Nike Women's 15k // Week Four

After a tough week three of training, having a difficult time finding the motivation I needed and feeling fairly discouraged overall, I wasn't feeling particularly inspired going into week four. Monday was a stressful day and I was feeling pretty defeated, so the last thing I wanted to do was run. But the Rainbow Run Club requires a certain level of accountability, so I rallied myself together and it ended up being my best run yet, both distance and pace wise. That completely reset the tone of my week and set me up for one of my most intense and rewarding training weeks yet, with two extra NTC workouts as well as a speed training night with NRC, and an 8k run on Friday evening that was my longest run yet and also included my fastest km pace. Needless to say, I'm absolutely exhausted now, so my rest day today definitely feels deserved.

Since this challenge of training for the 15k is new to me, I've been struggling with finding the right balance between running and strength training throughout the week. My  tendency is to focus more on the running since it's still relatively new to me, and knowing that I need to work on increasing my distances to prep for the race. Yesterday after the early morning NTC session, Alyssa and I had the opportunity to chat with Nike Master Trainer Emily Hutchins about just that, and she stressed the importance of strength training throughout the week. She recommended running 2-3 times a week on top of strength training, with one run focused on a longer distance and one tempo run, which was interesting to me after I've adopted the thinking that the more runs, the better.