I only run on days that end in a "y."

Woke up to a nice cool morning.  After Tuesday's MGP frolic through the hills on top of Saturday's hard long run, we decided to run some fartleks on the trail this morning.  Time to stay on a soft surface and get in some good turn over. We ran 8.5 miles with 20 x 1 min fast with 1 minute easy in between.  It was good to make it through these feeling strong, though I was really glad it was over when we finished.  

Ran 1.5 miles warm-up and met the group at the annex - then 8.5 miles with 20 x 1 minute fartleks for a total of 10 miles.  Paces for the first 5 were around 6:20, then dropped to low 6:00's, with the last 5 around 5:40 - 5:50 pace.  7:40-7:50's pace during recovery minutes.

3.2 miles of fast stuff.

Legs still a bit on the fatigued side and on the last fast minute I felt a pop in my right hamstring.  Fortunately, it feels fine now, and I think I will take tomorrow off.  We have a 21 mile long run with nothing but hills scheduled for Saturday.  Fun.

low 50's and pretty windy.  I gotta say that I am getting tired of hills.  First half of the long run reached a peak gain of over 300ft, then back down, and close to the same on the second leg. Lots and lots of rolling hills.  It has been good though - I am feeling more confident on the hills than 4 weeks ago. 

The groups got mixed up with those running 14 - who were running at a pretty good pace - and us running 21 - who ended up also running a good pace because of the other group.

I held back a little bit on the second half - the hills took a toll - the last 8 days have really taken a toll.  I could barely do easy strides at the end.  Tomorrow is my Birthday, so I plan on taking a day off, and I just might take Monday off, too.  My wife is traveling on Wednesday for a few days, so this week is going to be light mileage.   Probably just what I need.  

My quad held up pretty good.  A couple times I felt it but it was because of a miss step.  It's sore so I am icing it.  A couple days off would be good for it I am sure.  I think we are very close to being in race shape at this point - need to maintain, sharpen a bit, and arrive fresh and healthy. 

Splits all over the place due to the hills:  8:37, 7:45, 7:37, 6:48, 7:03, 7:01, 7:16, 6:54, 7:08, 6:50, 7:07, 7:16, 7:20, 7:12, 7:05, 7:05, 6:51, 6:57, 6:58, 7:00, 6:44, .5 with some strides. 

21.5 miles @ 7:10 AP.

After 2 full days off and a treatment on my quad yesterday I decided to go for an easy run this morning.  I did not wear my Garmin but I can tell you the pace was slow.  I am sure I will never go through a training period like the past Saturday to Saturday period - it destroyed my legs and nearly gave me a major injury.  If I had it all to do it all over again I would have replaced that Tuesday run with an easy run.  Live and learn they say.

My legs were very lethargic this morning but started feeling good by the last mile.  My quad is much better - probably 90-95% - so I will continue to take it easy this week.  I am pretty sure I won't get above 40 miles.  But hey, one of my running buddies just ran at 3:00:17 at Napa Valley this past Sunday on 40 miles a week training - so I am not too worried about taking an easy week at this point in my training.

Nice 8.5 mile easy run - did my regular out and back with a little extra - no watch but pace at the end was probably high 7:00's.  

A couple of times it was light rain - very enjoyable.

Quad is probably 95% - did not really bother me at all.  Still a bit on the sore side.  It seems to move around a lot - kind of hard to pinpoint. 

Possibly going to the gym at lunch to hit the core - time to really start in on getting stronger. 

PM - 45 minutes core - got to 10 x 200lb on the crunch machine!  Did some light leg extensions to gently work the sore quad, along with some one leg squats, regular back and core workout as well.

Had some more therapy on my quad - there was a knot deep that was causing all sorts of issues.  Seemed to have gotten it worked out, also got some good strengthening exercises for the hip and a really good stretch.  Should be back up to speed in no time.

7 ish miles - no pace watch - on Brushy Creek train in the rain - some paths of concrete by there was a 12-14 inch worn path right next to it of hard packed dirt - which at this point had turned a bit muddy.  Other parts crushed granite.  Never been there before but it was really pretty - would go again.  Pretty good pace at the end as it was coming down pretty hard and I was late to where I needed to be.

