Role Mother (and marathoner) Melissa is trying out the Half-Marathon Heart Rate Challenge and documenting it along the way. Here, she reflects back on the first half of training, some setbacks, and her top takeaways. (Check out her intro post, her first two-week check-in, full of run/walk/skip/stop/bend over combos, and her thoughts on delayed gratification.)

Melissa and the four reasons she runs.

Well, as part of wave 1 Amazing Half marathon training I am one week away from being halfway done! And how do I feel about that? With apologies to Coach MK, I admit that I need to put myself on HR training probation. The last two weeks of my life have been a tsunami of mini life changing episodes all crashing into the rocks of my training at the same time. I have not only  let my physical training lapse, but any strong mental base I had accumulated in the early weeks is also down the drain. To snap myself and my self-pity out of the HR training timeout chair, I went back and listened to the very first HR training podcast. And I am so glad I did!  If you listened to that first podcast eight weeks ago during the first week of training, I highly recommend you go back and listen again. I have such a better perspective listening now than I did 8 weeks ago. To put it simply, it’s  all starting to make sense now. I went on to finally listen to the rest of Coach MK’s and Dimity’s podcasts, and their wisdom and humor has gotten me out of my funk and back on the heart rate training track. If you have yet to listen to any of the special podcasts that accompany the training club,  DO IT! Here are a few takeaways from my podcast listening binge…

1. One bad run doesn’t define a training cycle. (Did you get that? Good. If not, tape it on your fridge. Tattoo it on your tricep. Live it. Love. Learn it.)

2. Boring weeks are OK. No. I take that back. Boring weeks ARE AWESOME. No injuries? Nothing to report? Just training run boxes happily check offed? AWESOME. Your base is being built.

3. Tempo runs and speed work? Relax. We don’t need them right now. Eat the whole cardio pizza, then you can add some toppings. 90% boring is what you need right now.

4. Your mileage and aerobic base is your secret sauce. Trust in it. It’s gonna taste great later. Promise.

5. Running math sucks, so if you’re gonna do it, do this equation- look back at the last 8 weeks and stop complaining about being slow and start looking at how many more days a week you’re able to run now. Look at the accumulation (slow boil) of how far you’ve come. Look at how you’ve been able to work all these training runs into your crazy schedule. Look at how differently and more positively you’re looking at your running. Now add up the greatness, because you’re gonna love the answer.

6. The hard stuff is ahead of you. Don’t panic. You’re gonna have the tools you need to knock it out of the park.

I am grateful for the HR training plan for many reasons, as it is coming at a time in my life where I need all the grace I can get. It doesn’t care about my previous running failures, or demand standards and workouts that leave me feeling inadequate, exhausted, or less than. Grace often comes into our lives when we need it the most, and for me, the HR plan has come at just the right time.

We’ll check in with Melissa every two weeks to see how she’s running and how she’s feeling, so come back to follow her progress.