Fun pre-10K selfie! Meagan, Me and Stephanie!

We are TWO WEEKS IN! Only 16 to go;). Yes, there’s a reason why it takes a lot of dedication to stick with a marathon plan. So glad I can journal here with you guys to keep me motivated! It was actually a really solid week and I’m feeling right where I need to be! Each day is exactly what the Hal Higdon Marathon Novice 2 plan calls for and so far, I’m mostly sticking with the plan although I did flip flop the lower mileage weeks, doing 6.2 this Saturday instead of the 9 it called for so I could run the TOTALLY AWESOME Tour De Fleurs 10K here in Dallas (more on that in a minute).

Sunday – Cross Train, 60 minutes. Um, I only did 20 minutes on the bike. Oh well, Need to work on this for next week. Sundays are tricky since they are a full work week for me but I still need to figure this out.

Monday – rest

Tuesday – 3 miles easy. Well, the humidity is back and I could definitely feel it but it helps knowing that it won’t last forever and we are only weeks away from my favorite running days of the year. Get here fast, Fall!

Wednesday – Still sooooo warm and humid so did the treadmill today. 5 miles in just under an hour. I took it nice and slow and walked at a 5% incline multiple times and watched an episode of Gilmore Girls. The training plan for today literally said “run at whatever pace you feel like”. So I did.

Thursday – completely unremarkable 3 miles. Well, unremarkable except for WHY THE HECK IS IT STILL SO HOT. That is all.

Friday – rest

Saturday – Tours De Fleurs 10K at the Dallas Arboretum! I ran this race last year and loved everything about it except that they cut the course short and I’m so glad I gave it another try! I had a great time with my friend, Stephanie, from Food and Fitness 4 Real and we ran most of it together, which we’ve never done, so that made it AWESOME SAUCE. What wasn’t so much awesome sauce was the bazillion percent humidity. Yeah, have I mentioned that I don’t like humidity??

Even with the humidity, this race is amazingly gorgeous!

Another fun surprise this morning was running into Meagan, a Run Chat friend (#runchat on Twitter if you’re interested in joining us some Sunday evening)! It was her FIRST 10K so Stephanie and I loved chatting with her before the race (see opening pic!). IT actually didn’t end up exactly like she wanted, but I’ll let her tell that story herself. Bottom line, she’s awesome and I love connected with virtual friends in person!!

Goofing off on our way into the Arboretum. Doesn’t she look “Gordeous”? Get it?

Because of course I had to stop and take a pic here.

The post race festivities included the amazing drinks, donuts, Nothing Bundt Cakes, lives band, etc. I also have to say I just adore the Dallas Arboretum. The pumpkin displays in the Children’s Garden are amazing!! Such a fun and beautiful place. Definitely plan a trip with your family this fall!

Weekly Wisdom: Weather changes EVERYTHING. Remember last week? My amazingly cool and speedy 8 miler? Yeah, this week’s long run was “only” 6.2 which SHOULD have been a walk in the park, right? Especially considering it was a race with all that encouragement and happy runners around me? Well, let me just say if Stephanie hadn’t been there it would have been a very unhappy day for me. It’s just a reminder that race conditions are no joke and any and all goals HAVE to be adjusted accordingly. Lesson learned.

Next week’s long run will be 9 miles and the forecast is looking good! I’ll check in with you after that! Hope your day and your week have been filled with HAPPY RUNNING! Did you learn anything this week?? Please share!!

Jen