Last Long Run - Finished!

I headed out for 20 today from work.  Early morning - first real cold of the year.  Fortunately I thought ahead and dressed reasonably well (hat, gloves, underarmor shirt).  I started with 4/5ths of the normal 5 mile work loop - then headed basically for home - going toward Bluff Point, through Mumford's Cove and in through Noank and Mystic.  Turned around less than a mile from my house (after 100 minutes of running) - and started back.  It only took 80 minutes back since I did only the last 1/5th of the loop once I popped back toward work.  I have no idea on exact mileage or pacing - but I'm pretty sure I did at or a little over 20, possibly at a sub-9 pace - felt pretty fast and fresh the whole way.  All taper from here!!!

Wednesday I did 6.5.  Didn't quite get as much 'tempo' as I'd liked - but probably about 7:40ish for 4 miles or so.  Larry was dragging a bit - but we got faster as the run went.  Felt great personally - could have went faster.  Tuesday I did the normal 1300 in the pool.

Next week taper starts, but still has some serious runs (13 and 8 + 8x800s on Monday - which is one of the more intense interval sets).  Nevertheless - it feels good to be done with the hardest of the runs.

Week 13.

The most intimidating run occurs on Friday this week: 20 miles.  I'm feeling pretty good about it, despite having this lingering cold.  I did 10x400s (off-track) yesterday.  Since I wasn't on a track I ran for 1 minute 40 second intervals - with about 40 seconds in between . I broke the 10 up into 2 5x400s with a good 2 minutes in between the sets.  Weather was perfect.  Today I did my therapy swim at the UCAP pool.  500 misc. warm up followed by 2x400, 100 cool down.  Tomorrow I'll do 6 or 6.5 with some of that at 'tempo' pace.  Since I'm fighting this cold-thing I'll probably have to ratchet it back a little.  

One Sick Week.

Sick, both literally and bad-assish.  Today's 'long' run was only 13 miles - so I decided to run the brook street hill (twice) and go through Haley farm and the Bluff Point trail.  Total time, 1 hour 52 minutes.  Despite not feeling 100%, I think I managed this at about an 8:40 pace (i think).  I'm not at full strength, but I've managed a pretty solid week.  Tomorrow I can kick back and watch some football, so the strength training Sunday and hopefully be ready to go because next week is the biggest training week.

Week 12 Update.

So I managed to bike in Tuesday, and then did a sloppy long 'tempo' Wednesday - the area got 2 inches of rain, I think I ran during a good inch of that.  Truth be told it wasn't that bad.  Larry dragged me out and pushed me the whole way.  I laid of the gas because I think I have a low-grade cold.   We did the first 5 in 43 minutes and the second 5 in 42 minutes - Larry could have easily done 40 for the second 5.  I wished I could have went faster - but didn't want to weaken my immune system too much.  Today I did the normal 1300 in the pool.  I'm pretty convinced the pool is great therapy.  Helps the muscles, helps the head cold.  I felt great - although it's a sneaky workout for burning calories - because now I feel like going to sleep.  Tomorrow - 13 or 14 miles - and week 12'll be a wrap ('cept for the strength workout).  Hopefully I'll feel better next week - but I'm pleased to have (mostly) gotten through this week without having to miss any days.

Biking Through Week 12.

I'm really wanting one of those cyclocross bikes.  I wish I'd known about them when I purchased my hybrid.  Anyway.  Before buying a new bike, my wife points out I should put a few miles on my current bike.  So today, after doing my 'off-track' intervals with Larry (2x1 miles 6:50ish; 1x800 6:30ish + bitch hill) I biked home today - my first ride in about 4 weeks (last one was sept 20th).  I'll take it into work tomorrow.  Rain Wednesday could push my long run back to Saturday - but that's ok - I'm still thinking I'm going to have a great week training.  Starting to feel good about this race.  I'll plan I buying my kick-ass bike next summer if we move up to Mass as a reward for all the hastle.  Of course, if we stay, I'll buy one anyway...

Week 11 Long Run.

