Weekly workouts: Skidaway Island Half Training (week 1)

After taking a recovery week of easy running and workouts after the Charleston Half, I'm back up and running (literally) to train for the Skidaway Island Half Marathon on April 4 in Savannah, GA. It's the first year for this race and there's also a marathon. Typically, I'm a little leery of inaugural events, but this one takes place on an incredibly scenic island and fell at just the right weekend for me, so I decided to just go ahead and register.

Since we're at the start of a new training cycle, my group "long" runs aren't really long at all, so initially I had planned to do an 8-mile long run on Sunday. But it was such a beautiful day that day that I thought it would be more fun to try out the running stroller for the first time. So D got out his bike and B got in the stroller, and we went for a 3.5 mile family ride-run around our neighborhood. That's farther than I expected to go the first time out and my pace was faster than I thought it would be. Pushing the stroller is definitely a different experience and I need to be really conscious of my form while doing it, but I think once I get used to the stroller, it won't slow me down too much.

The rest of my week was pretty typical. I managed to get to Bodyflow on Monday night and was really struggling with tightness and a complete lack of balance. I pretty much had the coordination of a drunk on a tightrope. No idea what happened because I don't usually have issues like that with Bodyflow. I guess I was just tired. Tuesday, I hit the track and ran 4x400s. My splits came in faster than the last time I ran them, so I'm feeling good about gaining some speed.

Overall, this week was a good start to training for my next half and I'm feeling more like my old, pre-baby running self than ever.

The week in workouts

• Monday: Bodyflow
• Tuesday: Track workout - 2.27 miles - 4x400s with (1:42, 1:43, 1:44, 1:42 = ~6:50-6:58 pace; 8:30 pace overall including recovery laps, warmup and cool down)
• Wednesday: 20 minutes strength + 20 minutes crosstrain (elliptical)
• Thursday: OFF
• Friday: Run - 3.95 miles (8:47 pace)
• Saturday: Group run - 4.22 miles (9:02 pace)
• Sunday: Stroller run - 3.5 miles (9:34 pace)

Total miles: 13.94

Total runs: 4

Total core/strength workouts: 2

Total crosstraining workouts: 1