it first thing in the morning, then I have to walk all the way to my kitchen to get it. Otherwise, it stays there until I’m dressed and ready for the day.

Runfession #4: This one goes with #3 but I’m trying really hard to make sleep a priority.  My body needs 8 hours of sleep to function well…yeah, I never get 8 hours of sleep until recently. I’ve been trying to go to bed (sans distractions like social media) between 9:30 and 10 pm which is super hard for me. Since my nights are my time to workout, clean the house, do dishes, prep meals and lunches etc., I’m usually short on time.

Runfession #5: RUNCH! I officially got back to my weekly runching! I love being able to fit in my run during my lunch break at work but only do it on days when I don’t have any other meetings post run. My work doesn’t have showers and I don’t like sitting in my sweat all day…thank goodness for baby wipes, water/mini towels and dry shampoo!

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I managed to get out yesterday on my lunch break for a little 5k, out and back kind of fun. I’m glad I got it done as shortly after that our school called to tell us Lilly’s ear was really bothering her. Luckily, our family doctor squeezed us in at the end of the day and sure enough – ear inflection. What a way to start the long Easter weekend!

Runfession #6: I’m totally using my running this weekend to eat all the junk food – not going hide it!

What do you have to runfess from this month?

Anyone running on their lunch breaks?

Do your Easter plans include any long runs (because of extra food consumption)?

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Don’t forget you can use “ANNASTIUX” at Tiux for 20% off your next order!

Runfessions are shared on the last Friday of the month and is hosted by Marcia at Marcia’s Healthy Slice! You can check out her blog and read about lots of other blogger’s Runfessions in her link up!

Happy Easter Weekend!

Half Marathon Training Week 4 ~ Bluenose

/ Anna @ Piper's Run / 16 Comments

With spring in the air…oh wait, spring has not sprung in Nova Scotia just yet! We had a big snow storm last week and ended up with over 25cm of snow! Don’t get me wrong, I love snow but it’s a little to late for me.

Having said that, I changed up my week a lot and it barely resembled my training plan, you can see what I did below!

Half Marathon Training Week #4

What was Planned vs What Really Happened!

Monday 19th: 40 minute cross train |  Rest Day! After traveling to the city for a full day meeting I was spent by evening time. Therefore no cross training and I went to bed super early – extra sleep was welcomed!

Tuesday: 7 k run | Yoga Flow class at lunch. It felt great to stretch really well.

Wednesday: 35 minute tempo run | 7 km run with Carmacks. I decided to take our dog out for 5 k that evening and then I went back out for another 2 k.  I also had my last (potentially) physio session for my hip/obliques – woohoo!

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Thursday: 5 k | Rest Day. Snow storm!!! Though I had planned to either run on my treadmill or get on my bike, it didn’t happen that evening.

Friday: Rest Day | 14.32 km cycling. I decided to do a short ride on my bike: 33 minutes.

Saturday: 5 k | 11 km long run. This run started off really great as I ran through my subdivision for the first 5k and then things went down hill slightly. Well, I literally ran down hill out of my subdivision but that’s not the point. Some portions of the sidewalks were still covered in snow. I  run in the snow for certain parts on on the sidewalks or on a very small path – like one foot in front of the other kind of path. No room for anything else.

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Needlesss to say 6-11 km was hard going. My hip and obliques held up pretty good, though I did some some slight discomfort around 5k in. I stretched for 30-40 minutes and did legs up the wall for 10 minutes post run which both helped to make a difference in my post run recovery. I also wore my Tiux compression socks during my run and another pair for the remainder of the day.

Sunday: 11 km run | Skiing! This is why I moved my long run to Saturday, so I could go skiing one last time with my daughters on the last day of the season. I was feeling great post long run and felt really good skiing down the hill.

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Though it wasn’t a great week of following my actual training plan, it was still a pretty active week so I’m really happy with that!

Total running km this week: 18 km (14.32 cycling, 1 skiing, 1 yoga)

Total running training cycle: 48 km

When was the last time you took an unplanned rest day?

What’s your favourite cross training activity?

How often do you change your training plans?

I don’ t blog every day but you can find me over on Instagram most days!

Also, looking for some running discounts? Check out my discount page that is always being updated.

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 I’m linking up with Holly and Wendy for the Weekly Wrap today.

Half Marathon Training Plan ~ Bluenose

/ Anna @ Piper's Run / 23 Comments

A few months ago I agreed to run a half marathon with two friends whom will be running their first half marathons!!! Kind of exciting, right! I’m currently in week 4 of my training and thought i’d share my training plan.

I usually post this prior to starting a round of training but I was two weeks into training before I realised that I should have been following a training plan! Obviously, those two weeks I did not follow my exact training plan below but I was running, cycling and going to yoga anyway so it all worked out just fine.

Event: Bluenose Marathon (5k, 10k, 15k, half, full and team relay)

Location: Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.

Race: Half Marathon.

Date: Sunday May 20th (kids run May 19th)

Previous Bluenose races: First half in 2006 (different course), 3 – 10k’s, 1 -5k and 4 kids run’s (2k).

