May the Mass x Acceleration be with you

AM

3 miles easy in 24:11 - feeling pretty good for a morning run.  Splits: 8:21 - 8:02 - 7:49

Noon

7.5 miles in 59:45 (7:58/mile)

Felt good, easy, rained, no wind, ok temp, pretty nice run. Although the snow is mostly gone from the area there are still lots of downed branches on the trails around work. Lots of trails are barely passable, others aren't.

Oh yeah, I accepted the job offer I got on Monday. Still kind of reeling. I spent all day thinking, praying, talking with my wife and others to try to make up my mind. I decided to work at home so I could just focus on it, but then the power went out and I had to go in. God had a bunch of people cross my path while I was in the office that contributed to accepting the offer, so I guess God had His way with me.

Splits: 8:38 - 8:00 - 7:52 - 7:43 - 7:46 - 7:40 - 8:07 - 3:59

AM

Easy 3 this morning in 23:37, felt really good in the crisp, foggy air. Splits: 8:14 - 7:51 - 7:32

Noon

12.45 miles in 1:34:00 (7:33/mile) 

Perfect day for a run - low 40s, no wind, no rain, overcast, but bright white clouds, not the dark gray and black scary kind.

Legs a little tight, but not that soreness that I've been struggling with for weeks. The easier pace has been paying off, and I am getting some good mileage this week, somewhere in the top 5-10 on the mileage page right now, I think. That's only because my long run was on Sunday, instead of Saturday, though.

 Splits:  8:03 - 7:41 - 7:28 - 7:24 - 7:33 - 7:21 - 7:30 - 7:30 - 7:33 - 7:40 - 7:27 - 7:32 - 3:17

AM

Easy 3 in 23:57. I'm feeling surprisingly good after 12 yesterday. Kind of interesting splits. Splits: 8:09-7:59-7:49

Noon

7.2 miles in 55:16 (7:40/mile)

Quads a little sore today, not too surprising. Beautiful, sunny day with temps in the low 50s. I brought a jacket but took it off around 3 miles in, so the rest was in shorts and short sleeves! It's supposed to continue for at least 5 days.

Splits: 8:19 - 7:45 - 7:43 - 7:36 - 7:27 - 7:27 - 7:27

4.02 miles in 31:33 (7:51/mile)

19.06 miles in 2:23:59 (7:33/mile)

Another beautiful day, around 50 at the start and 60 by the end. I'm getting to the point where one water bottle isn't enough for my long runs.

Legs did pretty well today, and the run didn't become really hard until the last two, although I was pretty much wiped by 12 miles. This has me feeling more ready for a marathon. This is probably my longest run since my last marathon, more than a year ago.

Splits:

1st half: 8:09 - 7:48 - 7:49 - 7:39 - 7:36 - 7:23 - 7:28 - 7:35 - 7:37

2nd half:7:32 - 7:38 - 7:31 - 7:32 - 7:22 - 7:16 - 7:27 - 7:19.5 - 7:27 - 7:26

5 miles in something like 39:48. Hey, I'm just glad to be able to run under 8/mile the day after my long run.

7:00 AM - 26 degrees

Easy 4.07 miles in 32:27. I felt pretty good, only my ears were cold. Everything else was bundled up, unlike that brain-damaged teenager I saw waiting for the bus wearing shorts and a short-sleeved shirt. I guess he's too cool to be cold.

Splits: 8:24 - 7:53 - 7:52 - 7:46

10:30 AM - Sunny, warm, probably mid-50s at the start. amazing how fast it warms up once the sun comes out!

12 miles in 1:32:40 (7:43/mile). More pain in the quads today, but manageable. No brain-damaged teens at least.

Splits: 8:03 - 8:01 - 7:44 - 7:36 - 7:38 - 7:24 - 7:30 - 7:36 - 7:37 - 7:48 - 7:41 - 8:03 (last mile was after my weight-room workout)

Whoa, 4th place on the mileage board. Crazy! Of course that's only because I did my long run on Sunday again.

6:30 AM

4.05 easy miles. Warmer today, around 40 or so and a little foggy.
Splits: 8:53 - 8:21 - 8:10 - 7:47

Noon 

7.38 miles easy on the trails in 1:02:56 (8:32/mile)

Lots of things hurting today. Knees, quads, sciatica, groin. Also, I'm pretty sure my Garmin is not very accurate when I'm running in the woods on a cloudy day. I'm pretty sure my pace was close to 8, and pretty steady throughout the run, but the splits are not in agreement.

Splits:  8:56 - 8:40 - 8:40 - 8:28 - 8:13 - 8:02 - 8:41

5.05 miles in 40:07 (7:57/mile)

We were on vacation so I did not run much. Plus, my legs need a break for they do break.

Yesterday we drove from Vancouver, WA down to a town just south of Fresno, CA - about 14 hours of driving. We stayed with my cousins the Wilgenburgs on their farm, so I did my run next morning by running laps around their small 70 acre farm. Each lap a varied something so it was entertaining, and I got in 5 miles pretty easily. The workers were out in the field but I stayed out of their way for the most part.

