I am one with the levee and the levee with me

12 on the levee. Quads are so sore. 6:50 average with 4 miles in 6:26, 6:11, 5:59, 6:00. Felt good for a little bit in the 3rd faster mile, but otherwise did not feel good at all.

4 easy

12 easy, 7:02 avg. Quads almost normal. Will attempt small workout tomorrow.

12 easy. Kids were sick this morning, so I had to skip the morning run and do this at night. 

4 x 1 mile @ threshold effort. 5:40, 5:35, 5:27, 5:26. Aerobically felt fit, but my legs are going to take awhile to catch up. Afterwards my right peroneal tibial tendon flared as it has in the past. Will treat it, but if it turns into an extended flare up I'm ready to throw in the towel on this cycle.

12 recovery, no watch. Legs sore.

12 easy, no watch

Long run. I had planned for 12 easy + 6 x mile but my calves were still trashed from the Weds workout. So I changed it to a progression run where I could push the pace hard in the final few miles if I felt good, or just work down to about marathon effort if I didn't. 

I started from City Park and ran the first "old-man mile" in about 7:40, then dropped down to low-7s. Under 7:00 by mile 3 and worked down to 6:35 by mile 10. From there I upped the tempo and went 6:19 then 6:06 and continued to drop down to 6:00 by the time I got back to the park at 14. I reached my car at 14.5 and swapped out the Pegs for the Flyknit Streaks for the final mile. My hips really tightened up while I was stopped, but I managed 5:56 for mile 15 and got them limbered up again.

From there I did a loop around City Park, got up on my forefoot and just cruised 5:46-5:48 to mile 20. Aerobically I felt fine. My legs held up, but they're still becoming accustomed to the volume after my illness, so I felt it was prudent to not push harder than I did. The best part about the run was not crashing and not having issues with muscle fatigue. I think I may still have a shot at a PR at Houston, though I've relaxed my time expectations considerably considering the many setbacks in this training cycle.

Weather wise it was 50s, rainy, and windy. Not bad, but my clothes got soaked and I felt bogged down a bit.

Rest. My right knee flared during yesterday's run and I'm letting it rest today.

12 easy.

AM - 6 x cruise mile on the levee, 1:00 rests. 

5:31, 5:25, 5:24, 5:21, 5:20, 5:15

My legs are coming back. Started conservatively and ran a bigger cutdown than I normally do, but I just felt better as I went. The left calf was complaining from rep 2 on, but nothing flared or gave me indication to go easy. Just have to beat that muscle into submission. 

Weather was great. There was frost on my cars but my phone said it was 43°F out. Felt cold. But the wind was down this morning -- rare for the winter. I had this workout penciled in for today or Weds but had to jump on the opportunity for good weather.

12 moderate. 7:09 avg with most in the 6:40-7:00 range following the old-man 1st mile.

AM - 12 easy w/ 15-30s pickups. I didn't keep track of how many, but did a number of pickups from miles 6-9. Needed to get the legs moving. Hips feel terrible. Effort was less then mile pace but faster than 5k pace.

PM - 6 easy

12 easy

Big workout. 3.5 WU, 6400m @ T, 7.5 E, 3 x 1600m @ T (200m jog rests), 1.75 CD.

6400m = 21:29 (5:25, 5:21, 5:21, 5:22) -- Feel asleep on first 200 in 44s

7.5 E = kept pace honest at 6:50-7:05

3 x 1600m = 5:19, 5:19, 5:19

Tough, tough workout, but everything was controlled throughout. I'm mourning the 20:5x shape I displayed a few weeks ago on a 4-mile tempo, but everything is moving in the right direction. PR at Houston could still be in the cards.

AM - 12 easy

PM - 4 easy. Starting the week off right with a double.

12 easy. Still racking up miles on the old Zealots. I'm surprised they still feel good -- the soles are wearing off, but the midsole seems to be holding up well.

Big workout. Experimenting with a different type of workout.

