D3B trains for a (half) marathon! PART 3 - the final charge!

[D3Baseball]

Hello all,

This journey started a while back in this thread: http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showth...hp?t=151809303

To start...
At that point, I'd found out that I had a torn labrum and rotator cuff, thus ending my baseball career and temporarily derailing my lifting hobby. I wanted to stay active and was left pretty much one thing - running. I heard that I could run a marathon and set that as my goal. I was to have surgery in May, so I started training straight away to try to make up for all the inactivity that would come post-surgery.

There were some bumps in that first run for sure, with injuries at the end of my training and I never did run that half. I then proceeded on to surgery, which we can see in this thread: http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showth...hp?t=154345131

Operation!
After surgery, I had gained a lot of weight from the inactivity and lost a lot of fitness. Things were tough, I was feeling bad. I started training to get myself ready for my marathon, slowly but surely. Towards the end of that log, I found out something that has changed my life - I have ADHD. This affects a lot of things, but the most relevant have been my difficulties sticking to things as well as a difficulty with food; people with ADHD often develop addiction to things that can give them pleasure. For me, that was food, and that's why keeping from being a chubster has always been a challenge.

Now what?
So here we are. With a lot of travel and such going on, I put that last log on hiatus while I figured everything out. I did keep training, though. Some important things have been missed:
1. I went on a work retreat that cost me about 3 days of training.
2. Following that work retreat, I only got about 2 days of training in before a recurrence of a tooth abscess that made me sick, put me on antibiotics (my body doesn't like those) and opiate painkillers, and cost me another week or so of training. It also cost me about 1000 bucks.
3. I'm now on stimulant ADHD medication, which raises my heart rate when exercising.

New goal
All this paired with the fact that I was borderline unprepared in the first place and I decided to temporarily downgrade my goal to half-marathon. For the St. Jude Marathon, I'll be running in a half. I haven't given up on the long-term goal of running a marathon, but it made more sense at this point to get in a race I knew I could finish. I was talking with a training buddy and he said, "it seems like the best outcome for you if you try to run the marathon is that you get a leg injury before something worse happens." He was right. I just wasn't ready after all that.

Nonetheless, I will go on and kick ass in a much more doable distance for my current experience level.



What's ahead in this thread
I'm going to have a lot more fun now that I'm training for the half-marathon distance. I can actually complete my workouts with something other than slow as possible so I can barely finish pace. I'm also going to do at least one 5k race with my girlfriend, who is now doing my easy runs with me which is yet another thing that keeps this fun. I'm also participating in a friendly challenge with some friends in which we are split into teams and whoever combines to run the mileage of the width of the USA first wins.

I'll still be posting my fun graphs and such, especially now that my heart rate needs close monitoring on this medication.



But...supps?
Yes, there are supps. I'm pretty much all SAN nowadays (my medicine helps prevent impulsive purchases ):






Keeping it simple!

I also take Gatorade Prime for my empty-stomach runs:


Last, but not least...
I am still trying to meet a fundraising goal. My run will benefit children at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital here in Memphis, TN. The vast majority of the money they raise comes from small donations and that could be you. Groundbreaking research and unmatched care are daily occurrences at St. Jude and your money makes those things possible, all without financial burden to the affected families.

If you can donate any amount, please do so here: http://heroes.stjude.org/jlong

Thank you so much to followers old and new!

[Sawa3]

In!

[allieninja]

Good to see you still doin werk. When is the run?

[D3Baseball]

December 7!

[D3Baseball]

Time to start updating more regularly.

Soon, after some tweaking, I'll give an overview of my training schedule. Generally speaking, I'm following Hal Higdon's Half-Marathon Novice 2 program.

Everything has been going okay, I've been trying to figure out how best to fit running into my daily routine. I've been having difficulties getting up in the morning and I've tried doing some afternoon runs, but it has generally just been too hot. I'm going to go back to mornings. Evening runs once the sun goes down, honestly, isn't safe where I live/run. I've done a few indoor runs when my hand was forced. I could jog around my campus as well, but it is sub-ideal IMO

[D3Baseball]

Still playing with the best time of day to run - can't wait till fall really settles in here so it isn't hotter than the hubs of hell in the afternoon.

Other than that, things are going pretty well. I'm tweaking my running schedule, as it seems Tuesdays are never a good day for running in terms of my work schedule.

I had a 5 miler this past weekend, chewed that up pretty easily at a 10:59 pace (including a .11 mile stretch where I was walking and playing with my phone). Those who were following along earlier in my training might remember that I was running a bunch slower than that on my early long runs. Finishing at a less embarrassing pace and still having energy to spare was great, though I should mention that it was around 75 degrees that day; that makes things easier for sure.

My plan is to run at about a 10:30 pace at the race, and for now that seems possible. I'm not going to push it, though.

Will be doing a 4 mile run today, 3 mile run tomorrow, then a 6 miler on Saturday. I may make up for the missed run yesterday (Tuesdays suck) by running on Sunday, but I haven't yet decided.

[Sawa3]

Keep working to make the plan yours! You should be good with a 10:30 pace. Keep with it!