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

sleep, sweet sleep.  If that is not a song it should be.  After a nap on Saturday and a solid 8 plus hours Saturday night and another solid 8 hours Sunday night I felt pretty good.  I went out for 6 recovery on the soft train in the heat at lunchtime.  8:40's.

5:30 am - close to 80 degrees and high humidity.  Ran 2.5 miles or so to the Talleyrand Park and met Kevin.  We did 7 miles through his neighborhood and then I ran 3 back to the house.   Legs still do not feel 100%.  Picked up the pace on the 3 back to sub 7:00.  I hit a really long and steep hill somewhere between the last bit of mile 2 and into mile 3.  Still managed 7:30 pace up the hill but I did have to take a quick breather at the top.  My heart does not appreciate this warm weather!  Continued the long way home.  Most miles in 7:40's - 7:50s; with last 3 @ 6:50's not counting the time to catch my breath.

Ran at lunchtime - 98 degrees - sunny, hot, humid - a scorcher - so I went to the indoor track at the gym instead! Felt great - nice controlled temps. I started on the treadmill and that lasted about 2 minutes. Man, I despise the treadmill. So I jumped off and hit the indoor track loop. Much better - 7 miles @ 7:50s or so.

Wow - a cold front - 73 degrees and lower humidity this morning - it actually felt cool.  I decided to run with the training goup this morning.  I arrived early so I could get in 1.5 easy before the group left.  The scheduled workout was a 7 mile loop around Town Lake with 2 sets of 5,4,3,2,1 minutes fast with 1 minute easy inbetween each "fast" part.  The problem was that there was no way we could get the full workout in on the 7 mile loop.  I talked some runners into adding a mile along the trail by going up north 1/2 mile and then turning and starting the workout at that point. The thought was with the added distance we would be able to get both sets in.  It worked out well though we still missed the last fast 1 minute.  We had to cut our last recovery to 30 seconds to squeeze in the last 2 minutes, though.

This was a mentally tough workout but not as bad as a straight tempo.  This is actually an excellent way to get in some lactate threshold / tempo work in these warm temps.  We ran our fast portions around 6:10 and easy minutes around high 8:00s.  Anyway, I got in close to 5 miles of LT work.

4 miles easy to start:  9:11, 8:20, 7:37, 7:29 and then the fun part:

Time	Pace	Distance	Recovery Distance
5 mins	6:08	0.82	0.1
4 mins	6:10	0.65	0.1
3 mins	6:08	0.5	0.1
2 mins	6:10	0.32	0.1
1 min	5:59	0.17	0.1
5 mins	6:12	0.81	0.1
4 mins	6:19	0.65	0.1
3 mins	6:20	0.48	0.05
2 mins	5:55	0.32
		4.72	0.75     Lunch - 50 mins  - 13 miles on the bike at the gym at aerobic capacity.  Mark as 4 miles run.

75 degrees and humid at 6:00 am.  Ran with the group this morning.  When I looked at the posted route: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=4532264  all I could see was the elevation chart - nothing like some good hills on a hot and humid morning.  I felt good with the pace considering the heat and course.  Hopefully it translates into a much faster pace in cooler conditions.  I spoke to my mom in Nebraska (marathon is 120 miles to the north) and they were wearing coats last night.  I hope the weather stays cool up there for 2 more weeks.

Spits:  9:00, 8:33, 7:50, 7:45, 7:36, 7:18, 7:17, 7:20, 7:10, 7:20, 7:14, 7:19, 7:19, 6:47, .5 @ 5:54 (pick-ups)