It’s hard to believe that another 14 weeks have passed in this pregnancy journey! And that we’re still in the middle of a raging pandemic. And that there’s basically no end in sight. Unlike covid, however, this pregnancy does have an end date, and I’m quickly approaching it! Just over two-thirds of the way through, during the second trimester, I’ve averaged around 30 miles a week. This number includes dramatically reduced mileage during a 3-week national parks road trip, where I was hiking more miles a day than I was running within the week! Other fun stats? During each run, I’ve stopped on average 4 times to go pee. Only one minor injury popped up around Week 20, immediately after I completed the Wharf to Wharf Virtual 6-mile race in 6:09 average. Some pressure on the pubic bone popped up, so I decided to take five days off after that to just nip it in the bud. That seemed to do the trick and it hasn’t returned 8 weeks later so far! The longest run I completed was 11.7 miles, with most longest runs hovering around 7-8 miles.
Things didn’t start to feel much more difficult from a running perspective until around 24 to 26 weeks, which was when the belly started to grow outward and when my heart rate seemed higher for easy runs. Our 3-week National Parks road trip was unintentionally during this time, which was great because the focus shifted from running to hiking. I was hitting on average 25,000 to 30,000 steps a day just from hiking, walking around the camp ground and dramatically reduce running mileage (~ 5-10 miles a week).
For me, the focus during the second trimester shifted from hitting mileage targets or doing workouts to just running on feel and making the most of precious time with friends who are leaving the bay (Hannah and Victoria). While running has gotten a bit more uncomfortable, I’ve still been able to maintain my lifting routine! Additionally, my weight at 28 weeks is 20 pounds over my pre-pregnancy weight, although I do feel like most of that weight is coming from my now bulging belly. So far, I haven’t gained weight much anywhere else besides my boobs and maybe my thighs. It will be interesting to see how I feel over the next 12 weeks as the baby continues to grow.
Pregnancy so far has been a great way for you to practice truly listening to your body. As an athlete, I’ve always prided myself on knowing when to be overly cautious and to take some days off if a niggle pops up here or there. Now, as a pregnant athlete, those lessons learned have helped me stay balanced and appreciative of the pain-free miles I’ve been able to log. Of course my mileage is drastically reduced. It’s freaking uncomfortable to run now, but not painful! I’m averaging one-fourth the weekly mileage of what I used to and am grateful for every single one of those miles. Lifting and cycling on the Peloton keep me feeling energized, in a much more comfortable position too! It’s also been great to not have to focus on mileage targets or nutrition for performance goals. Suddenly running 3 miles is a huge accomplishment, which so dramatically different compared to just 7 months ago, leading into the Olympic Trials, when running 24 miles was what was celebrated. I’m taking everything in stride and am perfectly content with the expectation adjustment…and the extra cookie here or there. :-)
Below I’ve outlined what each week looked like and how I felt. This will hopefully be useful to me as I look back on my pregnancy, especially if friends ever ask how I was feeling at different points in time.
Week 13 (6/5/20)
30 miles | 1 day off | 3 lift days
6.5M longest run
2 days in Pacific Palisades
This was a planned down week after running 50-60 miles pretty consistently in the first trimester. I do remember that I vomited on the side of the road in the middle of a run this week, so that was fun! Then we decided last minute to drive down to LA to spend time with Peter’s family and my sister. Other than the vomit episode, the rest of this week felt pretty good.
Week 14 (6/12/20)
38 miles | 1 day off | 2 lift days
10 mile longest run
7 days in Pacific Palisades
I spent the whole week in LA, so without my trusty training partner in Hannah, I had little motivation to get out the door for more than 5-7 miles on my own. I did, however, get in a fabulous 10 miler with Gene at the Santa Monica boardwalk at a pretty good pace. This might have been my last “long run” where I felt good this trimester.