Continuos 9 miles with (2 MP + 1 T) x 3. I didn't quite hit the paces I think I should have, but the effort was pretty darn close. I may be getting sick. And the wind messed with me a little bit. Otherwise I needed to up the intensity just a touch, especially on the MP segments.

I need to look at the Garmin, but I believe my splits went like this (wind direction):

5:47 (tail)

5:44 (tail)

5:25 (neutral)

5:45 (neutral)

5:50 (head)

5:30 (head)

5:38 (tail)

5:53 (head)

5:14 (tail)

5:38 avg

AM - 12 easy

PM - 6 very easy. Had some weather roll in. 40s, windy, and rainy. Not the most pleasant run, but it's done.

12 easy

AM - Big workout. 6 mile warmup around City Park, then 4-3-2-1 (3:00, 3:00, 2:00 rests). Paces per 1600m.

22:14 (5:38, 5:33, 5:34, 5:29)

15:59 (5:20, 5:20, 5:19)

10:42 (5:21, 5:21)

5:18

This was a doozy. The opening 4 were supposed to be MP but I could not bring the pace down after that 5:33. Things got uncomfortable halfway into the 3-mile and remained that way to the end. 

PM - 4 recovery

6 recovery

AM - 12 easy including a mini-mini-workout of 6 x 200m levee sprints.

PM - 6 easy

This was my Haile G inspired Christmas 10 miler.

Workout. The last 2 weeks have been solid with big workouts and plenty of distance at T and MP. Since the long runs have gone well, I wanted to deviate from the well-beaten Daniels path slightly in order to hit some faster paces. Today would have been a good day for a 5k-pace workout, but experience has shown that 5k pace at 4:30am on the levee doesn't go well. So I did 6 x mile cutdowns, starting at T and working down to 5:05. I would have liked to see sub-5 on the last 2 or at least the last one, but I couldn't get there. The usual light winter breeze was there, and it impacted the even numbers. (I say "winter breeze" but it was 60°F. Winter in New Orleans.)

6 x mile (3:00 rests)

5:25 (down)

5:23 (up)

5:10 (down)

5:12 (up)

5:05 (down)

5:07 (up)

I felt pretty terrible on the warmup and first rep and thought this was going to be a blown workout. Was working up a fartlek in my mind to sub into if things went downhill, but I surprised myself on rep 3 by nailing the targeted 5:10. Then hit the targeted 5:05 on #5 and still felt decent. By the end I felt like I could hit 2 more in the 5:05-5:10 range without going to the well. I think that's perfect for this workout.

Saturday will be a long grinder. It was important to get an injection of speed today.

AM - 12 pretty slow. Windy morning and didn't feel great.

PM - 6 easy

12 easy

Big workout. 23 miles with last 10 at MP. I ran into some of the local runners and continued on with them. Their run dovetailed nicely in with mine, so I made some adjustments from the original plan to stay with them until they finished.

First 4 miles easy starting in 7:55 and dropping to 7:00. Then the 5-12 dropping from 6:50 to 6:20. At 12.5 we started MP. I started in the Bostons and hung with Rich in 5:44, 5:43, 5:41, and 5:46 (with a 180 and a goodbye). Ran to my car to swap out the Bostons for the Flyknit Streaks. The difference was night and day. Streaks are a fantastic shoe. Mile 5 was only 5:47 due to another 180 and sluggishness getting going again after the stop.

Then I settled into a comfortable pace. Surprised myself with a 5:33. Eased up just a little but still went 5:35, 5:34. I was well past mile 20 and feeling like I was hardly working. It was... surprising. I didn't intend to speed up but the next split was 5:30. Then I did speed up but only saw a drop to 5:28. 

Averaged 5:38 for 10 with the last 5 in 5:32. I'm ready to roll. I was thinking I'd be happy to break 2:30 again given the setbacks, but I'm setting my Houston goal at 2:26:xx. It would be disengenuous to say the fast miles were easy at the end of a 23 miler, but I was hardly stressed given the workload. I felt like I could continue running low-5:30s for another 10.

12 easy