Bret

AM - last day here in WV, so i got one last hill run in.  Up my favorite named hill called Round Bottom Hill, which is about a  1.5 mile climb and a bit longer descent and then back along route 2 which parallels the Ohio River.  Good run to finish up the week here.       

PM - easy run at around 6 pm - back in Florida in the heat and humidity.  Had plans to go a bit further, but felt a little drained by the weather conditions and I plan to run at least the 5k of the Midnight run tomorrow evening at race pace - so I backed off and kept the pace tonight in a heartrate zone that was almost painfully slow.

AM - did an easy 4 miles shake out this morning.  Using some older Gel Nimbus shoes that felt like the compression was gone on them this morning - either that, or my legs felt like lead, but definitely one of the two.  Running at Midnight race tonight - we'll see if they loosen up by then.

PM - Midnight Run - With a pretty late night storm causing some indecision in my house about whether to run this race, my daughters all bailed, but I decided the storm was about overwith and after a hurried registration and warm up was quite pleased with the rain having ended and the weather conditions not as warm and humid as it usually is.  Saw Doug during my warm up and right after the turn around during the race itself.  Race was full of high school cross country boys and girls.  I was running reasonably well (though I could not see my watch in the dark and was only guessing at pace) through 2 miles where I edged up to what I thought was my age group competition.  Just then I had an immediate and urgent GI issue - which caused me to back off the pace to keep things in order.  (Fortunately it turns out my competition was the next age group up).  Came out of it and finished well over the last half mile.  Splits turned out to be 6:04, 5:59 and 6:28.  Won my age group with this same time 2 years ago too.

Doug ran well - 20:19 (I think) and I met up with him and Travis and the rest of his family after the race.  Travis ran 17:44, finished 6th overall but 4th in his age group.  Bunch of young ones up front in this one!

Decided not to do the 10k after the stomach issues - and feeling generally too fatigued to head back out in the dark especially with the wet roads and no lighting except for luminaries out on the Causeway.

Anyway - not too bad of a night. 

Ended up taking today off to spend it with the family for July 4th.  Breakfast, then beach, then soccer game (Rowdies v. Stikers) at Al Lang field in St. Pete, followed by the fireworks.  As my daughter put it:  "A successful July 4th celebration with the family."

AM - 4.0 miles easy with Delaney this morning.   She had backed out of the Midnight Run on Sunday night, but awoke early yesterday and had her sister drive her to the gym to run on the treadmill before we went to the beach (sister was not happy about that) - so I have to give her credit for her committment.  Anyway, we did an easy run this morning, which was tougher on her than it should have been - but it was considerably humid (88%) at 6 am.  She's headed off to a running camp for 2 weeks on Sunday and wants to be ready for it. 

My left foot was sore again this morning - which I attribute to the race on Sunday night in racing flats.  Probably a combination of intensity and lack of much cushioning / support in the shoes (Ascics Tarther).  Will do a secondary run this evening.

PM - 11 miles easy this evening after work.  Actually after my first day back to work after vacation, I was not really motivated to go out to run, so it really was not "easy" to do.  Had a decent run though as I went through Spanish Trail and the up Belcher to the extension past Alderman and turned around by the girls' elementary school.  I remember in high school we'd come up to Alderman Rd to run "hills" - as that was about as close as we could get to finding any of them.

AM - 3.5 miles with Riley and Delaney this morning.  Riley's morning swim practices changed from MWF to Tues/Thursday - (she has afternoon training everyday) so she wanted to continue to work on her fitness with cross training (what swimmers call "dry land training") on her off-mornings.  She sort of struggles and complains as a true fish out of water when we run.   I really enjoy running with them as they chat and cut up on each other.  Delaney revealed to me yesterday that she prefers running with me because it keeps her from stopping when she's feeling lousy -and when she can't run with me she goes to the gym to run on the treadmill because she feels that she won't stop because the people in the gym would see.  Funny stuff.

Anyway - I will do a secondary run either at lunch or at the end of the day today.

PM - lunchtime 10 miles on the treadmill.  Cool indoor temps with the ipod for a change, made for a pretty enjoyable run today. 

AM - 5.5 miles in a very humid slog of a run this morning. Tropical system is moving in from the south making the already steamy weather even more thick and heavy.  Delaney went with Riley to the YMCA to run on the treadmill during Riley's morning swim workout, so that Delaney could do some strength work following her run.  I did not have time for all of that so, just ran on my own this morning.

