Theme of the week:  My resting heart rate finally gets up above 60 bpm (briefly, immediately before and during my yearly endocrinology appointment, otherwise it reaches all new lows this week), and yet I manage to convince my endocrinologist that I don’t have hyperthyroidism, despite a sky-high heart rate and blood pressure reading (in office).  Also, it was obscenely hot and humid this week.

Runs (and swims and strength training):

Sunday, August 8 – Run

Run: 7 miles.  11:16 per mile.  Strides: 159 per min.  Heart rate: 140 bpm.  Temps: high 70s, low 80s°F, sunny.  10:09 am.

This was an easy paced, hilly (353 ft. gain) run.  I got off to a late start because today is the last day of tax free weekend, and I was shopping for running shoes.  I resisted the urge to buy more, I already ordered a pair of Nike Peg 37s for $52 yesterday.  I think I might be able to get better deals if I keep looking later in the year (it took wasting most of the morning looking for deals though).

This was a very hot and sweaty run, I felt nauseous 2 miles in, otherwise it was a pretty standard hot August run.  Easterly light infiltration is causing some erroneous heart rate data, but with hills and some upwards heart rate drift towards the end, a heart rate of 140 bpm is pretty good.  I’m feeling really beat up and dehydrated 1.5 hours later, and trying to convince myself to go lift weights now.

Strength training at the gym: 1:22 pm.

Finally, after a week and two days off, I did some strength training.  This was a very good workout.  I was tired, and probably dehydrated going in, but I felt good once I got going.

I received my first unsolicited advice since joining the gym in April (possibly, my first unsolicited fitness advice since a guy told my to “swing my arms more” as I ran to build up speed, right before my second thyroid surgery in 2018 – I was considerably hypo at the time and not running fast, but this guy thought I should try to do what sprinters do, I guess).

I was doing prisoner squats (hands behind my head, squatting deep down today, full range), and a woman interrupted me, asked if I was new to exercising (I’m not!), and then she told me my knees were past my toes in the squat and that’s bad.

I said “thank you”, that was the end of the conversation, and I finished the set of 12 I had been doing and did 12 extra, all exactly the same, not modifying in any way.

I waited until she moved off, and then googled “squats knees over toes”.  I tend to do exercise movements that feel natural – because of my frozen left shoulder, a lot of the arm weight exercises (shoulder press, overhead pull) are slightly modified because it doesn’t have a full range.  My squats without weight are very different than my goblet squats with the 50 pound weight. 

It turns out that it probably isn’t “bad” to let my knees go past my toes when I squat.  A study from 1978 showed there was a ~28% increase in shear force on the knees, when knees extend past the toes, but trying to prevent forward knee movement can create a whopping 1000% increase in hip torque, so more reason to not attempt to change my form.

This interruption happened at 48 minutes in to my workout, and completely disrupted my flow as I started wondering if I was doing squats wrong and had been doing them wrong for the last 15-20 years. 

Overall, this was a very good weight training session, and some not so great advice from a stranger.

Monday, August 9 – Run

Run: 7 miles.  11:58 per mile.  Strides: 156 per min.  Heart rate: 135 bpm.  Temps: mid-high 70s°F, overcast.  10:23 am. 

I woke up feeling sore (DOMS from strength training?) in many places: lower back, glutes, upper hamstrings, shoulders, so I took 2 ibuprofen before this run.  (Two body parts that were not sore – my knees.)

I got off to a real late start today – one of my wireless headphones fell apart (probably due to the sunscreen/excessively sweaty/humid conditions I subject it to), and I’m 10-12 days past the 30 day return window on Amazon, so I was typing up an email to the seller.  Best case scenario they replace the headphones.  Worst case scenario I’m out $33, but I get to write a negative review, so it’s not the end of the world.

This was an easy paced, hilly (359 ft. gain) run.  My quads immediately let me know, that they too had DOMS, as soon as I started running, and that their DOMS was going to be the most annoying part of this run today.  It was very humid, and once I got moving, I was sweating profusely today (I’m writing this 10 days later, my sweat rate the last week has been elevated even more than normal).

This was not my fastest run at 135 bpm, but given the DOMS from strength training and the heat, I’m sure it is fine.

I felt much, much better by the end of the run compared to the beginning.  I’m not sure if it was the ibuprofen kicking in or gently muscle movements easing the soreness, but I’m happy the soreness went away (mostly).

