Next up, a 5k

Although this is the year of the half marathon for me, it's also been the year of convincing people around me that running is fun, actually, and that they should do more of it.

I know I can't take all the credit, but I think my unerring consistency with fitness—and particularly my commitment to running this year—has begun to rub off on people at work. I want to avoid too much backstory here, but basically our team of six is temporarily a team of three because babies, and we three left standing have been looking for ways to keep ourselves motivated, accountable, and sane during this time.

Back at the beginning of the year, we agreed to share our weekly workout schedules, encourage each other to complete our plans, and celebrate milestones and achievements. This has morphed into us going to the office gym at the same time and signing up for a 5k together.

We already ran an unofficial one together, but that was just practice for the real deal.

We signed up for the Furry 5k awhile back, before I switched my summer half to Snoqualmie Valley. At the time, that meant it was scheduled during ample downtime between big races. Now, it lands on the weekend before a half.

Because this race falls squarely in my taper window, at first I planned to run it as just a 5k. I don't want to tack any mileage onto it (like I did with MBH this February) and make it my last long run, especially because it doesn't start until 11:30am and it'll be hot. Plus, I'm trying to actually rest my legs this time around.

The best laid plans...

Then I thought I could run 8ish miles the day before as my last long run...but I generally don't like to run two days in a row. 

So now I'm thinking I may run those 8ish miles on the Thursday or Friday before the Furry 5k. My half is on the following Saturday, so that gives me lots of recovery time before race day.

Anyway, I haven't done any speed-work at all, and have in fact been trying hard to slow down and run my easy runs actually easy, so who knows how this 5k will go. This race is being held at the same park as MBH, so I've run this route many times, but they've reversed it for some reason. 

The reversed route could prove mentally challenging, not to mention physically—a clockwise route around this park means the hill we usually tackle a half mile in will be at mile 2 instead. What a treat.

The same, but different.

But, lately even six miles doesn't feel that long, so maybe three will feel easy peasy. It's true that the last few 5ks I've done have seemed to be over before I'd even realized they'd begun!

The main thing to remember is that this race can't get in the way of resting my legs for Snoqualmie Valley, so I need to make the smart choice...whatever that may be. I guess I'll wait and see how I feel at the end of this week, after my last double-digit long run is in the barn.

And, as always, I'll defer to the weather, because at the end of the day, it makes all my race-day decisions for me.

Ali