High Speeds

Did a 2-mile shakeout run in 10:35 - it was raining so I was afraid to go faster.

Taper for Monumental.

In Carmel, IN. Tapering.

This was essentially a repeat of Fort Ben - I started out fast (sub-5), then around 3 miles the quad spasm triggered. I slowed down to 6:00 pace for two miles, then gradually sped back up until I was doing about 5:10 for the last one. It was frustrating to say the least. I'd hoped that the physical therapy I've been getting would bear some fruit, but apparently not. I'll give it another month or two and then try something different. This is currently my biggest roadblock in running. 

I'm happy though that I was at least under 1:10:00 this time - baby steps.

First run after Monumental. Glutes were sore - did just 9 easy miles in the morning.

Did 9 in the morning, 3 at night. In the morning did 6 20-second strides. The evening run was 21:16 - I was feeling more energetic than usual.

Did 4x1 mile targeting sub-5:00. Got 5:02, 5:02, 4:57 and 4:53. My glutes still felt sore from the Monumental half marathon.Total of 12.

Did 9 in the morning + 3 at night. Did a pickup of a little over 1K in 3:04. 

Total of 9 miles in the morning.

Did 3x2 mile pickups. Ended up with 10:09, 9:59 (I didn't know where the interval ended - the first mile was 4:53 and I ran until I hit 10 minutes), and 10:27. In the last interval my left quad acted up again. Total of 16. 

I've started a new goal of increasing my daily mileage to a half marathon a day. Hence the unusual distance. Did  a 1K pickup of about 2:55.

Did 9 in the morning + 4.109 at night. Went to the gym as well to do strength exercises. Felt pretty tired after the second run.

My glutes were sore when I woke up this morning - so I ended up not doing a workout as planned. Ran 10 in the morning and discovered that in addition to my glutes being sore, my knees hurt as well. I suffered a lot more running 7:30 pace than I should have. Looks like I may have overdone it with the strength exercises yesterday. Ended up having to cut the evening run as I was still feeling some joint pain throughout the day.

Today the workout was 10x1000. My pacing was fairly uneven - the first quarter was around 66 to 67 for most of the intervals, after which I slowed down to 70-72. The first intervals were around 2:50 and 2:52 - by the end I was doing 2:58. I was able to stay under 3:00 for all of them, which I'm pretty happy about. Total of 16 miles today. 

Did 10 in the morning around Lady Bird Lake.

Back to the target distance of a half marathon. Did a mile interval in 4:48.

Tapering today for the turkey trot tomorrow. Did a mile interval in 4:47.

Last night I woke up with a high fever - so I wasn't sure how the race would go today. Fortunately, IbProfun did its job and I was able to run a respectable race. Started out a little slower than 5:00 pace - held it through 2 miles, at which point I was in 4th place. At that point my left quad decided to start acting up, and I was forced to slow down to 5:30 pace. I lost 4th place, but was able to hang onto 5th despite being unable to kick - 80 seconds was the fastest I could limp. It was close - I think 6th place was only a few seconds behind. 

With warmups and cool-downs, I ended up with 6.5 or so miles. The prize structure was different this year - turkeys went only 3 deep for overall, and they allowed the overall winners to double-dip into the age division awards. So no turkey for me :-(. First time that's happened in a while - but hey, given the circumstances I can't complain about my performance.

Still pretty under the weather - limped through 2.5 miles in about 8:30 pace.

Felt a little better today - did 8 miles at sub-8:00 pace.