Tuesday, August 10 –Run/Swim

Run: 7 miles.  12:28 per mile.  Strides: 155 per min.  Heart rate: 138 bpm.  Temps: high 70s, low 80s°F, sunny. 9:58 am.

This was an easy paced, hilly (374 ft. gain) run.  My DOMS today was much more severe than yesterday (especially glutes and quads, knees are still A-Okay).  I took ibuprofen again, but while my legs felt better that last couple of miles, zero steps of today’s run were pain free.  Lesson learned – don’t take a 10 day break from strength training and dive back in full force.  DOMS and heat made for a very slow run today, but I don’t think I’ve lost fitness

2pm: my yearly endocrinologist appointment.

I noticed after my run, as I was getting ready to go to the doctor’s, that my heart rate while sitting still was flying.  I know it gets high in appointments, it apparently is high leading up to the appointment now.  (It also was up to 85 bpm now, as I typed up the date August 10, but came back down to 57 bpm a couple minutes later, as my body realizes I’m post appointment.)

I don’t know why my heart rate and blood pressure get so high at doctor’s appointments, the pulse thing has happened ever since the first time I remember someone measuring my pulse in junior high, it is always elevated when I’m aware it’s being taken in a medical setting.  Always high, to the point where I did not realize my normal resting pulse isn’t in the high 80s, low 90s until I got a watch that does HR at randome times throughout the day in 2017.

Anyway, at the doctor’s office, despite trying to do slow breaths and get my heart rate down, my heart rate was 120 bpm, and my blood pressure was an obscene number that the nurse said they would recheck because she didn’t want to write it down.  (They never rechecked, but I think it’s ok).  My heart rate on easy runs in June and July often was lower than 120 bpm.   (The doctor’s office is also the location I associate with a lot of bad news over the last few years, so my body reacting in a “flight or fight” response totally makes sense to me, I just can’t control it.)

I told my endocrinologist that I get nervous before all doctor’s appointments, I pulled out my phone and showed him a picture of all the normal blood pressure readings I take at home from this year, and showed him a picture of my resting heart rate this year (monthly view, showing the decrease from January), and he actually believed me when I said it was only at doctor’s appointments that I get nervous.

We had a great conversation about how dangerous the delta variant is, how my dropping heart rate might be due to increased physical fitness, and how there is no sign of thyroid cancer in my body (by thyroglobulin test and neck ultrasound).  My TSH is low (sign of hyperthyroidism) but we decided to keep my thyroid hormone dosage the same, because despite a crazy high heart rate and blood pressure in office, he doesn’t think I have hyperthyroidism (this is a win! Having a doctor listen and believe me when I tell him my heart rate is normally very low, is not a thing that always happens).

Swim: 2:45 pm.  64 minutes.  52 laps/2,600 yards

100 yards each breast, free, back, breast kick, 600 yards free, 100 yards back, 100 yards free kick, 600 yards free, 100 yards back, back kick, IM, back, IM, 50 yards back, free, 100 yards elementary back.

My local pool is still closed, so I went to one that is ~40 minutes away from home but 5 minutes from my endo’s office, immediately after my appointment.  It was a small, 4 lane pool, almost entirely empty (there was man teaching a small boy how to swim in one corner of the pool for 30 minutes, otherwise it was just me).  The lighting in the pool area was darker and it was just me swimming by myself, which made for a very zen swim today.  Great job!  My heart rate ~3 minutes after finishing the swim was 73 bpm (I checked, to make sure it had come down since the appointment).

Wednesday, August 11 – Run

Run: 7 miles.  12:35 per mile.  Strides:  154 per min.  Heart rate: 120 bpm.  Temps:  81-86°F, sunny, hot.  9:50 am.

This was an easy paced, hilly (359 ft. gain) run.  I still have some DOMS from Sunday (usually it is gone right around 48 hours later, but it was severe yesterday, so I’m not surprised), and I once again took ibuprofen before this run.

DOMS was not so bad today, getting better.

It was already in the 80s when I started the run, and I struggled to get my heart rate above 120 bpm today (I did not attempt to get it to 130-135 bpm, my preferred easy pace minimum).  I’ve been doing well end of July, beginning of August, getting my heart rate up on easy runs, but today was about making it to 7 miles and surviving.

I had a slight headache (dehydration related?) the last couple of miles.

This run happened, it was fine.

My resting heart rate reached a new daily average low today of 48 bpm. (My heart rate is lower on days I’m not exerting myself much, so not surprising, but I’m not sure what to make of this falling heart rate trend.)