PM - 12.0 miles at the gym on the treadmill.  I did a heartrate zone workout using the Garmin.  First time I have done this.  I set it for a range which would have been roughly zone 4 between 155 and 163 bpm.  The Garmin will provide an alert if the HR drops below or goes above the target zone.  I  first did a 2 mile warm up and then 9 miles at a pace which averaged roughly 6:40-6:45 except the last couple of miles where I was exceeding the target zone perhaps because my body temp was going up and so I reduced the incline and then the pace slightly to keep it close to the zone.  Then I did a mile warm down.  The zone is basically my MRP.  Little disappointed that the ppm was not faster and that I had to slow it a bit to keep it in the zone, but overall, I thought it was a useful workout. 

AM - significant thunderstorm this morning required Delaney and I to go to the YMCA to run on the treadmills this morning.  Felt surprisingly fresh and not fatigued from yesterday evening's workout.

PM - After a bit of a stressful workday I went out for a run in a light rain this evening - 8 miles easy.  Actually did not really feel all that great.  Not sure if the fatigue in my quads was from yesterday's workout as a delayed onset, the two treadmill runs, or the extra miles this week, but this was a bit of a slog. 

AM - very early start to get out before the heat.  Planned to meet my friend Ken with the group who meets in downtown Clearwater to run over the beach bridges.  Ken is just starting his training for the Vegas marathon in December, so he was not up for a really long run.  As a result I went down early and ran for an hour before he and group arrived at 6 am.  We started with a plan to run a bit longer, but Ken was not feeling his best, and though I would have been tempted to do 20 total, we only did an hour together - so 2 hours total for me and just under 16 miles.  Ready for a rest day as was feeling a bit fatigued at the end myself. 

AM - 4.0 miles easy this morning with Riley (sent Delaney off to running camp in NC yesterday).  Riley pressed the pace (for her) the second mile and when I told her she was going faster than usual, she said she wanted to see how long she could sustain the pace (about 8 mpm) - so I said, OK - but it may be unpleasant for you later.  Deciding that she should experience it rather than taking my word for it - she lasted until just about the last mile when she slowed a bit and complained that I should have told her to slow down.  HA!

Anyway she finished just under 9 mins for the last mile - no worse for the wear.

I felt a little sluggish in the first half mile after taking yesterday off - but felt fine the rest of the way.  Will do a run later today, probably on the treadmill.

PM - lunchtime run of 6 miles on the treadmill.  Used the Garmin HR workout feature and kept the HR in zone 3 which for me was between 130 and 148 or appx top end of 80% max HR.  Took over a mile to hit the target zone and then toward the end of the run I exceeded the top end a couple of times - for a few seconds - probably from body temp.  Ran steady at 7:15 pace after warming up to it during the first mile.  Felt very solid and comfortable at that pace and my legs had some pop that I was holding back.  Will be tapering now for the next couple of weeks.

PM - lunchtime workout on the treadmill - Fartlek:  2 mile warm up 2 times (3 x 90 secs; 3 x 60 seconds; 4 x 45 seconds equal recovery )  The long reps were at 5:45 pace, the medium at 5:30 and the fast ones at 5:15 pace.  1 mile cool down.  Felt very much within myself on these reps and the volume did not phase me either.    Good workout. 

PM - after work 8.0 miles on the treadmill in an hour's time.  Felt very relaxed.  Good recovery run.  I did yesterday's workout at lunch so, I tried to stretch the recovery time by doing today's run later in the day and tried to get a little more sleep this morning - got almost 6.5 hours of sleep - better than my average which usually under 6.

PM - lunchtime workout.  4 mile warm up then 6 x 400 at 78-80 sec pace with 3 min recovery and a 1.5 mile cool down.  Top of my left foot, at the first metatarsal was noticeably tender/sore yesterday evening and this morning - possibly too many runs in a row on the treadmill (as I have not used the Vibrams at all) - so I did this run outside.  It did not give me any problems running - but the high heat and humidity (heat index of 104) really drained me toward the end of the run. 

PM - lunchtime run outside.  Of course very hot and humid, but I wanted to stay off the treadmill and I have been skipping morning runs in favor of getting more rest.  7 hours of sleep last night.  I wore the heartrate monitor and kept the pace under a 75% HR effort - which required me to slow down in the last couple of miles probably because of heat - not because the pace was too hard.  First metatarsal on left foot was tender again today, and was somewhat noticeable for the first 2 miles.  I cannot decide if it is the beginning of an injury to the bone or just some tendonitis from treadmill running for a couple of days in a row.  Keeping an eye on it.

