Week 20: Bumpin’, Slowing Down, and Dressing the Body I’m In

I am feeling training wise.

Things have been going great.

I have been, I'm definitely slower and like I know I keep bringing that up, but it bothers me, right? And I think that's okay to acknowledge that.

It's hard to lose fitness as a runner.

I was talking to my friend Francesca and we run together and I was just saying how like it can feel deeply sad to lose so much fitness that you fought so hard to gain and And how even if you're so happy and grateful for your pregnancy and you're so in awe of your body and there's all of these beautiful positive things that come with pregnancy, it can be hard because a part of my identity, not all of it, but part of my identity is tied into being an athlete and a runner.

And I am still an athlete.

I am still a runner, even if my workouts look different right now.

But it doesn't change the fact that it's hard.

That said, I've had some really good progression runs, tempo runs.

I've kind of have swapped out more like track style workouts for things that are more like progression runs and tempo runs.

So kind of doing long runs with some speed effort in there.

And that's felt really good because I think I just don't have the stamina to And the energy to kind of have like a speed workout and a long run.

And so I'm just kind of combining those things together so that I can have more rest days or easy runs during the week.

And that has worked really well.

And I'm feeling really good and feeling really proud of myself.

Um, that said, my VO2 max has dropped two points since the start of this pregnancy.

And it was funny because I actually got the alert, but my VO2 max dropped.

Um, literally like I pressed stop on my watch.

I had just done a progression run.

I was so proud of myself.

Um, I was like, wow, I like nailed it.

I ran, you know, like sub, um, 7.30 pace for my final mile of that progression.

It was like a nine mile progression.

I was so proud of myself.

I hit stop on my watch and it's like, oh, your VO2 max has dropped.