Thursday, August 12 – Run

 Run: 7 miles.  11:33 per mile.  Strides:  159 per min.  Heart rate: 133 bpm.  Temps:  82-86°F, sunny, hot!  9:59 am.

This was an easy paced, flat (193 ft. gain) run.  It was already in the 80s when I started, and I’m pretty sure I was still dehydrated from yesterday’s run, so the main goal was just to survive and finish.

DOMS is finally gone, so my legs at least felt better.  I have no idea how this turned into a negative splits/progressive run, but somehow each mile was the same pace or faster than the one before.  I’m also getting very good at sweating profusely to cool down on these runs.  The heat may be unpleasant, but it is not preventing me from still getting out and running.

Friday, August 13 – Afternoon Run

Run: 7.5 miles.  11:48 per mile.  Strides: 158 per min.  Heart rate: 139 bpm.  Temps: 88-90°F, hot, breezy.  1:48 pm.

A very rare afternoon run!  I went outlet shopping with my mom, sister, and some nephews in the morning (I convinced my mom to get some Peg 36s for $50 at the Nike Outlet store, but they did not have my size on sale!), and I don’t know how I worked up the energy to go during my peak afternoon fatigue time period, let alone in 90 degree weather, but this run happened.

It was hot (no joke – hottest run of the year so far), I was only planning on doing 5-6 miles, but once I started sweating heavily, I felt a lot better and decided to aim for 7 miles.  I then proceeded to get lost (running in my sister’s neighborhood), had to look up where I was, and ended up at the pool where my mom was swimming with some of my nephews, so I joined them for about 20 minutes after driving back to my sister’s, picking up my stuff and changing.

I don’t know what the worst part of this run was – running mid-afternoon during my extreme fatigue window, running in 90 degree temperatures, or running in a pair of retired Nike Peg 35s that probably have 400-450 miles already on them (probably the shoes – I immediately realized why they are retired running shoes but perfectly fine to walk around/wear to the gym – the cushioning is just not there).  I probably did more mid-foot/fore-foot striking than normal on this run.

Even though the weather is currently horrific, this ended up being a great run.

Saturday, August 14 – Long run

Run: 13.1 miles.  11:07 per mile.  Strides: 161 per min. Heart rate: 132 bpm.  Temps: ~74-70°F, sunny.  9:57 am.

I never thought I would say this, but thank God it was only in the mid to high 70s on this run today.  What a relief!

The last few runs (all the runs this week?) have been hot, this week has been hard on my body (just the heat taking its toll), so I didn’t bother trying to get my heart rate up to 130-135 bpm on this run.  The first 7 miles all averaged below 130 bpm (between 119 and 128 bpm averages), the last 6 miles were all over 130 bpm (between 132 and 156 bpm).  Miles 9-13 were all under 11 minutes per mile, with mile 13 somehow being 9:32 (not sure how this happened – lately the ends of long runs have been a struggle, not an opportunity to get tempo miles in). 

This run felt very good.  I love when I can finish long runs strong.  (Elevation gain: 595 ft.)

I really wanted to swim laps in the afternoon after this run, but with my local pool still closed for a few more days, and feeling very tired, I decided both strength training and swimming will wait 1 more day.

Running wrap-up

1.)  My yearly endocrinologist appointment happened today.  (See Tuesday’s write-up.)  No sign of thyroid cancer (which is great), and I’m staying at the same thyroid hormone dosage (I still think I might be slightly hypo, but I will take this as a win for now, because I’m still doing much, much better than last year).

2.)  My resting heart rate this week is absurdly low.

Possible reasons:

DOMS, increased humidity, stress from Tuesday driving down heart rate the days after, increased fitness. 

A resting heart rate of 48 bpm on Wednesday is the lowest daily average I’ve recorded since getting my watch in 2017.  My heart rate on my run that morning was 120 bpm, which is the lowest it’s been on a run in a long time.  This supports my hypothesis that running at a higher heart rate on easy runs helps improve my energy levels later in the day, if a low heart rate correlates with less energy (which it often does.)

3.)  This was the hottest week of the year so far.  I can’t believe I survived multiple runs in the upper 80s and one in 90 degree temperatures.  I have heat acclimatized so much better this year compared to previous years, I think not being anemic is a big factor in improved overall fitness.  It is incredible what the body can get used to (running for 90 minutes in 80 degree temperatures – I just turn into a sponge being squeezed and a lot of liquid comes out).

