Marathon Pre-Training, Week 1

My first full week of pre-training is done. So far I'm not pushing myself too hard. I won't begin to follow an actual marathon training schedule until the last part of May, so what I'm working on now is just building mileage and speed, losing weight, and increasing my overall cardiovascular health and strength.

This week's stats:

• 8.87 treadmill miles
• 0 outdoor miles (because the weather sucks ass)
  
• 3 hours on the elliptical machine
• lifted weights three nights, full body each night
• 3 pounds lost
  

We also met with our trainer. He switched up a lot of our leg exercises, and pretty much every muscle in my upper left leg is insanely sore right now from the single leg presses. I guess that confirms which leg is my weak one. Also, I have a bruise on the back of my neck from doing squats on the Smith machine, and my abs are sore. I think this may be the week when we have to start splitting our weight training routine over two sessions so we don't have to work out for three hours at a time.

My biggest question right now is whether to do cardio before weights or the other way around. I've been doing cardio first because we have to warm up anyway, so I figured we might as well just lump the two together and get it out of the way early. We've also already tried the approach of doing a half hour of cardio before and another half hour after our strength training, and it was considerably more difficult to operate the elliptical on legs already tired from lifting weights. Our trainer, though, suggests strength first and then cardio so that when I do my cardio I get my body used to running a little closer to empty, so to speak. If I go to the internet with the same question it seems that doing weight training first is the consensus among those who are focused on weight training, since doing cardio first can negatively impact your ability to lift as much as you could otherwise. By the same token, though, those who run races seem to advocate cardio first for a similar reason -- if you lift and then run, you'll have a harder time running. For now, since I'm not yet racking up long miles in a structured training schedule (I'd consider this my marathon "pre-season"), I think I'm going to try doing cardio after strength, at least for a while and see if it makes it harder to make progress either with strength training or my walking. (One of my resolutions is to trust the advice of other people who know more than me, like my trainer, so....) The more I read up, the more I think that once I start my actual training schedule I'll work my legs on Wednesday when I do my shortest technique walk, and otherwise focus my strength training mainly on arms and core. Unless I come across compelling evidence to suggest some other approach, of course.

I'm starting off with a new pair of running shoes. On my previous attempts at marathon training I went with Nike Pegasus on the recommendation of my sister. I used them exclusively for training until I realized I didn't have a marathon to train for, and then I just wore them into the ground. So I used part of my tax refund to get a new pair of shoes. I tried on a few things, but ended up getting another pair of the Pegasus, although these are snazzy neon colored. I'll have to get one more pair between now and the race, and I'm trying to figure out if I can afford to splurge another hundred bucks on a second pair of snazzy neon Pegasus(es?) to hold onto for when this pair reaches the end of their mileage allowance. Still mulling that over. It's not like there won't be Pegasuseseses I can buy at that point. They just probably won't be neon pink and green. THEY'RE SO PRETTY!!!

Although I'm not following a full training schedule just yet, I'm already incorporating some of the structured walks into my routine now. I'm doing one night of interval training to try and increase my speed. I'm also doing a tempo walk one night with the same goal in mind. And to get myself used to long walks without doing too much too soon, I'm going to cycle through 1 hour, 1 1/2 hour, and 2 hour walks on Saturday mornings without worrying about mileage. I did my long walk yesterday on the treadmill. Hour and a half. The boredom wasn't too awful, but I think if I'd had to spend any more time on that treadmill I would have had to resort to watching TV, and I've never really done that while exercising. I spend a lot of time on my workout music mix, and while it's all I need outdoors, the gym has too many things that break my zen after a while. I think mostly it's the music they play which is too loud to completely drown out with my headphones. I'm sorry, but the Jonas Brothers just doesn't work as motivating workout music for me. I'll be glad when the post-snow muddy mess starts to dry out and I can hit the trails outdoors.