New This Year: The course has changed and going in reverse order!

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Training Plan

I’ve used Hal Higdon half marathon training plans for the last few years and really like them.  I often modify them to fit in other activities such as yoga and soccer, not to mention I change them into kilometres since I run in kilometres not miles.  I’m not a fan of doing math while I run so having the plan in kilometres vs miles prior to training is key for me. Half Marathon Training Plan KMChanges you’ll see each week: 

  1. I don’t plan to run 5 days a week. My life or body doesn’t allow for that – let’s be honest! I’m happy to do other activities such as skiing (last few weeks) to yoga, cycling and soccer.
  2. I like to run in even numbers like 6 km  rather then 3.5 miles which is 5.63 km. Therefore, I might run slightly longer or slightly short then expected when the plan was converted from miles to kilometres.
  3. I have kids and my husband is a paramedic = shift work!!! I fit in my runs/workouts when I can and sometimes I change up the order of those based on my families needs vs my training plan. Life happens!

Future Races for 2018:

I have not registered for any other races this year and I’m kinda loving it. Don’t get me wrong, I have about 5-7 that I want to run between now and November! I’ll likely sign up late for most of them, some I’ll miss due to family responsibilities and some I want to be a pace bunny for again.

I’m also going back to my weekly posts of “What was planned vs What really happened”. I started this a few years ago and enjoy recapping my weeks this way. So there you have it, my training plan that I’ll attempt to follow with some weekly modifications.

What’s your favourite half marathon training plan? And why?

Have you ever forgot to start your training on week 1 before?

What’s your best tip for half marathon training?

I don’ t blog every day but you can find me over on Instagram most days!

Also, looking for some running discounts? Check out my discount page that is always being updated.

 

Run, Ski, Cycle, Skate, Ski MORE! Weekly Wrap Ups.

/ Anna @ Piper's Run / 15 Comments

Happy Monday!

I’m way behind in blog posts and sharing my weekly wrap ups but it’s for good reason. I’ve basically spent the last week with my kids and made zero time for blogging. So you are getting two weeks of workouts in one blog post!

Weekly Wrap Ups!

March 5th – 11th:

  • Monday: Rest Day (day after long run)
  • Tuesday: Indoor training – cycling 20.21 km
  • Wednesday: 5 k run with Carmacks.
  • Thursday: Rest day…aka watch all kinds of TV by the fire!
  • Friday: Rest Day
  • Saturday: Snowshoeing with my daughters and our friends. (Fresh snow!)
  • Sunday:  10km long run!

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This was my first 10k since November and it went rather well. I decided not to take my dog out and just see how I could make out with the distance. I have some minor pain in my obliques but seemed to work it out over a few days. Happy to say that my half marathon training has begun.

March 12th – 18th:

Keeping in mind this is week is March break (spring break) for my kids and I was on vacation with them. We stayed home and didn’t stop all week. My body is completely exhausted and I really should have taken Monday (today) off just to recover.

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  • Monday: Skiing with my daugther’s all day.
  • Tuesday: Skating with my daugther’s. Ran 5k at the beginning of a snow storm.
  • Wednesday: Skating again with my daughters.
  • Thursday: Cross training: indoor Cycling – 24.46km
  • Friday: Skiing all afternoon/evening with my daugther’s.
  • Saturday: Skating AGAIN!!!!!!! And 5k with Carmacks.
  • Sunday: Skiing one last time on the most beautiful day of the year!!!!

It was a pretty great March break for our girls. We also went shopping with gift cards and hit up the library twice.

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Running with Carmacks this winter has been lots of fun. He sure is making me run WAY faster then I would on my own….by about 20-30 seconds. I guess those will be my tempo/speed work days! As I mentioned above, I’m completed exhausted! My body is tired and I feel like I could sleep for a full 24 hours to recover. A rest day can’t come soon enough!

Half Marathon Training:

Early last week I had a bit of an eye opener! I realised the I’m basically in my half marathon training without having a training plan or actually realising that I should be “training” for a half marathon.

I’m running the Bluenose Half Marathon with two girl friends, our husbands use to work together a few years back and we became friends. It’s a girls weekend and I convinced them to run their first half marathon!!! Anyway, I freaked out a bit and then sat down and decided on Hal Higdon Intermediate training plan – which I’ve done before. I’m going to modify it as I need to and don’t plan to run 5 days a week as it’s planned out.

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My body is not ready for 5 days of running…at the most 3 days of running a week, plus yoga, cycling and lately a tone of skiing and skating! I’ll be writing more about my training plan and how training is going. I’ll also be going back to my “What Was Planned vs What Really Happened” recaps. Because, the reality of a full-time-working-mother-runner-who’s-husband-works-shift-work running schedule doesn’t always go as planned. Just being honest!  Let’s do this!

How was your week?

Did you celebrate St. Paddy’s Day?

Training for a race?

I don’ t blog every day but you can find me over on Instagram most days!

 I’m linking up with Holly and Wendy for the Weekly Wrap today.

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