4.) I haven’t signed up for in-person races yet, even though I became fully vaccinated towards the end of the month in April, 2021. I wasn’t ready, and still don’t feel ready, to be in large crowds of people for extended periods of time. The sad part is, I really love running marathons (or training for them, but running and completing a goal is also a good feeling).

So I was deeply saddened when the one marathon that I probably would have signed up for this year,if I were ready to run in person, the Air Force Marathon (I last ran the Air Force Marathon in 2019, I also ran it in 2013) sent me an email on August 19 announcing they were moving it from in-person to virtual. I’ve made no effort to sign up for it, so this decision doesn’t affect me, but at the same time, I’m just so frustrated that we’re still dealing with this. I live in a country that is fortunate to have multiple Covid-19 vaccines with high effectiveness available, enough doses to vaccinate all its citizens many times over, and yet, months after being made available, we still have low vaccination rates, and have increasing rates of Covid-19 cases and hospitalizations once again.

I don’t know what the solution is. I understand many people are fearful that the vaccine may be harmful. I’m fearful of getting Covid-19, more fearful that many of the worst parts of hypothyroidism and anemia – the brain fog, forgetfulness, lack of focus, extreme, indescribable fatigue, dizziness, getting out of breath doing the simplest tasks – that all of that may happen to me once again. So I’d much rather deal with feeling crappy for a couple of days than have to go through any of that again.

As someone with an autoimmune disease (Hashimoto’s), and year-round seasonal allergies, my immune system seems to be very active all the time. I was worried I would have a strong reaction to the vaccine, but here I am, several months later, setting new 5K and 10K PRs on training runs, swimming, lifting weights, and feeling much better than I have in a really long time. (I’m not saying the vaccine gave me super powers, but the timing of an increase in fitness and becoming vaccinated are coincident. I have a suspicion returning to swimming laps has increased my lung capacity and/or cardio vascular fitness, and I only started swimming laps because I felt comfortable going to a gym only when I was fully vaccinated.)

When will races be back for real? I don’t know.

5.) My weight is back down slightly this week (it sure does look like a gain though), but in the depths of the summer, when I’m losing tons of water and electrolytes on a daily basis, none of these numbers mean a whole lot.  As long as this number isn’t steadily climbing week after week, I’m happy.

 Total walking + running miles this week (August 8 – August 14): 66.79 miles (down 17.6 from last week

Total walking + running miles this year (2021): 2,270.69 miles

Total steps this week (August 8 – August 14): 128,370 steps (down 23,620 from last week)

Total steps this year (2021): 4,370,210 steps

Average steps per day (August 8 – August 14): 18,338 steps (down 3,374 from last week)

Average steps per day (2021): 19,337 steps

Total running miles this week (August 8 – August 14): 55.77 miles (down 8.33 from last week)

Average running mileage per week (2021): 57.26 miles

Total running miles this year (2021): 1,848.6 miles

Average running speed this week (not including hill repeats) (August 8 – August 14):  11:45/mile.  (50 seconds slower per mile than last week – when it’s very hot outside, it is ok to slow down)

Average running speed this year (2021): 11:37 per mile

Average running heart rate this week (August 8 – August 14): 134 bpm (down 6 bpm from last week)

Average running heart rate this year (2021): 138 bpm

Average resting heart rate this week (August 8 – August 14): 52 bpm (down 2 bpm from last week – freakishly low resting heart rate this week, that’s for sure)

Average resting heart rate this year (2021): 58 bpm

Elevation gain this week (August 8 – August 14): 2,458 ft. (up 75 ft. from last week).

Elevation gain this year (2021):  83,037 ft.

Average elevation gain per week (2021): 2,572 ft.

Swimming distance this week (August 8 – August 14): 2,500 yards/52 laps/1.42 miles

Average swimming pace this week (August 8 – August 14): ~1:14/50 yards lap or ~2:28/100 yards.  (This includes stoppage time and a variety of laps including kickboard laps)

Average swimming pace this year:  ???  To be determined.

Swimming distance this year (2021): 90,250 yards/1,807 laps/51.28 miles

Average swimming distance/week (2021, starting on April 23): 5,542 yards/111 laps/3.15 miles

Current thyroid medication: 137.5 mcg/day levothyroxine + 5 mcg x 2 times a day liothyronine. Started on Aug. 11, 2020.

Weight, weight fluctuate

Weight: 163.2 lb (down 0.7 lb from last week).

Weight January 1, 2021: 163.3 lb

Weight change since Jan 1, 2021: -0.1 lb

Previous week:  August 1 – August 7, 2021

Next week:  August 15 – August 21, 2021