Went to the indoor track due to the rain.  Was going to go easy but this other runner kept looping me and well, I didn't like that.  So after a mile I sped up, caught and passed him  He kept with me the rest of the way.  I did not pay attention to lap times, I am guessing 6:20 pace.  3.5 miles at this pace, the other runner stopped when I hit 3 miles.  Then over 3 miles easy pace to finish the run.

My mom is here visiting, picked her up yesterday, so I actually had someone to watch the kids so I could go for a run.  My wife left town on business on Wednesday and isn't coming back until later today.  It was really a struggle to get in a run while she was away.

My leg felt much better so I figured I would go on a 14 mile run today.  I have lost one GPS watch and misplaced the other - so I am watchless.  I had a normal watch to keep track of time but otherwise I ran by effort.  I ran pretty hard so most likely low 7:00's for the majority, tried to push it at the end.  

I ran my 14 mile progressive run route but kept going until I felt like turning around.  I figured I was around 15.5 for the run but gmap shows the route to be 16.22.  I ran the last 3.7 miles in 26 minutes so right around 7:00 pace.  That seems to be about what I did most of the run at. Full 16.22 miles in 1 hour 57 minutes - so overall average pace was 7:12.

 Quad feels pretty good.

A bit over 6.5 miles in 60 minutes.  Still can't find my GPS watch but I know the route.  I ran the trail loop near the office during lunch.  Legs were pretty sore and it took a while to get going.  75 degrees and sunny - it was quite warm out.

Warm and muggy morning, and my body is not used to the time change yet.  My alarm went off at 4:50 and my body is saying "wait - it's 3:50!"  

Got to the annex a bit early and ran a couple easy.  Met up with Russ to do Barton Hills - lollipop loop - so putting down these miles as easy is a misnomer, there were anything but easy.  We hit the first hill about 1.5 miles in and it was rolling hills for the next 4 - 5 miles.  Nice finish via the trail.  There was no water set out so we carried on.  That was really mentally tough because I really wanted to stop 1/2 way through the hills.  

No GPS but Russ said the last mile was 6:40.  We ran 8 miles in 56 minutes so the AP was 7:00.  It felt hard but did not realize we were moving that fast.  See - there is a positive about not running with the Garmin all the time. 

1.25 easy miles cool down to finish it off.

Leg felt pretty good - I was worried a bit about the downhill stress but had no issues.  Actually felt fine after the run and even now. 

7 miles around the trail near the office during lunch.  It was humid but fortunately the sun stayed hidden, otherwise it would have been miserable. 

65 degrees/humid. 

I had to go into work last night at 9 pm and did not get home until midnight, in bed at 12:15, probably fell asleep around 12:30 - only to wake up at 4:55.  I had to get downtown at 5:30 to meet Dasha and borrow her fancy new touch screen Garmin.  I then ran a couple easy and met up with the Boston group at the annex.  After the coach spoke (seemed like eternity) we headed over to the track, so another 1.75 miles easy.  

I then did 8 x 1000 with 200m active recovery in between sets.  Nothing outrageous today speed wise - I kept it nice and relaxed and worked on turnover.  I didn't feel fatigued until #7 but I suspect that is normal, pushed through without a problem.  Although there were a lot of runners out there I did not have anyone running my pace.  Mike was there but had started early - he was already on number 5 when I arrived.  So I just ran them by myself.

I decided to take the long way back and really fatigue the legs, and it worked.  2.6 miles back.

1000m in 3:50 (6:10 pace) (warm-up)

1000m in 3:45 (6:02 pace)

1000m in 3:45 (6:02 pace)

1000m in 3:41 (5:55 pace)

1000m in 3:43 (5:58 pace)

1000m in 3:45 (6:02 pace)

1000m in 3:42 (5:56 pace)

1000m in 3:42 (5:56 pace)

1000m in 3:42 (5:56 pace)

As a side note, Garmin shows these long - .63 to .65 miles, which, if true, would make the pace closer to 5:37 - 5:43.  This is the pace that the Garmin said I was running during the repeats.  I am going to trust that the track is correct and that the Garmin is off.  I had to run around other runners a few times, but I can't believe it would have been off that much.

65 degrees, 100% humidity.

7 recovery miles this morning.  First mile was really slow.  9:22 AP pace.

