January Recap

I know.....I KNOW.....I didn't recap my triathlon.  I will.  Pinky promise!  Should be done tomorrow, which I'm hoping will be a snow day from school.  It's kind of up in the air right now as it seems the snow hasn't hit us quite like it was forecast.  But that can change a lot in the next several hours.  So, we'll see.

I wanted to hop on real quick & give a recap of January.  Although it feels like there isn't too much to recap.  I knew coming into 2014 I really needed to step back from running.  This proved to be tough mentally.  The first few weeks I struggled with mentally feeling it was ok to step back.  The things I silently tell myself is crazy.  And if I wasn't running like I thought I should be then I would beat myself up over it (figuratively).  However, being true to not only wanting to take a step back from high mileage and wanting to cross train some more, plus focus on my indoor tri and not to mention this blasted winter weather, it was easy to actually not run so much.  I still struggle with the mixed feelings.  We'll see how it continues to go.

For the month of January I ran *drum roll please*........112.17 miles.  Yeah....I know.....that's IT!  I ran that much last May when I fell & was injured pretty bad.  BUT....see, how I beat myself up there.  I feel like it ridiculous crazy that I "only" ran that much.  It's ok, you can reach out & slap me.  About time those things filter through my mind I remind myself how much I needed to only run that much.  My body needed that break (ha ha, if you call 110 miles a break).  I remember that I have different goals this year.  If I want to focus on speed I need to kick the mileage down a notch, at least for a little bit.  I don't think this will be the new norm.  And let me mention again this winter weather is really kicking my butt!  And I'm pretty hard core about winter running, but this year has me searching for a straight jacket so I don't go crazy!!  (I'll have to save that topic for another post.)

I'm not as good as tracking my other exercises like miles biked, laps swam or how many days I weight lifted.  I do know I did a lot more of that than usual.  I probably bike & swam this month than I did in all of 2014.  So, hey I'm reaching part of my goal that I set for this year.

My streak is still holding strong.  As of the end of January I have ran 614 days in a row.  I did run a lot of 1 mile days, which is really hard (mentally) when I was used to nothing less than 5 for the last 3 months.  I'm not letting much of anything get in the way of my streak.

I guess I'm more on track than I give myself credit for.  2014 has been off to a good start.  I'm sure soon my miles will creep back up there with the natural ebb & flow of training.  As I inch every so painfully slow toward spring my running will shift gear as I move toward those race goals that I have in sight.  Until then.....I keep on going 1 mile at a time.

How was your January?