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Marathon Weight Gain and Recovery; and Beijing!

7/21/2015

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It's now two weeks to the day post-Gold Coast Marathon, and I have just got back from my all-too-quick China trip to see my husband (whose passport was stolen and he was unexpectedly trapped in Beijing and unable to fly - all good now, he is now in the possession of a brand spanking new passport, phew...). I am so tired and blurry/sketchy-feeling that it has made me realise that all those times after big bender weekends in my (earlier) youth (lol) were not simply the results of a hangover or a come-down, nope: just good old fashioned lack of sleep can make you feel really weird too. Oh well... As a result, I didn't get up and run like I had planned to this morning, and today will be a 'recovery' (from the flight) kind of day.

So, let's talk about recovery. After the marathon I had a whole day's worth of sitting on planes (I flew from Brisbane to Beijing via Singapore). Now, I had the forethought to actually get a post-race massage on the day before I flew, and I tried to walk about as much I could on the arvo after the race (active recovery and all). I even had a post-race soak in the hotel spa. So, I did everything I could to prepare myself for my day of not moving and sitting in a tiny chair. It actually wasn't too bad, but by the time I got off at Beijing, my legs were definitely stiffening up and a bit sore (but again, nothing like any previous post-marathon feeling, weird hey?). The next day they were a bit tender when going up or down stairs, but nothing too major. This has been the best marathon ever for me, in terms of both performance and recovery afterwards, but I still attempted to take it easy for the next week, just in case.

So, the next week was spent cycling around with Husband, visiting our friend's pool and gym (where I ran only once, and that was a full 6 days after the marathon), and general wandering around in the extreme Chinese heat. All good. Except, and I think I usually find this after a marathon (not with a half-marathon or shorter race distances however), I have gained about 1-2kgs since the race!! Does anyone else gain weight when either training for a marathon or in the recovery period afterwards?? I do, annoyingly so, and I'm sure it was a combination of doing much less activity, eating more (and eating delicious Chinese foods I have greatly missed), and a third annoying female factor, but whatever the reason, it's kinda annoying! It doesn't sound like a huge amount of weight (and it's really not I guess) but when you're a shortarse such as myself, it makes a big difference and I felt it in my clothes immediately. Oh well. The body needs to recover and heal and all that, and I'll soon be back into upping the training, so all good.

During the second week in China, I did get in an outside run (SOOO hot and humid!), and some more gym work and kicking around in the pool, in between visiting the Aussie embassy a couple of times (fun stuff) and some other Beijing antics. Here are some photos of my time in beautiful and bizarre Beijing:

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1 Comment

Three Is the Magic Number (or ThreeS)

7/5/2015

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Apologies in advance to those who have already seen this plastered (by me!) all over facey. But I’m just a little bit excited. Ok, a lot. Because, guess what?? I definitely got a pb at the Gold Coast Airport Marathon this morning! By a whopping 28 minutes!! I am still very surprised by my efforts. But you’re now looking (well, virtually anyhow) at the proud owner of a marathon pb of 3:36!!! I am finally in the ‘3s’!

This was definitely my strongest full marathon yet (out of 5 in total), and my legs felt pretty great the whole way through – how bizarre hey. Even at 37 and then 38km and beyond, I was sort of expecting my legs to go their usual route of pain and slowing down. But nope, not today. I really felt awesome for the WHOLE race. No word of a lie. I suppose it could have been down to me telling myself that ‘it’s just another Sunday long run’, or the other trick I used – I pretended I was running a 50km or longer so that I would be pleasantly surprised when the finish line came sooner.

So, I’m not exactly sure why this marathon was so very different to the other 4 that came before it, and it has really hammered home that no two marathons are ever the same. It’s surprising even more so, for the fact that I felt kinda underprepared, training-wise, for this event. Sure, I’ve been training, don’t get me wrong. However, I wasn’t following a ‘training plan’ per se, but was kind of just winging it and doing my own thing this time, which basically consisted of my usual weekday runs of between 10 to 13km, and a long run on Sunday (which at its max might have been about 33 or 34km? Again, I have been winging it with the distances too and not strictly measuring them either). But no speedwork or ‘tempo’ runs or much practise at all at any kind of race pace. So, maybe less really is more?

It’s hard to pin it down to any one thing that may have helped me in this race, but as a not-very-scientific comparison, here is this race compared with that of my previous pb (4:04) in beautiful Guizhou, China:

  • Trained on hills (for my weekly long run) but ran on flat today, whereas for Guizhou: I trained on flat but the marathon was very undulating.

  • My fuel was ALL sports drinks, gels, and one small peanut butter snickers (which was a mistake! Yuck…) today, but in Guizhou I had lots of ‘real food’ as fuel (bananas, snickers, cakes etc). I definitely prefer the actual food – felt quite sickly at times today…

  • It was a beautiful day today, and even got quite hot. In Guizhou it was pissing down rain and cold for the whole time.

  • NO pre-race beers or wines yesterday for me, whereas I’m pretty sure I would have had a beer or two the night before in Guizhou.

  • I knew I could really give it my all today, no pacing myself for another race as all I have to do is sit on a plane tomorrow – whereas in Guizhou I knew I had a whole full marathon the very next day to complete! So, was definitely pacing myself (or trying to).

  • Chatted with new running buddies all through the Guizhou race, but don’t think I spoke to anyone during the race today (apart from the drinks crew and cheering crowd at times, just to say thanks – so, maybe, conserved my energy a little bit more?)

  • On that same note, I had a lot more support in Guizhou and the team aspect really helped me (I think) whereas today it was just me supporting me. Lol…

Who knows why today’s race went so well… I’m definitely not complaining. Thank you Marathon Gods for making this possible!!!

So, yay, definitely ticked off my goal for today.

Another goal that was ‘ticked off’ recently was my Bacon Sleep Sex launch party held last week. Thanks again to all who came! It was such a great day. Just went by far far too quickly for my liking, but I suppose that’s always the way when there is something you’re looking forward to. The only major downer for the day was that one extra special guest couldn’t make it after all – namely my husband, who’s passport got stolen the night before he was due to leave China!! What a fucken nightmare… L Anyway, it’s a long (boring) story, but the end result is that tomorrow I will be going back there for an all too brief visit while he is stuck in Beijing. The best laid plans of mice and men and all that….

So, if you’re interested, here are my pre and post marathon photos (I didn’t have my phone with me at the actual race, so didn’t get any action shots per se, one of the pitfalls of racing alone with no besty or husband support team, d’oh…) and a few photos from last week’s book launch (there will no doubt be many more to follow of the latter – just waiting on the official/professional photos to come in! Exciting…):


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    A 30-something's running and travelling experience around the world.

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