our choices show what we truly are

Another slow recovery run 8.5 miles at 6:00/km. I am just tired and eager to go to sleep.

Not enough time to run tonight, 5 miles no watch. Recovery is going fine.

My legs are almost back to normal, 10 miles at 5:24/km but I started pretty slow and finished at marathon pace. I am very happy that last race didn't disrupt too much my training.

5 miles at 5:30/km, not much else for tonight.

I am rarely able to do during a training what I planned in advance, today was not one of those day. I wanted to run 29 km at marathon pace and even though my running buddy bailed out (he sent me a message late last night) I accomplished that. The only "negative" thing was that it was an awesome day with perfect running conditions, I felt like I had an unfair advantage, other than that I felt great from the beginning to the end, kms were passing fast, I didn't loose my concentration and during the last km I really felt great, not slowing down. I am building up my confidence for the upcoming marathon.

29.2km in 2:10:34 4:30/km

7 miles at 5:51/km. It was a slow recovery run, but considering yesterday's run, I feel almost completely recovered.

I know my entries are boring a few big runs and a lot of recovery runs, this is the way it is right now. Another recovery run, 8.6 miles at 5:51/km.

My focus is pretty much on my long runs at marathon pace during the weekend and lots of slow miles during the week.

8.2 miles at 5:53/km. Evening run alone, not much else.

Another 8.2 miles at 5:44/km, life is officially back in my legs.

Tonight I felt really good but I didn't want to push the pace too much, I started very slow and progressively accelerated to marathon pace and a little below. 8.6 miles total at 4:52/km average.

Ready to rock and roll this weekend with another long run.

Long stressful day at work I was very glad to go running to clean up my brain. 5 miles at 5:33/km. It was my rest day for the week before tomorrow long run. 

I wanted to run, after last week, a longer distance at marathon pace and for all the obvious reasons (last week long fast run, last week mileage and just two days ago another 6 good miles at marathon pace) did not happen. I started feeling so and so but well rested, not great, but it was OK until I reached the first incline of the road I started slowing down, bad sign not even a mile into the run. Last week I was always 10-20 seconds under goal time, today I struggled to stay 10-20 seconds above, when I got to mile 13.7 with a decent hill in front of me I gave up, since then things went from slower to bad, I did 13.7 in 1:39 and the remaing 6.5 miles in 54:00 in spite of the fact I was trying to stay below 8min/mile. I walked a mile at the end to get to the car just to relax my muscles and keep my legs moving, but I was really tired.

Negative things : I am not able to sustain yet two big runs at MP on two consecutive weekends on high mileage.

Positive things: it was another spectacular spring day with perfect running conditions, I did at least another half marathon and change at MP and I managed to complete on dead legs 6.5 miles (alone).

Rest day today. Trying to recover from yesterday's run. One hour core exercises.

I got home and I was sick with fever and headache.

I am feeling much better than yesterday, I went out for a short run and I struggled for two miles. 

I was feeling much better tonight I went out with the idea of doing a 10k and then I warmed up, legs and lungs were doing their job, I ended up with a few more km.

I am happy that things are going back to normal.

The last 7 days I ended up doing an un-intentional tapering week. I discovered that doing two long runs for two consecutive weekends at marathon pace it is not in my legs and in my brain. During the second one after 13-14 miles I slowed down big time with my legs totally numb toward the end. On top of that the next few days I got sick and the rest of the week was stressfull due to a big deadline this coming wednesday. In spite of that I wanted to do another 13 miler last saturday at marathon pace thinking that I was completely recovered, but it didn't happen, after ten miles I was already exhausted and I stopped after 10 miles. 

I learned the lesson the hard way, too many miles too fast combined with stress at work means disaster. Now I am in real recovery phase, this week just a few slow miles with the goal to try to recover for sunday's race.

I think I got a little bit "overtrained" but I am still hopeful for sunday, otherwise, as usual, I will get what I can. I am keeping my "legs" crossed (not much running).

Rest and relaxing day, at least in the running department. Last day of stress at work.

A nice 5 mile run, my legs feel much better than last saturday. Tomorrow another rest day just to be cautious for next sunday. Weather is cold again, strong wind from the north, conditions for next sunday look bad, oh well not much I can do about it.

