Training this week felt enjoyable, but was pretty uneventful. After a much needed three days off, I hit the ground running on Thursday with new-found motivation. This was my goal and I was happy to be back.

I wrote last week about a three-day juice cleanse I was doing on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Day one and two were fine, with little to no problems. I felt decently full except for a dull (but manageable) headache. Then on Wednesday morning I woke up with a splitting headache! I chugged water and green tea and drank all my juices, but I never managed to get rid of the headache. I woke up on Thursday and ate solid food and instantly my headache lifted. My body was definitely trying to tell me to eat something! Despite the third day, the juice cleanse was overall pretty simple. I really did feel detoxed afterwards and I felt like I hit restart on my system. So far I still haven’t had any “bad” food since ending the juice cleanse and I feel great. I weighted myself on Thursday morning and I had lost 5lbs while doing the cleanse. (Of course I took this as a grain of salt because it was just all water weight!) Still – I felt good! If you are looking for a clean and simple way to jump start your system and clean-up your diet, I recommend a raw juice cleanse.

Soooo despite missing out on three days of training this past week, I still managed 59 miles in just over 7 hours. This is the first week in six weeks that my weekly mileage hasn’t been over 70. I think I can cut myself some slack  🙂

On Saturday morning I got up early to head to the pool for a swim (because I tried to go Thursday before work, but the pool was closed!! Let me tell you how much that sucked at 6AM!) After my swim I ran 10.6 miles and I felt awesome. My body is getting used to some distance and I was excited to feel so good during the run.

Sunday I got up early again and headed out for a 32-mile bike ride. I rode through Willoughby, Willoughby Hills, Gates Mill and Hunting Valley. It was such a gorgeous morning. I was in heaven! The sun was shining and there were so many other riders and runners out. I found myself thanking God for the chance to be out there and being able to ride and train.

This week’s training is looking pretty full. I swam this morning and am riding to work tomorrow (30-miles total). I will do a CTC brick on Wednesday, a long run on Thursday and an indoor brick at the gym on Friday. Not sure what the plans are for this weekend yet. We were supposed to go to Put-N-Bay, but the weather is looking iffy. If we don’t end up going I may do the Sweet Corn Challenge on Sunday (50 miles), but we’ll see!

I honestly cannot believe we are in week 20 of training. Only 4 more weeks until race day!

Stay safe – happy training!