Weekly Update: 9-15 January 2017

This was another normal week training wise; I'll be busy for the next few weekends so I appreciated the standard routine. For further details on what my usual week involves, see my post here. 

Outfit
Here is a flatlay of the outfit I wore to Parkrun on Saturday. The Nike Free Run Flyknit are miracle shoes. I've seen mixed reviews but I love them. More on that later. 

Running
This week I completed three runs. Again it was hard to find the motivation for the Thursday night run because I was tired from my other training and I knew I had to be at the pool at 5.30am the next morning. However, if I didn't do it I knew I'd feel worse and see it as a wasted opportunity. I was satisfied with the run in the end. It was 7km and my average pace was 5 minutes and 17 seconds per kilometre. That's faster than I usually do for a training run. It's good to get some 7km practice in because I'll be running that distance at the Sun Run on the 4th of February. 

After last week's struggle at the Parkrun, I did much better this week back at my home Parkrun location. Despite substantial improvements in my 5km runs over the past couple of months, my self confidence took a knock after last week's experience. It was incredibly hot and humid for the Parkrun, already reaching 32 degrees by 8am. I also ran without any device telling me my pace, which is rare (I wanted to enjoy the run rather than stress about times for once), so I had no idea how fast I was going. Therefore, I didn't expect too much from today's run. It was such a shock when I found out my 5km time was 23 minutes and 38 seconds. I never expected to be under 24 minutes because it's only the second time I've achieved a time like that. My personal best is actually 23 minutes and 36 seconds so if I knew I was only two seconds off my personal best time I would have tried to run a little faster at the end. Regardless, I am very happy. 

Tennis
In addition to tennis club I played tennis on Saturday this week. The husband and I hired a court so we could hit together. We played a couple of sets of singles and practiced serving. It was really fun and made me realise how much I miss singles. At tennis club, because it's more social tennis, we only play doubles. My game is definitely more suited to singles. I can't fit anything more into my standard week but now I want to incorporate tennis singles somehow, maybe a competition here and there. 

Swimming
This week I completed five training sessions and went to usual Wednesday night swim club racing. The total kilometres was slightly less than last week with 13.625km. I also completed one of the long distance swims for the Masters Swimming Australia Endurance Program.  It's a year long program which involves 62 long distance swims. This week I finished the 30 minute breaststroke. I was pleased with my race times for Wednesday night swim club especially the 200m freestyle. 2:41.71 is a significant personal best for me. 

Improvements/Progress on Last Week
-Improve my diet. I said that last week (and for many weeks before I was doing these weekly updates). I'll leave it on the list and hope for some progress.
-Leg strength. My calves and hamstrings didn't hurt as much during my faster runs this week. I am very grateful for that. However, it's still an ongoing problem so I still hope to find some exercises to improve leg strength. 
-I didn't have much time for additional bootcamp style activities (but I did regular bootcamp on Monday) but I did some. I completed five pushups before work some mornings in the week. It's about creating the habit. I can't believe I'm capable of doing five "real" pushups now. I've never been great with body strength so it's huge progress. I think I'll be able to do ten soon. I'd like to create a similar habit with daily crunches. 

Weekly Photo
This week's random photo is from my Thursday night run along the river. On another note I love the Nike Free Run Flyknits. My best runs have been in these shoes. I'll make another post on that. 

What did you achieve this week?