Week 15 (6/19/20)
52 miles | 0 days off | 2 lift days
11.7 mile longest run
1 mini workout with 8-10 x 20-40s pickups with Hannah
2 days in Pacific Palisades
Back at home in Mountain View, I was able to get in some solid mileage again, even a day with about 8-10 20s pickups and a “long run” with Marissa! All things considered, this almost felt like any other normal week. The only thing really slowing me down at this point is my own desire to hold back and to take things easy. For instance, in the middle of the run with Marissa, I slowed down the pace for 2 miles while she added on. My body has been changing slightly, with some additional bloat and weight gain in my belly and potentially thighs.
Week 16 (6/26/20)
51 miles | 0 days off | 2 lift days
10 mile longest run
8M with grass fartlek with Tom of 4x (2:45, 2:15 off, 60s fast, 90s off)
4 days in Oregon with Jenna!
Weight = 143 pounds (9 pounds over)
Just when I would think - I’m going to start to feeling like crap this week - I go ahead and surprise myself. I crushed a workout on the grass fields at Stanford with Tom. Somehow, I feel better running a quicker pace than I do running slow and easy. Go figure. The latter half of the week was spent in Oregon with Jenna (!!) who was gracious enough to meet halfway to spend time together and to hand over some much needed baby gear! Most runs include at least 2 pee breaks.
Week 17 (7/3/20)
30 miles | 2 days off | 2 lift days
7 mile longest run
Weight = 143 pounds (9 pounds over)
After returning from Oregon, my right knee flared up a tad, with a little bit of swelling on the front below the kneecap. I got a massage and took two days off, and that was enough to help the eradicate the inflammation and the pain. I kept the runs all under 7 miles, mostly because I didn’t have much motivation to go longer than that. Most runs at this point feature at least 2-4 pee breaks.
Week 18 (7/10/20)
45 miles | 0 days off | 2 lift days
8 miles with 14 x 200m with Sergiy during his workout
11 mile longest run
Weight = 145 (11 pounds over)
This week I felt strong enough to hop in a workout with Sergiy to help him en route to his 400 meter repeats. I was able to hold 34 - 38s for each rep, mostly because of a leisurely walk rest in between. Just like a few weeks ago, I felt better running fast than I did on my easier runs and surprised myself at the speed I was able to maintain despite being 18 weeks pregnant. It’s crazy to be carrying an extra 11-12 pounds, while creating a human life, and still be able to run pretty darn fast!
Week 19 (7/17/20)
42 miles | 0 days off | 2 lift days
10 mile longest run
8M with 200m repeats @ 37-33s and 4 x 20s hill sprints with Jay
Weight = 147 (13 pounds over)
This week, I hopped in for a few 200s and hill sprints with Jay just for fun and felt great. So far, nothing has gotten too uncomfortable (besides the pressure on my bladder from the baby), and is such that I can basically maintain all of my normal activities with ease. Most of my easy runs were spent with Endy this week as Hannah was out of town. I got together with some of the guys (Tom, Imran and Max) for a run at baylands, and I’m grateful to get these runs in before I get too slow for all of them!
Week 20 (7/24/20)
14 miles | 5 days off | 2 lift days
Wharf to Wharf Virtual 6M race in 6:08 average pace (616, 600, 606, 615, 610, 608) with Hannah
2 days in Tahoe
Woof. Considering that I hadn’t been doing many workouts the last 6 weeks, I was completely blown out of the water by my Wharf to Wharf performance. With Hannah alongside as my trusty racing buddy, I created a route that traversed through Intuit, the bay trail and then the Shoreline Service road loop. My goal was to run 630 pace and then get faster from there (maybe dropping to 620) so that I could secure a top 100 spot to win the coveted long sleeve that W2W gives out. Welp, that plan was thrown out the window after I checked my first mile split, which was sub-620! I figured I could maintain that and was even able to drop to 600 pace, albeit unintentionally. While this was tons of fun, as soon as I finished the effort, I paid for it by having some massive pressure on my pubic bone. After hearing stories from other pregnant runner friends who dealt with the same thing, I decided to take time off to just let it calm down. I didn’t want to ever have trouble walking, so I took 5 days off and saw the chiropractor to get some treatment. I spent the next 10 days in Tahoe with Marissa and Hannah, which was great!