68 degrees - high humidity.  Yuck.  Woke up at 6 am - right when the group should have been leaving the annex.  I knew the route so found them around mile 4.  Parked my car on a side road and jumped in with Woo.  Man - going from 0 to 7:00 mile pace is not easy, we turned the corner after 1/4 mile and hit the expo hills - also not fun without a warm up.   We met up with Farshid and I ended running with him as Woo took off later in the run, and we kept the pace right around 7:05 - 7:10 which felt nice and easy.  That seems to be a good sign.  

I think there was maybe 3 miles of this run where there were not any hills.  It was hard running to the annex - where I normally would have finished - and to have to keep going since I had to run to my car where I left it on the course. So 4 more miles to go at this point, and it was the first part of the cap 10k course - so all rolling hills to my car.  

I went a little bit extra to get in 19.  Around 7:15 AP for the run. 

Last week 30 miles, this week 80.  My legs held up pretty well.

In San Antonio with the family.  Slept in but managed 4 easy on the treadmill - get the legs moving a bit.

Warm and humid - continued recovery run - 7 super easy.  Legs started feeling better by the last couple miles.  Took it easy as still trying the quad from flaring up.  Rolled it last night for some time and it was sore this morning.

Tomorrow looks like a wash out - the prediction is for 3-4 inches of rain tonight through tomorrow am.  I may end up running a double - some at the gym in the am and then in the afternoon.  

AM - 4 inches of rain last night - lots of lightning and rain when I woke up.  So off to the gym, 10 miles on the indoor track.  This really isn't too bad with music and getting into a zone.  

Will be going on at lunch for 6 more.

I think I will finally take a day off tomorrow - we are doing a tempo run on the hills Thursday.  Would like to get to 6 miles of tempo pace.

PM - I was really on the fence about what to do for lunch.  I ultimately decided on some 400's to work on turnover/speed.  I did not over do-it since 1) I had run 10 miles already and 2) I only had an hour to squeeze this in.  I ran over to the 1/2 mile trail loop and did some warm up laps, and then did 9 x 400m on the crushed granite portion.  After a couple I decided to turn this into a Fartlek style workout but running the other half of the loop - which is covered in wood chips - as recovery.  This took about 2 minutes so it worked out great and allowed me to add to my mileage at the same time.  I did not rest but kept this up as a continuous loop - 400m hard, 400m recover, repeat.  I set up the distance alert on the Garmin so I would run the correct distance.  It was hard to keep consistent on the trail so my lap times varied a bit but I managed to start hitting them on the last few.  

9 x 400m 1:30 (first couple) down to 1:23 on crushed granite trail with 400m active recovery.

Easy pace back to the office - 7 miles total.

As a side note I reached in my gym bag to grab my kinvaras and they weren't there, fortunately I had the A5's.  I hit a couple puddles on the way back - bad thing about the A5's is that they have holes in the soles - but that is also a good thing, too, because the water drains back out. 

55 degrees - felt cool but a bit humid.  

I mile warm up and then I met Russ at the annex.  The group was doing Fartlek on the trail but we had decided on a tempo run.  This might be the last one before the big show.  In the end it was a wise choice because the trail was dark and washed out in some places and we heard from other runners that it was not a good run.

We ran 5 easy to the top of Expo and 35th then ran 5 tempo miles through the Expo hills, over LAB and then 2 miles on the trail.  I wasn't sure I would do to well because my legs still felt a bit off from Tuesday.  However, it all worked out in the end.  Big surprise too coming back as a strong wind was right in our faces.  The trail definitely took some pace off, there was the initial part where it was a bit dark and I stumbled a couple steps but managed to keep it going.  Our easy miles were a little fast at the end, too, I looked down at one point and we were at a 6:58 pace.  I thought our pace was pretty good through the hills and overall we were pretty happy with the run.

6 easy - progressive up Expo hills - 8:18, 8:01, 7:41, 7:17, 7:07

and then 5 @ tempo:  6:26, 6:24, 6:20, 6:30, 6:15.

Lunch:  1 mile warm up and then hammered the quads with extensions, lunges, and one legged body squats, plus core.  Trying to toughen up the quads a bit for the downhills.

6 recovery early in the morning.  Legs felt beat up - took it slow.