Today I took my sir isaacs out for there first long run - 18 miles.  With rain pending, I would've done the brooks, but I left them at work.  doh.  So I plopped the kids at school and headed out at 8:50.  The weather was pretty muggy for October 14th - especially the first hour of running.  I ran through mumford's cove and over to bluff point (45 minutes) - ate my first gel of the season.  Then headed into work.  Yes work, but I didn't go in.  Turned around at the fire station (~1:24), then back to the visitor center and filled my empty water bottle and ate second gel (1:30).  at about 1:45 I realized I was almost half-way through the 'filled' bottle - guess I was thirsty.  I hit the bluff point parking lot at about 2:00, and ran another 10 min. before taking down my last gel.  It was mercifully raining now - so although I was thirsty - at least it was raining.  Hit the 215 intersection with around 2:25 or so - and starting to feel the hurt.  At 2:30 I mentally broke the run into 10 minute segments.  Really hard the last 20 minutes.  I vaguely remember long runs hurting this much 2 years ago.  The good news is that I made it injury free.  Hopefully get a strength training session this weekend.  For the record books - managed another 1300 in the pool yesterday.  Pretty solid week.

On tap next week.  Either 3x1600s or 12x400s, then another tough 10 mile tempo wednesday.  13 easy next Friday - should feel like a walk in the park.

Nice Easy Tempo.

Parent visits, sick kids, car trouble - it's really been hard to get solid weeks in.  2 weeks ago I missed a run (tempo).  Last week I got the runs and swim in, but missed strength work.  This week, I have 2 runs done but no x-train or strength as of yet.  The kidos are still sick - add to that the possibility of me getting sick and missing my 18 miler - disaster!  Hopefully I'll avert that.  Anyway - today 5 miles in 41 minutes.  Probably ~7:45 for the middle 3.  Not the fastest pace - but I didn't want to push it much.

Hit the Track.

I finally made it to the Fitch High track for interval work.  6x1200s.  I like 1200s.  They're easy, yet not too easy.  I did all 6 in about 5 minutes - which I think is about a 6:50 pace or so.  I'm going to PWN week 11!

Week 10 Long Run.

That was an easy long run.  12 miles at an easy pace - 1 hour 47 minutes.  Like the last 12 miler - 5 weeks ago - this one felt very good.  Not great out of the gate - but a pretty solid effort.  For the week - 28.5 total run miles - the most so far and only 3.5 from the 'peak' of 32.  I also did ~4.7 eq.miles in the pool - so about 33 total.  Compared to 2009 - I did 42 miles running that week - but 7 of those was during a Sunday easy run - so I'd done 35 miles total after the Friday long run then - so the plans, in a weird way, are conquerable.  Obviously, the goal has been more x-training and strength training - and that seems to make up the difference.  This was a good, confidence building week, after last week's injury worries.  Saved by the pool!  btw - good luck to the triathletes in Kona this week.  What a great venue for the race.

10 Weeks in and Still Going.

Some good news - I did 10 miles today at a sub 8:00 min/mile pace - and my calf/ankle felt fine the entire time.   Weather was still not perfect - but starting to feel much more fall like.  I did the normal loop around work twice  - both with Larry - and it felt like we were running hard the whole time.  This counts as a 'long tempo'.  Larry mentioned that it was probably 10.2 or more - which would put the pace in the 7:45 range.  It's definately an improvement over recent 'long' runs.  Friday I can 'relax' with a 12 miler - easy pace.

Yesterday I did the pool work at UCAP and Monday I sandbagged the intervals a little - since I'm still worried about the calf muscle.  I did the sneakers mile at about a 7:20 pace and then ran up the bitch - so it wasn't totally without intervals - but I just didn't want to push things.  I'd rather get the 10 and 12 in safely.  The swimming seems to be helping.

Enter the Monster Month.

The 'Monster Month' is upon me.  I enter with a little trepidation.  My last week was ok, but I missed a key run due to injury.  You can see this by looking at the dip in the week 9 point in the above graph.  The red plot is the running distance, blue is the comparative distance I did 2 years ago.  The yellow shows approximately how much I've recouped via cross training - green and yellow diverge for future runs (weeks 10-15) in which I assume a range of 4 - 8 miles of x-training.  I'm a little unnerved by the dip in the red at week 9.  I really need to nail all 3 runs these next 5 weeks *and* aim to do 8 equivalence miles of x-training - otherwise this marathon is going to kick my butt.  hard.