Early AM - had a nice run with the group in Clearwater this morning.  I went down early and ran 5 (basically over to the beach and back) and waited for my friend Ken and the rest of the group to start at 6 am.  Had a nice mix this morning.  Ken and I ran with a college aged young lady who was starting her training for the Columbus marathon.  We ran over both the main bridge to the beach and the Sand Key bridge to the Marriott and got some water and then ran back over them again.  On way out on the Sand Key bridge I did a couple of surges to test my legs and lungs - and felt very fit and light.  I did the same coming back over the main bridge.  Closest thing we have to hills. 

The first 5 miles on my own were a bit ragged - my left foot - 1st metatarsal was tender and took about 2 miles to warm up - and then I had some kinda low blood surgar thing going on - like I was getting shakey and needed to eat.  So when I got back to the car, I had some Gatorade, which seemed to solve that problem.  The run with the group was great and I felt as if I really hadn't put much effort in when I was done.

PM - lunchtime workout on the treadmill.  3 x 2 miles at 6:30 pace with an 8:15 pace mile rest between each 2 mile rep; then 800 at 2:48 with a short cool down.  This could not have gone better for me today.  I would describe the effort as comfortably managable.  Excellent confidence builder workout. 

AM - early morning easy 3.0 miles ahead of a long day of meetings including dinner tonight.  Did an ice bath yesterday evening after my workout and so my legs felt fine this morning.  See if that carries over to tomorrow as well.

Unplanned day off - work schedule left no time for a run today.

PM - lunchtime workout - total of 5.5 miles - outside, after an easy 3 mile warm up, I did  4 x 200 with 200 recovery.  Times / distance were a little imprecise, but they were right around 33-34 seconds with the last one at 32.  I was a bit sluggish when I started the run, and it was quite hot and humid - the tapering and extra onboarding of carbs and calories has me feeling a bit heavy - normal tapering stuff.  However, when I ran these 200's I was really amazed at how much strength and speed I seemed to feel in each rep.  Started to rain a bit at the end of the workout so the cool down was actually pretty nice.  Just need to stay healthy and uninjured for the next few days...

AM - easy 5.5 miles this morning - kept my HR under 70% which made the pace rather slow on a very warm and humid morning.  Felt a bit sluggish and constrained by the forced easy effort.  Whenever my pace and HR would creep up a little bit - I would actually feel better - but I kept backing off.  Flight to SLC is later this afternoon. 

AM - 4.0 miles with Rob up at the top of Big Mountain.  Rob wanted me to get a feel for the steepness of the downhill for the Des News Marathon on Monday.  I was surprised at how sore my quads were even though we were not really running that hard.  I am a bit concerned about how fatigued I will be in a full marathon given the severity of the descent here.  Oh well, I will just have to deal with it as best I can.

AM - easy 2.0 mile shake out run with Rob, followed by a few striders.  Hoping for good weather for tomorrow's race.

Wow, what a 'beast' of a race course.  Easily the toughest race I have ever run.  Rob and I had planned to run together, with Rob pacing me to hopefully finish with a sub-3 hour marathon for the first time.  I was a little concerned about the course on Saturday when we went up to the start to run the first few miles to get  an idea about what I'd be facing on the downhill on Monday.  My legs were fatigued after only 4 miles and I let Rob know that I wasn't so sure how the marathon would go.

On race morning, as planned, we clipped off 6 min miles for the first 4-5 miles with Rob pushing the pace a bit up in front of me.  When the road would level a bit, he would continue on the same pace, whereas I would slow to my normal aerobic pace.  I was not feeling all that great and noticed a hotspot on my left foot that I knew was a blister forming.  I have never had a blister in a race and I run in those shoes all the time - so I figured the steep downhill and the camber of the road caused the friction.

Anyway, as Rob got out ahead of me, he picked up the drinks and gels his wife Ann was waiting to deliver at mile 6 just before we started the climb up Little Mountain.  Rob handed me the gatorade and assured me the course would get easier.  He pushed out ahead again and motored up the mountain, and my Florida boy legs simply settled in for the grind to the top.  I think one of those miles was probably 8:45.  I got to the top and felt very good, even though I had been passed by about a dozen runners up the hill and I saw my pace per mile average was down to 6:57.  So, I decided to do my best to get the pace down to a 6:51 or better as we went down the Canyon. 