Splits: 8:16 - 7:56 - 7:58 - 7:46 - 7:48

7.36 miles in Anaheim, CA in 54:53 (7:28/mile)

After 3 days at Disneyland we decided to sleep in, get some workouts in and go into the park later. So, I took the opportunity to explore a paved bike path along the Santa Ana River that I've never been able to use. Our usualy hotel is more than 3 miles from the entrance to the trail so not worth using. This time, however, it was only about 2 miles to the trailhead. It's a nice trail. Very flat, runs along the river, which is really a man-made canal I'm pretty sure. Bikers, runners, walkers. One homeless guy who was sleeping under one of the overpasses. I didn't notice him until on the way back, around 9:30 or so. I wanted to say, "maybe you're homeless because you sleep in until 9:30 on a workday!", but I didn't.

My legs were definitely stiff and heavy at first, and never really loosened up much, but I still managed to get in a decent pace.

Splits: 7:09 - 7:48 - 7:36 - 7:32 - 7:33 - 7:16 - 7:15

9 miles on Santa Ana river in 1:07:21 (7:29/mile)

Another beautiful sunny day in Anaheim! Actually, it rained a couple days while we were here, including yesterday. But supposed to mid low 70's today. Already felt warm on the run.

The homeless guy was back, but not under the overpass. He was across the path from where I saw him last time. That must be his spot. Still snoozing at 9:45 in the morning. He must have to work late.

On the last lap I decided to give it a good effort and see what I could come up with.

Splits: 7:40 - 7:28 - 7:38 - 7:38 - 7:38 - 7:35 - 7:32 - 7:34 - 6:39.5

2.38 mile warmup in 18:29 (7:45/mile)

Nothing like coming back from vacation and plunging right into a track workout. I kept it pretty light-moderate with paces at 10k for only 1200m.

3x1200m on the track @ 10k pace with 400m recovery jogs.
4:40.7
4:39.7
4:39.0

2x800m@5k with 400m recoveries
2:56.7
3:01.6

1x400m in 86.0

2.39 mile cool down in 20:54 (8:45/mile)

See now, this is the problem. I do a simple, moderate workout, and then I'm in so much pain at the end I can barely crawl through the cool down. Grrrrr.

Due to being too tired to run on Tuesday and too many meetings on Wednesday I didn't get to run until today. Still not feeling great. Every in my quads hurts.

Splits: 8:26 - 8:15 - 8:06 - 7:55 - 8;03 - 7:58 - 8:26

Easy 2.4 mile warmup in 19:39

2x500m @ 1/2 marathon pace with 300m recoveries
2:01.2, 2:03.2

Feeling pretty good today, so going to do a short and moderate speed workout.

Speed workout of straights and curves for 1 mile with a little extra jog at the end.

Splits: 21.7, 21.8, 22.0, 21.2, 21.1, 20.9, 20.4, 22.1 (10m long)

This workout went well. I ran a little slower than usual for this kind of workout and also stopped after only 1 mile, 1/2mile of speed. Finished feeling good and the cool down wasn't torture.

2.4 mile cooldown in 19:42

21.25 miles in 2:47:22 (7:53/mile)

Not feeling too bad today. The first 14 miles were good. My quads tightened up and were aching during the 15-16 miles, last two of the Vickory part of the run and I thought about cutting the run off at that point. But, I stopped to stretch for a minute and that helped, so I decided to tack on the other 5. I definitely experienced a drop in bloog-sugar levels around mile 16 or 17. the last few miles felt like they were the same effort as the previous miles, but the pace slowed up about 20-30 seconds/mile.

Splits: 8:08 - 7:47 - 7:45 - 7:41 - 7:38 - 7:46 - 7:39 - 7:51 - 7:43 - 8:19 - 7:55 - 7:51 - 7:46 - 7:47 - 7:52 - 7:43 - 7:58 - 8:05 - 8:19 - 8:09 - 7:50

Easy 3.1 mles in 27:06 (8:44/mile)

I set out to run about 7 miles today, but decided after a mile and a half that I should just finish up and go in. The legs were still pretty tired and sore from Sunday's long run. Tomorrow I should be able to handle a workout.

3.43 mile warmup on the trails in 28:18 (8:15/mile)

I decided to do my interval workout on the trails today. That should slow me down a bit and also soften impact so that I won't be in so much pain afterwards. I did 4x 1mile with increasing speed. I started with about marathon pace or slightly faster and took 10 seconds off each one, or so was the plan. So, I wanted to do 6:40, 6:30, 6:20, 6:10. What I did was:

6:46, .25 mile recovery
6:30, .3 mile recovery
6:17, .35 mile recovery
6:11, .40 mile recovery

Only the last one was really hard, as expected. I tried to do a couple 1/2 mile intervals at under 6/mile pace, but couldn't make it on the first one so I called it quits.
3:11.4

11:50 recovery of 1.25 miles (9:28/mile). I was crawling again over the cooldown. My legs were aching pretty painfully for the next couple hours and then eased up. In the evening I didn't feel too badly.