Last training run before sunday's half marathon. 5 miles at 6:00/km.

Rest day, cleaning up, pruning trees and taking care of the garden. I am trying to relax my mind.

The short version I started with the goal of keeping 4:10/km till the end for 1:28 final time and I finished in 1:27:58.

The longest version. I don’t get why this race is so popular (about 10000 runners) it is not scenic and it is just a long straightaway on a freeway from Rome basket ball arena to the sea (Ostia), for those of you living in Utah it is like running from the Energy Solutions Arena to the Salt Lake marina, on I-80, or on the causeway from Antelope Island. No crowd support along the way except for the wind usually coming from the sea inland making the whole run miserable and nothing to engage your eyes except for a couple of hills.

Back to my day. I woke up at 6 am and by 7 I was on my way to Rome with my running buddy. We parked our car ½ mile from the start but very close to the subway station, where we would come back. We realized that the temperatures were not as low as expected, around 35 degrees, cloudy sky and no wind, we thought that if these were the conditions in Ostia it would have been perfect.

We stopped at the porta potties, we undressed for the race and we put on a plastic cover to try to stay warm along with a couple of cotton T-shirt, and then we headed for our corral, called in Italian “the cage”. We went inside to try to stay as close as we could to the front line and we waited there 30 minutes warming up just jumping up and down along with the rest of the crowd.

Finally at 9:15 sharp race started we got rid of our extra "clothes" and in 15 secs we started our race. My running buddy went ahead immediately, he is faster than me, and I saw him again at the finish line. After 1km there was the huge wall of the 1:30 pacing group occupying all four lanes so I decided to push to pass them and finally I was able to run my own pace. From km 2 to km 6 I was on pace (or slightly ahead, due to the surge to pass the 1:30 group) and I felt very relaxed and the conditions were still great. First short hill (a few hundred meters) I slowed down just a little but then I recovered my cruising pace immediately, second hill was longer approx. the whole km and I slowed down even more but I recovered lost time in the down hill side. The third hill (called “ il camping” hill, because there is campground at the top) is the worst is 1.5 km long and after two hills can kill your pace for the rest of the race, plus on top of the hill you can see the finish line (we were at mile 8) and if it is windy you will meet Sir Wind right there. I accepted my fate and I started slowing down all the way to 4:56, instant speed, for a 4:46 average pace, at the top there was a marching band but more importantly there was no wind. The next km was flat at the top, I kept loosing ground my legs were dead, I felt impossible to recover my top speed. On the downhill section, I went back to my 4:10 pace and I felt almost worse, if I could not go under 4:10 downhill no way I could keep pushing the same pace for the rest of the race. I decided to take one km at a time and strange enough I started again going under 4:10, with two km from the end my legs were pieces of lead, I kept my head down, the only real mental push was during the last km when I realized that even slowing down to 5min/km I would still improve my PR. After the finish line I stopped the GPS and I could not believe I was under 1:28.

I found my running buddy, he finished with a good 1:25:39, we collected our stuff and we walked for another km to the bus that took us to the train station to get the subway back to our car in Rome.

My goal for this race was to try to go under 1:27, I started conservatively shooting for 1:28 and then I realized that with those hills I could not keep the pace for a faster finish. I am incredibly happy about my performance, I mentally never gave up, thanks also to the huge crowd of runners, every time I slowed down I was passed by ten people so I knew right away I was slowing down, that’s the reason because many people do their PR here, in spite of the hills and the wind.

Plus as added bonus weather was perfect, overall a great race. Now time to recover and taper for the marathon in three weeks. Stay tuned.

 My splits:

Split             Time     min/Km          Delta   min/Km

Km 5         0:20:39       4,07              0:20:39     4,07

Km 10       0:41:31        4,09             0:20:52     4,10

Km 15       1:02:35        4,10             0:21:04     4,12

Arrivo        1:27:58        4,10             0:25:23     4,09

I went out just for a slow motion jog to keep blood flowing in my muscles. I stopped after 4 miles because it started raining I didn't want to get wet. Legs tonight are already much better than this morning, my right leg is much more sore than my left one, this is the first time I noticed this asymmetry.