I immediately passed three runners and then saw Rob coming out of the short out and back at about mile 10.  He looked at me and asked if I was ok, and I said I was good - and did not expect him to wait or anything...I could see he was feeling good and possibly was weighing his options to race the rest of the way. 

Slowly but surely I began to move the average pace per mile downward until about mile 15 where it was showing 6:51 as I began to exit the Canyon.  I hoped that I could maintain that pace for the last 10 miles.

I saw Ann and the kids just before mile 16 and she said I looked good, and was still running well as I grabbed a bottle of gatorade from her.  The short hill at the zoo slowed my pace to 7:02 and I hoped I would be able to get things back under 6:51 after that, but that stretch on Foothill to almost mile 20 is really difficult with some uneven pavement, rollers, and speed bumps and I slowly began losing time.  I never got discouraged though, and kept hoping that I would start to feel better as the course turned downhill again past the stadium.  Indeed I had a few good miles until mile 24 where I think I ran 6:48 and had a slight glimmer of hope that I could get close to 3 hours.

Unfortunately, I got confused on where to turn left from South Temple and ran past the turn. The course was not really marked there and I saw no race volunteers or officials directing runners.  There was no one in front of me, and the runner immediately behind me followed me until I reached the parade route where a police officer told me I had run off the course.  He said I could stay on that road until I reached "30th" which meant nothing to me.  I let the female runner behind me catch up and let her know that we were off course.  I thought I just needed to find a turn to go back to the street that paralleled the one I was on.  So, when I found a break in the spectators lined up for the parade, I headed back on course. 

Eventually, I found my way to the last mile where I saw Rob, who ran with me for a little bit, and said I was doing well.  He then told me I had about 400 yards to the finish and alerted me that a female runner was bearing down on me - so I kicked it in to the finish - hoping not to stumble and fall because my legs were just about shot.  I was able to hold her off and finished at 3:08.  I think I lost about a half mile when I doubled back onto the course, so I may have run 3:05 or so - which I confirmed on my Garmin and on Runkeeper was the case for 26.2 miles (3:05:14) which does not include the time I lost when I had to speak to the cop and the slowed pace whilst I got my bearings.

This was a very difficult course in my opinion and though I did not run sub 3 - I was pleased with my effort and that I never got discouraged, even when I went off course.  I would not however, expect to run this one again!

Thanks to Rob and Ann and their kids for allowing me to bunk at their house this weekend and for the kind hospitility (and medical care for the blister!).

I was also glad that I got to meet a few folks from the blog and the winner of the race John Kotter.

Hats off to Rob for a negative split and his master's win.

Returned home late yesterday evening arriving at 12:30 am and off to work in the morning - quite sore and fatigued - probably take it easy this week.    Blister injury looks much improved - toes are bruised on the right foot from the downhill pounding.  No running today - as if that was even a possibility.

PM - lunchtime - mostly a walking effort with a few periods of light running 2.5 miles around the two lakes in the Carillon office park, just before a thunderstorm.  Even though I was really stiff and sore again today, this felt very good (excluding the first 100 yards or so of running - which was quite uncomfortable) - especially afterwards when I did some self massage with the foam roller in the gym.

PM - lunchtime - walking with more running, beginning to feel much less sore.  Walked the first mile and then ran the second mile in about 8 mins and then ran most of the last mile after some more walking.  Soreness was not a limitation to the effort today, but I want to gradually ease back into things and consciously restricted myself from just doing a "normal" aerobic run so that in a few days' time I will be soreness-free and ready to resume training.

PM - lunchtime run easy 5.0 miles on the Feathersound/Carillon Office Park loop.  Was feeling much more like normal this morning, so I was perhaps a little overly ambitious with this run as my legs still have the lingering soreness and it was very hot and humid.  In fact, my legs feel today (post 4 days) the way they normally feel 2 days after a marathon.  Anyway, I was glad I got out and moving with an actual run - rather than a walk / run or a zero.

AM - went out too late this morning around 8 am and was thinking I would run anywhere from 6 to 10 miles - and ended up at 9 and quite drained from the heat in the last couple of miles.  Probably should have kept it on the short side, but I am used to doing my long runs on Saturday mornings of late, and though I mentally was ready for one, my body is not yet fully recovered from the race earlier in the week.  Will take a full day of rest tomorrow.

Day of rest.