Week 21 (7/31/20)
30 miles | 1 day off | 2 lift days
8 miles longest run
7 days in Tahoe
Coming off the 5 days off to let my pubic bone recover, this week I kept the mileage low to make sure it didn’t flare up again. This was great as I was in Tahoe and had tons of time to hike, bike or kayak instead of running. I’m finally starting to obviously show, which is making running a bit more difficult, especially when you combine altitude into that equation. Running this week felt exceptionally hard because of the 6000 feet of elevation and the increased changes in my body. This was the first week where I started to feel the baby move!!
Week 22 (8/7/20)
39 miles | 0 days off | 4 lift days
8 miles longest run
Weight = 148 (14 pounds over)
At this point in the pregnancy, I decided to stop doing workouts besides mini pickups. Really, I feel like there’s no real point and I feel like my form and balance are so off kilter that I could get injured just from that. I had the super-duper anatomy ultrasound this week to ensure the baby is developing according to plan, and everything looked good.
Week 23 (8/14/20)
21 miles | 3 days off | 2 lift days
7 miles longest run
2 days in Yosemite, 3 days of hiking
Weight = 151 pounds (17 over)
With the focus this week a trip to Yosemite, I only ran 4 days and I certainly wasn’t complaining. Hiking is definitely more comfortable than running at this point and I didn’t want to wake up at a campsite, trying to get in a run before going to Yosemite for hiking. After months of having cancelled camping reservations at Yosemite due to Covid, it was such a relief to finally be able to set foot in the park, especially with the reduced traffic! Still feeling pretty damn good in this second trimester at this point.
Week 24 (8/21/20)
24 miles | 3 days off | 2 lift days | SMOKE
5 miles with 8 x 20s hill repeats with lepley
2 days driving to Yellowstone National Park
Aaaaand fire season in the west is here. Little did we know that this week would kick off a record 30-day streak of Spare the Air alerts in the Bay area due to a lightning storm that triggered several fires across the state. Because of poor air quality, I didn’t get in the number of runs I was hoping to before we left on our trip on Saturday. The saddest part was that as we drove 500 miles east, the smoke followed us the entire time due to the winds. So not only was California affected, but also all the poor states east of us. We spent the weekend driving through Nevada and Idaho before finally making it to Yellowstone on Sunday night. Sitting in the car with the seat belt around my waist started getting uncomfortable during this time.
Week 25 (8/28/20) National Parks Road Trip
17 miles | 3 days off | 0 lift days
5 days hiking 4+ hours
Yellowstone, Teton, Rocky Mountain National Parks
Week 26 (9/4/20) National Parks Road Trip
11 miles | 4 days off | 0 lift days
6 days hiking 4+ hours
Great Sand Dunes, Black Canyon of Gunnison, Arches, Canyonlands and Capitol Reef National Parks
This week my belly really began to pop! A baby bump finally started to appear and strangers knew that I was a pregnant lady. I didn’t track my weight during this time because I was on the road camping so access to a scale was limited, ha! Running wasn’t the priority, so I continued to enjoy exploring all of the national parks and hiking through Colorado and Utah!
Week 27 (9/11/20) National Parks Road Trip
5 miles | 6 days off | 0 lift days
4 days hiking 4+ hours
Bryce Canyon, Zion and Great Basin National Parks
With the last leg of our trip through Utah and Nevada, I was ready beginning to be ready to head home. With one minor hiccup - the smoke got really bad in the bay. We returned to Mountain View on Friday, and the AQI was 190+. It stayed bad through the following Tuesday, making for a pretty rough transition to being home since we had been outdoors basically 24/7 and now were stuck to being indoors 24/7. I was able to run in Nevada before we make the final drive back through Tahoe and I felt surprisingly good. That was my only run for the week, considering it definitely wasn’t safe to be outside.