M'kay

6.5 miles in 49:30, 7:37/mi, HR 147.  1 mile in 8:32, HR 126 with the dogs.

Yesterday sunny and warm.  Today cloudy, windy, rainy...and warm.  Felt better than expected after yesterday's effort.  Aimed for recovery effort but pace still wound up fairly quick.  Guess I won't complain too loudly.

Adrenaline 8 - 34 miles.

8 miles in 1:01:02, 7:37/mi, HR 147. 1 mile in 8:55, HR 129 with the dogs.

Back to nice but cool weather. Felt a bit tired but kept pace easy. HR monitor went on the fritz early on but settled down. Resting up for tomorrow's Fartlek session.  Core workout after run today.

Asics GT 2120 - 194.31 miles.

11.33 miles in 1:24:00, 7:25/mi, HR 157. 30 minutes warmup, 3.68 mi, 8:10/mi, HR 153. 12x1 minute on/1 minute off Fartleks. 30 minutes cooldown, 4.22 mi, 7:06/mi, HR 150.

Good workout despite the bad winds and flurries that greeted me today. Most of the "on" sections were somewhat shielded by the winds by surrounding hills. Effort felt good throughout. Goal pace was in the 5:38-5:45 range and I hit that pretty consistently. Dealt with a bad side-stitch beginning around #5 and was gasping for air towards the end of #12 but otherwise uneventful. Tired legs carried me back home.

Brooks Adrenaline (Yellow) - 420.33 miles.

Completely unrelated to running, but boy, I love my new home office.  My industrious wife finished converting our formal dining room (which we never used) into a beautiful study for me to work from a few months ago. It has two nice big windows that look out onto the front and side of our property. Tonight the special treat was being able to sit and watch a momma and her baby (deer) feed on our grass. The baby was about 10 feet away from where I sat so I really got an up close viewing. Nothing like working on a tough work problem (aren't they all?) that's had my blood pressure up for a couple of days now and getting treated to some of nature's stress relief! Plus, less grass for me to mow! Bonus!!!

9 miles in 1:10:13, 7:48/mi, HR 148. 

Tough to make myself get out the door today...didn't get started until mid-afternoon.  Wanted to turn around and go home even after I warmed up.  Legs felt tired, heavy and clumsy.  Overnight snow had mostly melted but cold and depressing nonetheless.  Couldn't even bring myself to roust the dogs for their mile.  Bailed on core exercises today too.  Hoping tomorrow is better.

Adrenaline 8 - 43 miles.

12.87 miles in 1:32:17, 7:10/mi, HR 155. 30 minutes warmup, 3.72 miles, 8:04/mi, HR 144. 5 Tempo miles with splits 6:27, 6:28, 6:28, 6:27, 6:27, HR 170. 30 minutes cooldown, 4.15 miles, 7:14/mi, HR 144.

More snow and it was on the roads this morning, not ideal Tempo Run weather. Fortunately I managed to wait until much had melted from the roads and only had to deal with a couple of intermittent mini-blizzards. Tempo segments were hard but right in my range especially considering I was running on some rolling terrain. Garmin tried messing with my head today....Training Center wouldn't download my workout, history view froze the watch, and Motion Based/Sport Tracks both showed me 1 tempo lap short. Fortunately I can do basic math and the total times/lap splits didn't make sense without the missing lap so I was able to reconstruct it, but not before wondering if I'd lost it and only did 4 tempo miles. A resounding no...it was 5. My only question is why were these 5 so hard when I just ran a 15K (9.3) at a faster pace and it didn't seem this hard. Anyone? My only answer is race gear.

Asics GT 2120 - 207.18 miles.

6.5 miles in 49:42, 7:38/mi, HR 149.

This week of snow is getting old. The season's shouldn't be able to go in reverse. An easy effort trudging thru a mini-blizzard and a slush filled road. Feet wet immediately and just cold enough to be uncomfortable when wet. Whaaa!!!

Core exercises afterwards. 

Brooks Adrenaline (Yellow) - 426.83 miles.

Fast finish long run 20 miles in 2:24:14, 7:12/mi, HR 151. 2.58 mi cooldown run/trudge to the car in 21:19, 8:16/mi, HR 145.

Goal for today was FF Long run including 12 miles at ~:45-1:00 slower than MP, 6 miles MP, and 2 miles 10K race pace. Decided to run a couple of paved trails and meet my wife in Olympia for some follow-on errands afterwards so I was a bit out of my normal element for logistics. Wound up carrying one 24oz bottle of powerade with me.

First few miles were rough because of winds. Then the rain started but I managed to settle into a good rhythm and the pace (7:30-7:45) seemed pretty easy. Then the first set of hail arrived with more winds and I was carrying a few extra pounds of water in my clothes. Next the stomach cramps started and next thing I knew I was taking not one but two unscheduled pit stops in the middle of the woods. Resumed my trek passing thru intermittent rain and hail storms with occasional sun breaks that switched from very cold to almost unbearably hot and humid.

Increased speed at mile 12 to start hitting 6:40-6:50 miles. Found it a bit tough to keep that kind of speed and having difficulty mentally but refocused on the task and hand and settled in. Next six miles were 6:50, 6:50, 6:42, 6:46, 6:39, 6:45. Somewhere around this time the trail dumped me out in the middle of a road and disappeared. Uh oh. Took my best guess now worried about how to link up with Dianna afterwards if I didn't know where I was and pressed on. Bad encounter with a bus who decided to pull into a pedistrian crossing right in front of me. I expressed my displeasure with a loud slap on the bus rear which evidently startled the driver but I was more than a tad bit mad. Ran out of sidewalk, realized I'd lost the trail and turned around to try to find it. At this point, the last 2 of the fast finish miles kicked in and I did my best 10K race speed impression, which at this point was closer to 15K race speed.

Wound up backtracking and finding the trail again and hit the last two miles in 6:27 and 6:25 but couldn't have run at that pace much longer. This was really a tough run on so many levels but I felt good afterwards. Takeaways are that I need to reproduce my rehydration/fueling plan better on these runs, that tough paces are maintainable if I just focus on the task at hand instead of thinking about how much distance is left, and that it's better to know your route.

Due to my detour, I was now a couple of miles away from my pickup point, so I wound up running another 2.58 miles to complete the course. Probably a good thing as my calves were very tight from the short walk I did immediately after the initial run while calling my wife to let her know I was alive. Fed ourselves at the local IHOP afterwards and I consumed the entire plate.

One of the other tasks at hand for the day was my marathon course recon. Decided to drive the route with my Garmin on the dash. First, I'm glad we did as the course has many twists and turns in some sections that are good to know about in advance. It's also nice to have a bit of a clue where the course goes in case the signage is poor. But mostly all I'll remember is thinking "how did they manage to put some many hills in this thing!" The course is definitely hilly and will be challenging. I was pretty depressed after driving it thinking the sub-3 will be tough. After I uploaded the garmin results, I realized that although it looked bad and definitely had some steeper climbs/descents, the overall profile of the course is no worse than my normal run route x 2 which is about 22 miles total. I'll have to remind myself of that several times over the next few weeks as final preparations are made.

Adrenaline 8 - 65.58 miles.