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

70 degrees and high humidity.  Fun stuff.

Got to the annex early and did a warm up on the trail and then met Russ and Mike at the annex.  Sticking to the trail all this week.  The main Boston group was doing the 10 mile fartlek with MGP, HMGP, 10k pace, etc.

Mike didn't want to do that - he thinks it is too strenuous at this point.  So we did 8 miles on the trail and with 4 miles to do started a 12 x 1 fartlek with 1 minute easy in between.  Our easy bits were low 7:00's which may not seem hard except that our fast minutes were 5:45-6:05 paces.  Let's just say I was glad we were done when we hit number 12.  I finished the last 3/4 @ slightly faster than MGP (6:30 pace) to get a feel for running tired.  The heat is definitely taking some getting used to.

Lunchtime - 45 minute spinning - good solid effort.  Get the blood flowing and loosen up the hips a bit.  Felt pretty good afterward.

Had a deep tissue massage from Kip - the Kenyan marathoner.  He gave me some crazy advice.  My favorite was this:  Wake up at 4:00 am on Saturday - don't eat anything - go for a 12 mile run.  Come home, shower, eat, go back to sleep.  Wake up in a couple hours, go for another 12 mile run.  Come home, take it easy all day.  Go out at 5 pm for another 12 mile run.  Maybe if I was single I might try this one time.  He did finally say one could start doing this with going for time and not mileage, and don't wear a Garmin, and go out on a route you have never been on before.  So go out for an hour, repeat 2 more times.  No wonder the Kenyan's dominate the sport.

5 easy on the trail at lunchtime.  Warm and sunny - no watch.  Legs are feeling a bit better.

Warm and muggy.  It felt a bit cooler than it actually was.  1.5 miles easy and then met Russ and Mike.  The rest of the group was running Yasso 800's.  It's a good track workout, but I don't really get anything else from it.  I know I can go run 2:50's and I also know I can't run a 2:50 marathon, so in that regard it really doesn't tell me much.  

We decided to continue with the taper and healing and instead run the 7 mile trail loop with 3 miles progressive and one mile cool down with 10 second strides on and off on the last half mile. 

I don't have my Garmin in front of me but we ran low 7:00's for the warm-up and then 6:50, 6:40, 6:30 ish on the trail.  The effort was there even if the pace doesn't reflect it.

Looks like I will put in a whopping 38 miles this week.  

45 minutes spinning at lunchtime, solid effort.

Met Kevin for an easy run.  I haven't seen him in ages so it was good to catch up.  I didn't have my Garmin but he said we had run 44 minutes when we parted ways.  This was his neighborhood and he gave me a couple directions, but of course I took a wrong turn and ended running up Talleyran, a rather long and steep hill.  55 minutes total running.  I'll put down 6.5, could have been closer 7.

68 degrees and humid.  We decided to start late today, 6:30, which was a nice change.  Unfortunately, there was some dog walk that they shut down the streets for.  So I had to park about 1/2 a mile way and then run to the annex.  I saw the main group leave and Russ and Mike were no where to be found.  Finally Russ showed up and Gilbert, our coach, told us to run with him.  Mike was nowhere to be found so we went.  We ended up running the entire run with Gilbert which was awesome.  He told us some great running stories along the way - it made time fly.  4 MGP miles at the end - my legs felt the best they have in a while.   

MGP miles on the trail:  6:50, 6:43, 6:36, 6:43.