Trails!

I massaged my calves to death this weekend and occasionally iced my foot when I felt a bit of inflamation.  It felt really good after not running on Sunday, so I decided to continue with my scheduled monday run.  It felt pretty good in the morning, I tried to warm it up before taking off on the run.  It hurt a bit during the run, but felt better than on Sat and much better than last week.

I ran the Millville and Providence hills loop with more clothes on today.  I overdressed this time, so as not to be hypothermic this time.  Started with 2 easy miles warmup (7:18, 7:13) then wanted to run a tempo 5-6 miles at 6:30 pace.  I started out just right for the first two miles, 6:30 and 6:30.  Then the uphill started (6:42 with same effort).  The next mile killed me as it was a progressively steeper hill (7:41).  The next mile, I was at 6:30 pace for the flat half and then it climbed again for 1/2 mile (7:00).  The next mile started at the peak of the hill and was a fast downhill that started to hurt my foot so I layed off a bit (6:14).  The last three miles home were slight downhill and at a comfortable pace. (6:25, 7:05, 6:50).  I feel good to have got that one over with.  The uphill section was meant to help me for the striders 10 Mile race but we will see.

Total Time: 75:26 (6:52 ave)

Ave Hr: 163

My foot hurt worse today, especially on the downhills.  I considered cutting the run short but didn't.  I ran through Providence and River Heights at a nice and easy pace.

Total Time: 59:15 (7:24)

Ave Hr: 152

My foot was feeling better today (maybe from the ACE bandage wrap job on it last night) but I decided to lower the intensity and keep the mileage up and see if that helps.  So today I changed my fartlek run to a general aerobic run.  My goal was to stay ahead of the 7:00 guy.  I did have a chance meeting with Paul on the river trail.  Only the dedicated run when its cold and early.  Dedicated or stupid, who knows??

Total Time: 1:16:26 (6:57 ave)

Ave HR: 160

Easy miles in Providence Hills.  Did 2x20 sec hill surges and 4x20 sec striders.  Foot felt about the same as yesterday.  The rain during the run was a nice change from the freezing temperatures and snow.

Total Time: 59:28 (7:18 pace)

Ave HR: 158 

Easy Pace on Landfill Loop.  Body felt very fatigued and sore.  I did some rock-climbing and a pull-up and bench-press competition on Wed night and it all caught up with me this morning.  I am very sore.

Total Time: 46:29 (7:44)

Ave HR: 149

Striders WRC 10 Mile race.

It lived up to its hype of another killer race.  After an easy 2 miles to warmup we hit the road.  The weather cleared up enough to make the race almost ideal.  It was breezy and maybe 5 degrees cooler than I would like, but ideal.  Not as many big names came to this race but there were still plenty of people there.

There were some course issues that made the course too short, so I will report my splits based on my Garmin.  By the way, it came out to be about .1 mile short.

Mile 1	6:03	Little up Little Down
Mile 2	5:24	All Downhill, people still pulling away from me
Mile 3	6:04	Rolling Hills
Mile 4	6:16	More Rolling Hills
Mile 5	7:03	Start of big hills
Mile 6	7:10	Uhh... hilly
Mile 7	7:43	Kill me now!!
Mile 8	5:42	Finally!  Downhill again
Mile 9	6:13	Slower than I wanted, people that I passed on uphill passed me back during this mile.
Mile 10	6:07 (ave)	Passed the people back on short uphill and kicked hard.  I passed a guy in the last 100meters.

Finished in 1:03:01 (6:18 ave Pace). 

Ave HR: 177 Max HR: 186 (during last .25mi) 

12th Place overall and 5th in Men 25-29

Official Results are here: RESULTS

I feel really good about it as I was able to work the uphills ok.  I still couldn't rip the downhills like the people around me. That may be something to work on.  My foot issue was not much of a factor.  I don't think it slowed me much if any.  It is nice that we have a break before the next race as my body is trashed right now.

Some people on the Blog had some GREAT races and Congrats to them.  Especially Paul and Ted.  They both ran very well.

Cooled down with some more miles.