 PM - 4 easy after work.

Slept in after 9 hours of sleep!  The legs are definitely feeling the stress I have been putting on them these last 2 weeks.  5 easy before the last big 23-24 mile run tomorrow which will be 3 weeks out from marathon day.

Met Russ and Mike at the Barton Springs pool parking lot and took off about 9:25.  We then header over to the annex to pick up one of our coaches who wanted to get 20 miles in.  On our way we ran into the Cap 10k runners so we hijacked the race and ran the last couple miles of the race to the annex.  We caught the right group as they were doing 7:20's.  We couldn't find the coach at the meet up point so we took off on the trail.  He had gone ahead hoping to catch us coming the other way on the trail.  We found him about 4 miles later.  He had put out water and gatorade stations earlier every 2.5 miles.  This was a life saver - it was hot.  Full sun and 70's for most of the run.  At the end I was just hanging on wanting it to be over as soon as possible.  The Expo hills coming back were particularly hard.  This was not a pace run but a time on feet run - and I haven't done a run like this in a long time.  We had some 7:05s and some 7:30's and everything in between.  Glad it's over.  The last 2 weeks were hard but I plan on cutting back significantly over the next 3 weeks and to try to get to Boston with some really fresh legs.

We jumped into Barton Springs at the end of the run after strides.  Very nice reward!

The Three Amigos caught on camera in the race:

https://webspace.utexas.edu/ab2293/www/Running_Photos/CAP_10_K/img191.jpg

High 50's but humid.  Met up at the annex for 8 easy on the trail.  I did a bit before so ended up with 9 miles.

Coach preached to the Boston group to stay on the trail or soft surfaces for all easy and recovery runs from here on out.  Good advice, like always.

Started low 8:00's and worked down to 6:35 at the end - enough to fire the muscles for the last 10 minutes and work on muscle memory at MGP and slightly faster.

Legs felt pretty good overall - a bit tired - but no major ill effect from 23 miles on Sunday.

It is going to be a challenge to cut back my mileage - I won't know what to do with myself. :-)

5 easy on the soft trail near the office.  Warm and humid - light rain at the end.  8:10 AP.

Preparing mentally for tomorrow's tempo intervals on track.

Low 60's, high humidity.  Met Russ at the annex at 5:30 and did an easy warm up to the Austin High track.  We met Mike there who was starting his 3rd 1000.  This workout is not particularly hard, just long.  We ran 8 x 1000m at HMP or faster, with 400m active recoveries with no stopping.  It ends up being about 5 miles worth of tempo pace but the 400s break it up so it is not too taxing on the body.  At this point it's all about keeping the workouts fairly easy.   Ran easy back to the annex for a bit over 10 miles total.  

I am in denial at this point that Boston is less than 2 1/2 weeks out.  

1000m intervals @ tempo ish pace with 400m recoveries around 8:10 pace

3:59 (6:24 pace)

3:58 (6:24 pace)

3:53 (6:14 pace)

3:54 (6:16 pace)

3:51 (6:11 pace)

3:47 (6:05 pace)

3:50 (6:10 pace)

3:37 (5:49 pace)

5 recovery miles at lunch time. Warm and humid - stayed on the trail.

14-15 on tap for tomorrow.

Close to 70 degrees, muggy start.  The group took off at 6 am, Mike and I ran a half mile down the opposite direction on the trail so that we would get in 15 miles.  I had run a half mile before the start.  

The course was Expo hills, Mt. Bonnel, Scenic, Enfield hills, then finish on the trail.  

I had a crappy run, nothing in my legs the last couple miles, Mike took off with 4 miles to go and I couldn't stay with him.  It was miserable, I am actually quite depressed.  I thought I would be feeling good around now in the training cycle but I feel worse. I couldn't generate any leg speed for the life of me - no strength, nothing... Not sure what to make if it all. 

I came home and slept for an  hour and a half. 

Next training cycle I am sticking to what has worked for me.  I feel like I just want to get through Boston and take some time off.  Hopefully, I will cheer up later today.

9:09, 8:34, 7:49, 7:44, 7:26, 7:16, 7:13, 7:43, 7:24, 7:06, 7:21, 7:22, 6:55, 7:11, 7:28, .5 @ 7:02.   7:30 AP.