New day, new race, new plan.

Back home from a weeks relaxation after Grandmas marathon, and I’m easing back into working out ready for the Twin Cities Marathon. The old legs felt quite good last week, just a few days post marathon. So I completed a few short easy runs. To date they’ve not reacted badly to that. Which is a good sign. 

Counting back from race day (October 1st) in my Best Athletics training plan still puts me in the “prep phase”. So I really can be taking it easy and still be in a training plan. 

I got up, made some coffee in my new Grandma’s Marathon mug, and considered the day ahead.

I really like the Grandma’s coffee mug. A nice piece of merch.

Today on the training plan is down as a strength and conditioning day. Something which I’ve done precious little of in the past. I’ve always concentrated on racking up the miles to get me through a run. So I’m late to the party with strength training. But as I get older I should really work on it more to lessen the chance of silly injuries and niggles. I did pick up a couple training for the last Mara. Perhaps that was a warning.

As you can guess then, I know nothing about what exercises would be best for me. Google and YouTube was my friend here, and I quickly found videos from Ben is Running and Steven Scullion as well as Nick Bester, with some exercises that seemed quite easy for a beginner. I memorized them and headed to the gym.

Shhhh… Don’t tell the wife I “borrowed” her yoga mat. 

I’m not sure I knew what to expect from a strength and conditioning workout. But it was a lot tougher than I imagined. One set of reps of some of the exercises and I was working up quite a sweat! Then I added a weight and things got hard.

OK, I probably added too much weight. In the Ben is Running video, he worked with a kettlebell. It looked fairly big in the video, so I picked one in the gym that looked the same sort of size. It was 15lbs! Let’s face it. Black text on a black kettle bell is difficult to read. I decided that to start with I needed a lighter bell, I found a nine pounder. Things were easier. It still made me sweat. But I was more comfortable.

First S&C workout in the bag then. A new experience, and a not unpleasant one, certainly something I should have tried earlier in life.