Hey friends! Let’s chat about how my 10 week half marathon training plan went.
Spoiler alert: it didn’t go quite as I had expected.
So I posted on Instagram that I might need to do a post about my half marathon training to process my feelings. That’s what blogging is all about, right?? 
Welp, the first thing that I should mention is that my sister and I signed up for this half-marathon right after the one we did in May this year. We were high on excitement and hopes of improving our last race. Then of course reality and life hit.
Half Marathon Training Ups and Downs
Good Things About My Training:
–I felt improvement in my cardio after a few weeks. Runs progressively got easier in the breathing department and I was almost never sore afterwards (unless I didn’t sleep enough and get that time to let the muscles repair).
–Training got me out of the house on days when I was working from home, sitting on my booty.
–I got some much needed vitamin D. Vitamin D=Amanda feels happy about life.
–I had a goal to work towards which is motivating and exciting.
–I got a lot of podcast listening in.
Bad Things About My Training:
–Fall Allergies.
–Not doing my cross-training (still need to join a gym after leaving my gym job…oops).
–Fall Allergies.
–Fall Allergies.
Fall Allergies While Half Marathon Training
Seriously though. How do I forget every year that my fall allergies totally sideline me for a good two months? It’s like I think my allergies have gotten better or something. If I’m outside for more than 15 minutes, I feel miserable the rest of the day and even into the next morning. I even take allergy pills regularly, but there is only so much that those can do.
For each of the half marathon training runs, I would put a tissue into my shoe pouch and wait as long as I possibly could stand the sniffling, then I would allow myself to blow my nose. After that I would have to use my shirt to wipe the snot. Super cute. Let me tell ya.
I’d come home with an itchy runny nose (and really my whole face was itchy) and suffer through the rest of the day. Needless to say, this made me NOT want to do my training runs and resulted in only completing about half of them. My longest run was 7 miles instead of 10. Dangit.
Tips on Training with Fall Allergies:
While I didn’t finish my training, I did learn a whole lot of what to do and what not to do while training with fall allergies.
–Carry tissues (or be cool with wiping snot on your shirt)
–Practice “snot rockets” aka covering one nostril, turning to one side and blowing your nose into the air. (sounds super gross, but necessary at times. a lot of runners do this while running since it’s easier than carrying tissue and faster than stopping to blow your nose.)
–Take your meds about an hour before you go outside.
–Try not to run outdoors on windy days
–Plan routes that don’t go through wooded areas or trails (you can see from my photos I didn’t always take my own advice)
–Train on the treadmill (but try to do long runs outside to get used to it)
–Change clothes or shower as soon as you get inside (to get the allergens off).
[Tweet “7 tips for training with fall allergies. #imasemihealthnut #runchat”]
Final Thoughts on my Half Marathon Training
I think overall it was good to at least attempt to train for the half marathon. I improved my cardio, got out of the house and had something to work towards fitness-wise. (And gave me content for Instagram…obviously a plus. )
[Tweet “An obstacle is often a stepping stone. #imasemihealthnut”]
My longest run I did was 7 miles, however, so I will definitely be walking at least half of it. The good news is that my sister is in the same boat. She’s been attempting working fulltime, schooling fulltime, being in a band and being a mom, so understandably the half marathon training took a backseat.
I’m trying not to beat myself up over not doing the best I possibly could on my training. I’m human. I’m not a professional runner, so it’s okay if I don’t win the race. I tried!
[Tweet “half marathon training thoughts from a non-professional runner. #imasemihealthnut”]
So What’s Next?
Fitness-wise, I will still continue to try to get outside for walks (hopefully on less-windy days) AND I will be joining a gym. I’m thinking Anytime Fitness because they offer yoga classes with the membership, but there’s also Blue Moon Fitness in our area that is slightly cheaper.
Try not to judge me, but I’m leaning towards Anytime Fitness because their social media game is way better (which means more interaction if I post and tag them). I know, I am constantly thinking about the blog…it’s not a bad thing to be passionate about something, right?? 
In other news, I have some fun projects up my sleeve all about blogging and social media so I’m getting pretty excited about those.
[Tweet “Say “yes!” to new adventures. #imasemihealthnut”]
Oh, and our half marathon is on Sunday, so I will let ya know how it goes! I will probably be snapchatting (follow me on snapchat: SEMIHEALTHNUT) before and after the race, so check that out for some videos. Probably goofy ones of me and my sister. (Also if you look at snapchat today when this is posted, you can see some videos of me trying out Mighty Muffin for breakfast. #zoeyfluffybutt steals the show of course.)
Plus we are going to KC this weekend to visit our brother so I will try to snapchat then, too. (woot snapchat)
[note the super sexy picture]
Have a good weekend, friends!
Tell me….
Do you have fall allergies?
Have you ever done less than stellar when training for a race?
PS I’m all about Pinterest this year, so I would LOVE IT if you could pin one (or two!) of these images. Just hover over the image to reveal the “pin it” button or use the handy dandy buttons at the bottom and top of each post to display the whole list of pins.Follow SemiHealthNut Stay in the loop with bloglovin’! Follow
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